0:00:02 > 0:00:05Laurence, Angela likes Demis Roussos, Tony likes Demis Roussos,
0:00:05 > 0:00:09I like Demis Roussos and Sue would like to hear Demis Roussos.
0:00:09 > 0:00:12So, please, do you think we could have Demis Roussos on?
0:00:14 > 0:00:16# Ever and ever
0:00:16 > 0:00:17# For ever and ever... #
0:00:17 > 0:00:20We British have a love-hate relationship with foreign pop,
0:00:20 > 0:00:23but some of these songs have sold in their millions
0:00:23 > 0:00:26and gone into our hearts.
0:00:26 > 0:00:28The way he puts it over. The way he sings.
0:00:28 > 0:00:32It's that little tone in his voice that no other singer's got.
0:00:32 > 0:00:36Catchy tunes - once heard, never forgotten.
0:00:36 > 0:00:39Instant memories of a holiday abroad.
0:00:39 > 0:00:41# This year I'm off to sunny Spain... #
0:00:41 > 0:00:43It's sort of a pop equivalent
0:00:43 > 0:00:45of coming back with a sombrero
0:00:45 > 0:00:49or a straw donkey or some duty free retsina.
0:00:51 > 0:00:54This is a different history of pop since the war.
0:00:54 > 0:00:56Never mind guitar, bass and drums,
0:00:56 > 0:01:00think balalaikas, zithers and panpipes.
0:01:00 > 0:01:02I think every now and again,
0:01:02 > 0:01:06a funny instrument breaks into the mainstream!
0:01:08 > 0:01:11It's a story that starts with Hawaiian bands...
0:01:12 > 0:01:14..and leads to Shakira.
0:01:14 > 0:01:18# Le-lo, lo-le, lo-le Le-lo, lo-le, lo-le
0:01:18 > 0:01:23# Can't you see? I'm at your feet... #
0:01:23 > 0:01:25And now that music's gone global,
0:01:25 > 0:01:29has the appeal of the foreign pop song gone for ever?
0:01:29 > 0:01:31Is there still anyone for Demis?
0:01:33 > 0:01:34Ange...
0:01:35 > 0:01:38..imagine making love to this, do you know what I mean?
0:01:46 > 0:01:50We start our story in the 1940s
0:01:50 > 0:01:52and the aftermath of the Second World War.
0:01:52 > 0:01:56Life for most British people was far from exotic,
0:01:56 > 0:01:58but in dance halls and on the radio,
0:01:58 > 0:02:01music played a huge role in cheering up the nation.
0:02:02 > 0:02:06The popular music was big bands, Glenn Miller and Vera Lynn...
0:02:08 > 0:02:10..but there were other sounds, as well.
0:02:10 > 0:02:12Influenced by Hollywood films,
0:02:12 > 0:02:16music from around the world was reaching these shores.
0:02:16 > 0:02:20Hawaiian music had swept through the US in the 1930s.
0:02:20 > 0:02:23During the war, it came to Britain.
0:02:23 > 0:02:27Introducing Felix Mendelssohn And His Hawaiian Serenaders,
0:02:27 > 0:02:29in Sophisticated Hula.
0:02:29 > 0:02:31# Hands on your hips
0:02:31 > 0:02:33# Do your hula dips
0:02:33 > 0:02:37# Sophisticated hula is the talk of the town... #
0:02:37 > 0:02:41Felix Mendelssohn, a distant descendant of the famous composer,
0:02:41 > 0:02:43was a London-born band leader
0:02:43 > 0:02:46who latched on to the fad for Hawaiian music.
0:02:46 > 0:02:48His star guitarist was Harry Brooker,
0:02:48 > 0:02:51whose son Gary later found fame himself,
0:02:51 > 0:02:53with the group Procol Harum.
0:02:54 > 0:02:57Felix Mendelssohn And His Hawaiian Serenaders -
0:02:57 > 0:02:59they were huge.
0:02:59 > 0:03:03They were one of the biggest live entertainment things on the circuit.
0:03:03 > 0:03:04A lot of my father's friends,
0:03:04 > 0:03:08who were obviously his colleagues and Felix Mendelssohn's,
0:03:08 > 0:03:10were from the South Seas
0:03:10 > 0:03:14and certainly were exotic. The women were absolutely wonderful.
0:03:14 > 0:03:16I can remember nestling on,
0:03:16 > 0:03:21I think it was Luisa Mao's lap whilst she wasn't dancing
0:03:21 > 0:03:24and it was very comfortable in there!
0:03:32 > 0:03:35My name is Doreena Tahni Sugondo...
0:03:36 > 0:03:41..and I danced for Felix Mendelssohn's Hawaiian Serenaders.
0:03:41 > 0:03:43I was one of his hula lovelies.
0:03:43 > 0:03:46I sang with a local dance band, Hawaiian, of course,
0:03:46 > 0:03:52and they took me to Sheffield to see Felix Mendelssohn's show...
0:03:53 > 0:03:56..and I was absolutely fascinated.
0:03:56 > 0:03:58Mesmerised, if you like.
0:03:59 > 0:04:03I sat there and it transported me from Sheffield in Yorkshire
0:04:03 > 0:04:06into Hawaii, and I really loved it.
0:04:08 > 0:04:12I told my mum, "I'm going to go in showbusiness",
0:04:12 > 0:04:14and I packed my suitcase and went to Hull,
0:04:14 > 0:04:18to the Tivoli Theatre where Felix was appearing...
0:04:19 > 0:04:22..and I asked him, "Can I join your band, please?"
0:04:22 > 0:04:24And he said yes.
0:04:24 > 0:04:26This is my grass skirt...
0:04:27 > 0:04:32..and I made it in 1947.
0:04:32 > 0:04:36We had a head girl - she would go out and buy materials.
0:04:36 > 0:04:38We all had to make our own costumes, then.
0:04:40 > 0:04:45If I had been in the audience and I was watching that show,
0:04:45 > 0:04:49I would have been transported out of an ordinary, humdrum life
0:04:49 > 0:04:51into paradise because that's what it was like.
0:04:58 > 0:05:01Exotic performers like Felix Mendelssohn
0:05:01 > 0:05:04were popular speciality acts in film,
0:05:04 > 0:05:06on the radio and also on television.
0:05:08 > 0:05:13The BBC television service had gone off air during the war,
0:05:13 > 0:05:15but when it returned in 1946,
0:05:15 > 0:05:19so did a roll call of international entertainers.
0:05:21 > 0:05:23It seemed to me that the war
0:05:23 > 0:05:27gave people an interest in continental artists,
0:05:27 > 0:05:29particularly the French.
0:05:32 > 0:05:34The producer I worked for -
0:05:34 > 0:05:39he managed to persuade the gentleman who owned the Lido cabaret in Paris,
0:05:39 > 0:05:42which was very famous and still is there today,
0:05:42 > 0:05:46to close it for a night so that we could fly over the whole company
0:05:46 > 0:05:50to Alexandra Palace to do a show.
0:05:50 > 0:05:53And they came, all of them -
0:05:53 > 0:05:56the acts and the Bluebell Girls
0:05:56 > 0:05:58who, of course, were part of it.
0:05:58 > 0:06:01And the mannequins - we had special costumes made for them
0:06:01 > 0:06:04because we couldn't have any bare breasts, of course.
0:06:11 > 0:06:12There was no template
0:06:12 > 0:06:14for what television programmes were going to be
0:06:14 > 0:06:17and so, you did variety programmes.
0:06:17 > 0:06:23Variety but with a little bit more, not just music hall artists,
0:06:23 > 0:06:27but artists who could blend in a bit of ballet, a bit of opera,
0:06:27 > 0:06:29and so forth, so...
0:06:29 > 0:06:31And a lot of the artists were continental.
0:06:34 > 0:06:36But television only had a tiny audience.
0:06:36 > 0:06:39The cinema was still king.
0:06:40 > 0:06:43Played by Anton Karas on a hitherto unknown instrument
0:06:43 > 0:06:44called the zither,
0:06:44 > 0:06:47the most popular continental tune of the day
0:06:47 > 0:06:50was the Harry Lime theme from the film The Third Man.
0:06:52 > 0:06:55It sold half a million copies in its first month
0:06:55 > 0:06:57and zither sales rocketed.
0:07:04 > 0:07:08Although people in the services had travelled abroad during the war,
0:07:08 > 0:07:11for most Britons, the idea of venturing outside the UK
0:07:11 > 0:07:13was still a dream.
0:07:15 > 0:07:18You might not even leave your home town or your home city
0:07:18 > 0:07:20virtually at all in your life.
0:07:23 > 0:07:27For a lot of people, music from Spain or from France or Italy,
0:07:27 > 0:07:29I mean, this is a world they could never imagine
0:07:29 > 0:07:34and it gives them a sort of, a taste of the almost unfathomably exotic.
0:07:34 > 0:07:36It really is the ultimate escapism.
0:07:41 > 0:07:43Britain's taste for exotic music
0:07:43 > 0:07:44could be seen on television
0:07:44 > 0:07:50and in the newly-invented pop charts which first started in 1952.
0:07:50 > 0:07:52The top sellers of those days were a bizarre combination
0:07:52 > 0:07:57of novelty records, comedy songs and foreign-themed instrumentals.
0:07:57 > 0:08:02The pre-Beatle era in Britain, in British pop, is fascinating
0:08:02 > 0:08:06because it is this unformed mish-mash.
0:08:06 > 0:08:10Simply another facet of what you might call entertainment or variety.
0:08:10 > 0:08:14So, music is part of the same culture that brings you
0:08:14 > 0:08:17ventriloquism and end-of-the-pier comics
0:08:17 > 0:08:21and, erm, you know, orchestral pop and things like that.
0:08:21 > 0:08:23So, it isn't the preserve of kids
0:08:23 > 0:08:27and it isn't speaking about their culture, it's simply...
0:08:27 > 0:08:29It's just silliness, if you like.
0:08:29 > 0:08:31# Life will be sweeter
0:08:31 > 0:08:33# With senoritas
0:08:33 > 0:08:38# Who can besame as mucho as they please... #
0:08:39 > 0:08:42It's like the Good Old Days or something like that.
0:08:42 > 0:08:46Here's a ventriloquist, here's a comic, here's an impressionist
0:08:46 > 0:08:48and here's some music
0:08:48 > 0:08:50but it's essentially trivial.
0:09:29 > 0:09:31Two-Way Family Favourites on a Sunday afternoon -
0:09:31 > 0:09:34the radio programme that we'd always associate
0:09:34 > 0:09:36with the smell of boiling cabbage, you know,
0:09:36 > 0:09:39is full of those kind of tunes -
0:09:39 > 0:09:42Walk In The Black Forest and Happy Wanderer.
0:09:42 > 0:09:47# Mein Vater war ein Wandersmann... #
0:09:47 > 0:09:50The Happy Wanderer by the Obernkirchen Children's Choir
0:09:50 > 0:09:55is one of the most indestructible of these international pop melodies.
0:09:55 > 0:09:58The choir was set up to help children of the German town
0:09:58 > 0:10:01orphaned by wartime bombing.
0:10:01 > 0:10:02They became a propaganda tool
0:10:02 > 0:10:07when the choir was sent on a goodwill tour to Britain in 1953.
0:10:09 > 0:10:12And it was at a music festival in North Wales
0:10:12 > 0:10:16that the choir revealed their secret weapon -
0:10:16 > 0:10:19a new song called the Happy Wanderer.
0:11:01 > 0:11:04Recorded by the BBC and rapidly released on record,
0:11:04 > 0:11:07the Happy Wanderer was an instant hit.
0:11:07 > 0:11:11It stayed in the British top ten for an astonishing 26 weeks.
0:11:33 > 0:11:40The Obernkirchen Children's Choir is still going and still singing the Happy Wanderer.
0:11:43 > 0:11:48However, in the 1950s, the world was changing fast,
0:11:48 > 0:11:50not least in Britain's fading empire.
0:11:55 > 0:11:58Music from the Commonwealth had rarely been heard in the UK,
0:11:58 > 0:12:04but one style of Caribbean music made a big impact that lasted well into the 1960s.
0:12:05 > 0:12:10That's perhaps the only living folk music in English in the Commonwealth.
0:12:10 > 0:12:13A pungent thing, usually, rich in innuendo.
0:12:13 > 0:12:17A vehicle for topical lampoon and political satire,
0:12:17 > 0:12:21for the hard luck story and the veiled sexual allusion.
0:12:25 > 0:12:30The kind of calypso which became very popular internationally
0:12:30 > 0:12:33was specifically a calypso from Trinidad,
0:12:33 > 0:12:40from Port of Spain, where there was group of extremely talented
0:12:40 > 0:12:44songwriters and singers, who had a talent for a thing called extemporisation
0:12:44 > 0:12:47which was basically singing the news.
0:12:47 > 0:12:49# ..Because we want peace in the world
0:12:49 > 0:12:51# What we need Peace in the world
0:12:51 > 0:12:55# No more greed
0:12:55 > 0:12:58# To unite universally Because we want peace... #
0:12:58 > 0:13:02Calypso initially made an impression on British musical tastes
0:13:02 > 0:13:09with the arrival of the first immigrants from the Caribbean on the Empire Windrush in 1948.
0:13:09 > 0:13:11NEWSREEL: Arrivals at Tilbury.
0:13:11 > 0:13:16The Empire Windrush brings to Britain 500 Jamaicans. Many are ex-servicemen who know England.
0:13:16 > 0:13:20They served this country well. In Jamaica, they couldn't find work.
0:13:20 > 0:13:23Discouraged, but full of hope, they sailed for Britain.
0:13:23 > 0:13:26One of the very first 400, 500 people,
0:13:26 > 0:13:31who arrived on the Empire Windrush in Tilbury in 1948
0:13:31 > 0:13:35was a guy called Lord Kitchener - his nom de plume, obviously -
0:13:35 > 0:13:39who was a singer and who entertained people on the boat, apparently,
0:13:39 > 0:13:43and his early records, which are wonderful records like London Is The Place for Me,
0:13:43 > 0:13:45is a fantastic tune.
0:13:45 > 0:13:48I am told you really are the king of calypso singers.
0:13:48 > 0:13:50- Is that right?- That is true. - Can you sing for us?
0:13:50 > 0:13:51- Right now?- Yes.
0:13:51 > 0:13:54# London is the place for me...
0:13:56 > 0:14:00# London, this lovely city
0:14:00 > 0:14:04# You can go to France or America India, Asia or Australia
0:14:04 > 0:14:09# But you must come back to London city. #
0:14:09 > 0:14:12The fondness here in Britain for calypso at that time
0:14:12 > 0:14:15was picked up by the British media
0:14:15 > 0:14:19and if they didn't use the authentic Trinidadian calypsonians themselves,
0:14:19 > 0:14:25then other people appeared on popular television and radio programmes at the time,
0:14:25 > 0:14:27doing a very similar thing.
0:14:27 > 0:14:31So you would get people like Lance Percival...
0:14:31 > 0:14:33At this stage, sometimes,
0:14:33 > 0:14:35I even make up calypsos about things in the show. Madam!
0:14:35 > 0:14:38WOMAN SPEAKS
0:14:38 > 0:14:41David Frost's curl on the front of his hair?
0:14:41 > 0:14:42Ah.
0:14:42 > 0:14:45# Here we have a young lady who's not completely lost
0:14:45 > 0:14:48# She's worried about the curl on the front of her hair
0:14:48 > 0:14:50# Or the hair of David Frost
0:14:50 > 0:14:52# But I must admit, sir
0:14:52 > 0:14:54# It is plain to see
0:14:54 > 0:14:56# As I'm the older of the two
0:14:56 > 0:14:58# He got the idea from me. #
0:14:59 > 0:15:04There's a chap called Cy Grant, who did them, too, and hugely popular.
0:15:04 > 0:15:09Always a topical and up to date, Cy Grant has written a calypso especially for this occasion.
0:15:09 > 0:15:11We hope it won't prove too technical for you.
0:15:12 > 0:15:15# In this age of miracles, it is plain to see
0:15:15 > 0:15:17# Colour television is a reality
0:15:17 > 0:15:19# In this age of miracles, it is plain to see
0:15:19 > 0:15:23# Colour television is a reality Yes... #
0:15:23 > 0:15:26My grandfather always used to play Harry Belafonte.
0:15:26 > 0:15:30I knew from his voice this was a different sort of singer,
0:15:30 > 0:15:33but I didn't know where he was from or the music was that he made.
0:15:33 > 0:15:36# Down the way where the nights are gay
0:15:36 > 0:15:41# And the sun shines daily on the mountain top
0:15:41 > 0:15:44# I took a trip on a sailing ship
0:15:44 > 0:15:49# And when I reached Jamaica I made a stop... #
0:15:49 > 0:15:53I always find it interesting that calypso had such a potent effect
0:15:53 > 0:15:56on the mainstream in the 1950s.
0:15:56 > 0:16:01I think that does play a part in breaking down those prejudices
0:16:01 > 0:16:06and making the society accept people from different cultures.
0:16:06 > 0:16:13# What's the matter with me donkey? Man, I don't know... #
0:16:13 > 0:16:15But by the end of the 1950s,
0:16:15 > 0:16:20calypso was becoming a pale imitation of its satirical Trinidadian roots.
0:16:20 > 0:16:24Nothing could be much paler than Nina & Frederik,
0:16:24 > 0:16:30Danish aristocrats who forged an unlikely career as cosmopolitan folk singers on the BBC.
0:16:30 > 0:16:33THEY SING A CALYPSO SONG
0:16:37 > 0:16:40- # Does me donkey want money? - No, no, no
0:16:40 > 0:16:42- # Maybe he wants honey - No
0:16:42 > 0:16:44- # But me donkey won't eat. - No, no, no
0:16:44 > 0:16:46- # And me donkey won't sleep - No, no, no... #
0:16:46 > 0:16:50Their show was a parade of international stereotypes,
0:16:50 > 0:16:55cod foreign accents and all. But the British public lapped it up.
0:16:55 > 0:16:56Well!
0:16:56 > 0:17:00The next tune is a Spanish-Cuban number
0:17:00 > 0:17:05and it's about what a man it sees when he rides through the countryside on horseback.
0:17:08 > 0:17:11They also had a taste for exotic pop music.
0:17:11 > 0:17:15But, I think our relationship with it has been problematic, as British,
0:17:15 > 0:17:19because we've quite often seen it as vaguely inferior.
0:17:19 > 0:17:21THEY SING IN SPANISH
0:17:27 > 0:17:33Which sometimes, I think, reflects a slightly paternalistic attitude towards the cultures.
0:17:33 > 0:17:37We're listening to people singing quite childlike songs about nature
0:17:37 > 0:17:40and about happiness and about the simple life.
0:17:44 > 0:17:47These catchy songs from around the world were just as popular
0:17:47 > 0:17:50as the rock 'n' roll hits we now associate with the '50s.
0:17:55 > 0:17:58# The day that the rains came down... #
0:17:58 > 0:18:00For many in the record industry,
0:18:00 > 0:18:02rock 'n' roll was just another exotic fad
0:18:02 > 0:18:06that would fade away just as Hawaiian music had a decade earlier.
0:18:06 > 0:18:12It's a myth that in the '50s and '60s the only record-buyers were young people.
0:18:12 > 0:18:14There were lots of older listeners, as well.
0:18:14 > 0:18:19They don't want to listen to long-haired scruffy kids strumming guitars.
0:18:19 > 0:18:24They want to listen to a singing nun or a children's choir or whatever it might be.
0:18:24 > 0:18:28Because they're looking for something maybe a bit more conservative, a bit more reassuring.
0:18:28 > 0:18:32An escapism that appeals to somebody in their 40s rather than in their teens.
0:18:32 > 0:18:36# When I feel that something... #
0:18:36 > 0:18:40In 1963, the teenagers seemed to have finally taken over with the arrival
0:18:40 > 0:18:42of four young musicians from Liverpool.
0:18:44 > 0:18:47But not quite.
0:18:47 > 0:18:50Just as The Beatles became global superstars,
0:18:50 > 0:18:55they were challenged in the charts by a song sung in French by a nun.
0:18:55 > 0:18:57MUSIC: "Dominique" by The Singing Nun
0:19:00 > 0:19:06Sister Luc Gabriel was a young nun from a convent in Waterloo, Belgium,
0:19:06 > 0:19:08a stone's throw from the famous battlefield.
0:19:08 > 0:19:13She composed her own songs, including one called Dominique.
0:19:13 > 0:19:14SHE SINGS DOMINIQUE
0:19:18 > 0:19:21This catchy ditty was taped and sent to Phillips,
0:19:21 > 0:19:23who released it as a single.
0:19:23 > 0:19:26It went on to outsell Elvis.
0:19:26 > 0:19:31Very quickly, millions of the record were sold all over the world,
0:19:31 > 0:19:37from Japan to the United States and in '63,
0:19:37 > 0:19:41the hit was even number one on the Billboard Hot 100 in the United States.
0:19:41 > 0:19:46She left even The Beatles behind. For the press, it was sensational news.
0:19:46 > 0:19:47A singing nun.
0:19:47 > 0:19:51And, for the church, she was an interesting instrument
0:19:51 > 0:19:58in their promotion campaign to attract Catholic youngsters.
0:19:58 > 0:20:02The Singing Nun's success came just after the Kennedy assassination,
0:20:02 > 0:20:06when her song's simple charm was much in demand.
0:20:06 > 0:20:09But the Singing Nun's story had its own dark conclusion.
0:20:09 > 0:20:13Leaving the convent and coming out as a lesbian,
0:20:13 > 0:20:17she was ostracised by record company and church alike.
0:20:17 > 0:20:22She obviously pulled away from the church and released an anthem to the birth control pill,
0:20:22 > 0:20:27which is probably the last thing you would think of a nun or a former nun doing.
0:20:27 > 0:20:30Slightly against the grain.
0:20:30 > 0:20:34The press, they love to write about her, because it's a juicy story,
0:20:34 > 0:20:40articles with titles like Lesbian Ex-Nun, that sells,
0:20:40 > 0:20:46and for the church she has become a threat.
0:20:46 > 0:20:51In the 1980s, this former singing nun was hounded by the Belgian tax authorities
0:20:51 > 0:20:54for royalties on the hit single.
0:20:54 > 0:20:58Ironically, she'd never received any money, which all went to the church.
0:20:58 > 0:21:00But the battle drove her to despair.
0:21:03 > 0:21:07Her and her partner both killed themselves in a suicide pact,
0:21:07 > 0:21:11which is not the thing you think would happen when you hear
0:21:11 > 0:21:15this really beautiful, gentle, very religious record, really,
0:21:15 > 0:21:20so almost listening to that with the story in mind makes it even more affecting.
0:21:29 > 0:21:34By the early 1960s, the British public was hearing a lot more foreign pop.
0:21:34 > 0:21:39The Eurovision Song Contest had been launched in 1956,
0:21:39 > 0:21:41and the UK first took part a year later.
0:21:41 > 0:21:46Then, as now, it was a key date in the viewing calendar.
0:21:46 > 0:21:49Eurovision, to lots of people, was the one night
0:21:49 > 0:21:53where the whole family would be committed to the TV for possibly four hours,
0:21:53 > 0:21:56maybe even longer, depending if Katie Boyle was on it or not.
0:21:56 > 0:22:01Come in, Paris. Hello. Hello, France. Come in, Paris.
0:22:01 > 0:22:03Hello, Paris, May I have your votes, please?
0:22:03 > 0:22:06My mother used to like it. and Miss World as well,
0:22:06 > 0:22:09another similar programme of sort of exotic things going on.
0:22:09 > 0:22:13Here now is Eric Robinson and the orchestra to sound the fanfare
0:22:13 > 0:22:17which opens the Eurovision Song Contest of 1960.
0:22:19 > 0:22:22EUROVISION THEME
0:22:22 > 0:22:27It was the only time you could sit and listen to European music of the moment,
0:22:27 > 0:22:33sort of, and most of the time it was absolutely diabolical.
0:22:35 > 0:22:37SHE SINGS IN DANISH
0:22:41 > 0:22:46I think that Eurovision made people much more aware, suddenly,
0:22:46 > 0:22:52of this wealth of music talent that there was around Europe.
0:23:03 > 0:23:09I remember in the one I did in '63, the Danes eventually won,
0:23:09 > 0:23:15because the Norwegians bundled the voting a bit. There is always somebody who gets the voting wrong,
0:23:15 > 0:23:20which was a bit confusing for poor Katie Boyle.
0:23:20 > 0:23:21PHONE RINGS
0:23:21 > 0:23:26They are on the line, I can hear them on the line.
0:23:26 > 0:23:29There's the telephone again. Hello?
0:23:29 > 0:23:31So that is the final result?
0:23:32 > 0:23:35Singing was Francoise Hardy, who sang for
0:23:35 > 0:23:43Monaco, I think, and Nana Mouskouri who was singing for Luxembourg.
0:23:45 > 0:23:51# A force de prier... #
0:23:57 > 0:24:01I was in France singing and all of a sudden they spoke to me
0:24:01 > 0:24:03about the Eurovision...
0:24:03 > 0:24:07There was no television in those days in Greece,
0:24:07 > 0:24:13so they used me for Luxembourg
0:24:13 > 0:24:20and I came for the first time, just to sing this, the Eurovision.
0:24:20 > 0:24:22Nana Mouskouri didn't win Eurovision that year,
0:24:22 > 0:24:26but her appearance was a hit with UK audiences.
0:24:26 > 0:24:32In a bold move, the BBC gave this young Greek singer her own television series.
0:24:32 > 0:24:35It ran until the early 1980s.
0:24:35 > 0:24:39This is the way it started, and singing also a few Greek songs
0:24:39 > 0:24:44but translate a little bit what the song was about
0:24:44 > 0:24:46and we never thought,
0:24:46 > 0:24:50I mean I never thought that it would be interesting,
0:24:50 > 0:24:56then we have been for many, many years.
0:24:56 > 0:25:02The series, it was opening a very beautiful area from Greece,
0:25:02 > 0:25:05or the monument or treasures that we have,
0:25:05 > 0:25:07so people wanted to learn about the music
0:25:07 > 0:25:13and the music also make them know about your country.
0:25:13 > 0:25:18When it started in 1968, Nana Mouskouri's series was a big draw
0:25:18 > 0:25:21on the new highbrow channel, BBC Two.
0:25:29 > 0:25:34It was a pioneering world music show, with European folk, pop, even jazz.
0:25:34 > 0:25:37LAID-BACK JAZZ
0:25:38 > 0:25:39Nice.
0:25:49 > 0:25:52Millions of people were watching the television
0:25:52 > 0:25:55and there were only three channels - it was hugely powerful
0:25:55 > 0:25:58so if you got on one of the music-based shows,
0:25:58 > 0:26:00people would buy your records.
0:26:00 > 0:26:06I think the success of someone like Nana Mouskouri was possibly her televisual presence.
0:26:06 > 0:26:09Obviously she is beautiful in that kind of harmless,
0:26:09 > 0:26:11you wouldn't be offended if your wife liked her
0:26:11 > 0:26:14your wife wouldn't be offended if her husband liked her,
0:26:14 > 0:26:18she's not this sort of, you know, sexual dynamo,
0:26:18 > 0:26:21or doesn't look like one, anyway.
0:26:30 > 0:26:34I think you must have had this whole generation who must have looked at pop
0:26:34 > 0:26:36and thought, "My God it is awful - look at his haircut!
0:26:36 > 0:26:40"He's wearing a dirty jacket!" then all of a sudden you get Nana Mouskouri
0:26:40 > 0:26:46in her lovely little dress, with her combed hair and her clean glasses and her lovely way,
0:26:46 > 0:26:50singing a very sweet song, so it is, it's an escape, isn't it?
0:26:50 > 0:26:53It's a slightly Blackpool Pleasure Beach, Walt Disney version
0:26:53 > 0:26:56of the cultures of the world reduced to a series of national dresses
0:26:56 > 0:26:59and funny instruments.
0:27:03 > 0:27:05But in some ways it's quite liberating.
0:27:05 > 0:27:10The first time I heard international pop was sitting with my nan on a Saturday watching Nana Mouskouri.
0:27:11 > 0:27:17Another international act that made a big impact on UK audiences was the Red Army Choir.
0:27:17 > 0:27:22It might have been the height of the Cold War, but they wowed the crowds
0:27:22 > 0:27:27with their combination of physical and musical gymnastics.
0:27:27 > 0:27:28THEY SING KALINKA
0:27:37 > 0:27:40Now, you see I could sing that for you now...
0:27:42 > 0:27:44I'm not singing Kalinka for you
0:27:44 > 0:27:48although I think anyone of my age, it's in there and it ain't going to come out.
0:27:52 > 0:27:55It's the Red Army Choir. We're in the Cold War.
0:27:55 > 0:27:58Why on earth are people listening to this music, the enemy's music?
0:28:05 > 0:28:07TEMPO INCREASES
0:28:17 > 0:28:21But of course one of the key things about the Cold War is that most people actually
0:28:21 > 0:28:24weren't very interested in it at all, because it was only a cold war.
0:28:24 > 0:28:27When they came over, a lot of people would still
0:28:27 > 0:28:29associate the Red Army with the victory over fascism
0:28:29 > 0:28:32and with Stalingrad and with beating Hitler
0:28:32 > 0:28:36and I think that is what explains a lot of their appeal in the '60s.
0:28:36 > 0:28:41And welcome to the Royal Albert Hall, to witness what has been called
0:28:41 > 0:28:44the bloodless victory of the Red Army over the British public.
0:28:57 > 0:29:03By the mid-1960s, the British public was buying foreign music LPs in their millions
0:29:03 > 0:29:08and with stereograms and hi-fi systems becoming a fixture in many homes,
0:29:08 > 0:29:12people could travel the world through their record collections.
0:29:12 > 0:29:15I was just wondering why you'd buy these exotic records.
0:29:15 > 0:29:21buy another couple the next week and build a little collection
0:29:21 > 0:29:25to fill under the little stereo thing that had the little gap underneath
0:29:25 > 0:29:28to put the records in, and fill it up with easy listening.
0:29:28 > 0:29:32Maybe there is some escapism in a sound, "Oh, tonight we can listen to Greece,
0:29:32 > 0:29:35"tonight we can go to the South Seas."
0:29:35 > 0:29:41But there was one nation whose music we always had a love-hate relationship with - the French.
0:29:41 > 0:29:45Let's take a swing at our mates across the channel,
0:29:45 > 0:29:47where even the kids talk funny.
0:29:47 > 0:29:48Oh, yeah!
0:29:49 > 0:29:54SINGS IN FRENCH
0:30:01 > 0:30:05People like to believe that French music was terrible
0:30:05 > 0:30:08and they were delighted when The Beatles came along
0:30:08 > 0:30:11and conquered the world because it allowed them to say...
0:30:11 > 0:30:15"Well, yeah OK, we don't have the biggest army and the biggest empire or whatever
0:30:15 > 0:30:18"but culturally, we are still the absolute cutting edge."
0:30:23 > 0:30:26SINGS IN FRENCH
0:30:31 > 0:30:34Johnny Hallyday has always suffered because we thought
0:30:34 > 0:30:37it was a ludicrous... he suffers from what we think of
0:30:37 > 0:30:40as slightly stupid, not getting it quite right version
0:30:40 > 0:30:45of an indigenous British or American rock 'n' roll, so you get Elvis,
0:30:45 > 0:30:48and get our Elvis, who's Cliff Richard
0:30:48 > 0:30:53who's kind of not quite right but clings with his fingernails to the precipice of cool,
0:30:53 > 0:30:56and then Johnny is kind of like the French Cliff Richard.
0:30:56 > 0:30:59Everything about it looks wrong to us.
0:30:59 > 0:31:02Some of his records are actually quite good. A bit like franglais.
0:31:02 > 0:31:07Instead of making their own stuff and celebrating their own culture,
0:31:07 > 0:31:12be it sexiness or the impressionistic cool of Debussy or Ravel, it is simply aping ours.
0:31:13 > 0:31:15But some French music WAS cool.
0:31:15 > 0:31:18Francoise Hardy never had a big hit in the UK,
0:31:18 > 0:31:22but as a French icon, she was up there with Brigitte Bardot
0:31:22 > 0:31:26and attracted admirers like Mick Jagger and David Bowie.
0:31:26 > 0:31:29# Oui mais moi je vais seule
0:31:29 > 0:31:32# Par les rues, l'ame en peine
0:31:32 > 0:31:35# Oui mais moi je vais seule
0:31:35 > 0:31:38# Car personne ne m'aime. #
0:31:42 > 0:31:45Could you move that bass absorber...?
0:31:45 > 0:31:46Parisian vocal group
0:31:46 > 0:31:50the Swingle Singers were also considered chic and sophisticated.
0:31:50 > 0:31:53This mic on the right is a little bit low.
0:31:54 > 0:31:56Swingle Singers, Badinerie, take one.
0:31:56 > 0:32:01Rather cleverly, they didn't use any of those annoying French lyrics.
0:32:01 > 0:32:05MUSIC: "Badinerie" by The Swingle Singers
0:32:08 > 0:32:12I think something like the Swingle Singers is quite educated,
0:32:12 > 0:32:16quite unusual, but it's beautifully clever and beautifully smooth
0:32:16 > 0:32:19and beautifully easy and creates a lovely mood.
0:32:19 > 0:32:22It's just wonderful to listen too, so you don't have to be
0:32:22 > 0:32:25particularly clever to listen to it, I don't think,
0:32:25 > 0:32:29which would explain why it sold in bucket loads.
0:32:29 > 0:32:35But there was one French song that did cross the channel to top the British charts.
0:32:35 > 0:32:39Although it was sung in French, it didn't have many words,
0:32:39 > 0:32:41and everybody knew that they meant.
0:32:41 > 0:32:43MUSIC: Je T'aime...Moi Non Plus
0:33:03 > 0:33:06Serge Gainsbourg, he does have a hit here
0:33:06 > 0:33:11although with one of his maybe worst records, Je T'aime, which - I don't know if it is just by association,
0:33:11 > 0:33:14but now whenever you hear the tune,
0:33:14 > 0:33:20I don't think of kind of sophisticated French erotic pop, I think of Benny Hill.
0:33:20 > 0:33:22# Je vais et je viens
0:33:22 > 0:33:24# Entre tes reins... #
0:33:24 > 0:33:27A lot of that French music is quite erotically charged.
0:33:27 > 0:33:30It was a hit because it was a good record, it is
0:33:30 > 0:33:34just an English person and a French person singing about love
0:33:34 > 0:33:39but erotically, it's just a brilliant hook as well, it's just a very clever record.
0:33:39 > 0:33:44It seems that the French music only travels when it's about something slightly ruder.
0:33:48 > 0:33:52By 1969, when Je T'Aime was top of the charts,
0:33:52 > 0:33:57for many ordinary Britons, the fantasy of travelling abroad had become a reality.
0:34:00 > 0:34:06With higher wages in the UK, the creation of the Costa del Sol in Spain
0:34:06 > 0:34:09and the availability of cheap flights,
0:34:09 > 0:34:11the package holiday had arrived.
0:34:15 > 0:34:20I remember people coming back from the their very first Spanish holidays in the '70s
0:34:20 > 0:34:24with those bullfighting posters that had your name inserted that kids used to have on their walls.
0:34:24 > 0:34:29There is a certain element of that in the pop at the time, as exemplified by Y Viva Espana.
0:34:29 > 0:34:32# Oh, this year I'm off to sunny Spain
0:34:32 > 0:34:37# Y viva Espana
0:34:37 > 0:34:41# I'm taking the Costa Brava plane
0:34:41 > 0:34:43# Y viva Espana... #
0:34:43 > 0:34:48Sylvia Vrethammar was a successful Swedish jazz singer,
0:34:48 > 0:34:52who first had a hit with Y Viva Espana in her home country.
0:34:52 > 0:34:56But with the package holiday boom, the song had the potential to travel.
0:34:56 > 0:34:59# Espana por favor. #
0:35:01 > 0:35:05We decided after a while to record it in English,
0:35:05 > 0:35:08and the English lyrics are fantastic, they are really good,
0:35:08 > 0:35:13about Rudolph Valentino, about how the English girls,
0:35:13 > 0:35:17they come to Spain and at first they are very pale
0:35:17 > 0:35:20and then they get brown and everybody loves them.
0:35:20 > 0:35:24# When they first arrive the girls are pink and pasty
0:35:24 > 0:35:27# But oh so tasty as soon as they go brown
0:35:27 > 0:35:31# I guess they know every fellow will be queuing
0:35:31 > 0:35:35# To do the wooing his girlfriend won't allow... #
0:35:35 > 0:35:37I came with my hat and my Spanish act
0:35:37 > 0:35:43and it was mostly pop groups and then Sylvia from Sweden.
0:35:43 > 0:35:47It was very big. Everybody was impressed - Top Of The Pops, you know.
0:35:47 > 0:35:50# Espana por favor
0:35:50 > 0:35:53# La, la, la, la, la, la... #
0:35:58 > 0:36:03Y Viva Espana is a brilliantly crafted bit of pop for that market, the lyrics in particular.
0:36:03 > 0:36:07# There was one who whispered "Hasta la vista"
0:36:07 > 0:36:10# Each time I kissed him behind the castanet
0:36:10 > 0:36:14# He rattled his maracas close to me
0:36:14 > 0:36:18# In no time I was trembling at the knee
0:36:18 > 0:36:20# Oh, this year I'm off to sunny Spain... #
0:36:20 > 0:36:24Songs like Y Viva Espana are a chance to kind of recapture
0:36:24 > 0:36:25some of the spirit of that holiday
0:36:25 > 0:36:28so you don't have to wait 52 weeks before you can
0:36:28 > 0:36:34think about sun, sex, sand, sangria and serious sunburn.
0:36:34 > 0:36:39It's a sort of mythical Spain as seen by not just us, the English who are buying it,
0:36:39 > 0:36:41but by the Swedes and the Germans who are making it.
0:36:41 > 0:36:48A Spain of senoritas and... this is a time when red wine was an exotic drink.
0:36:48 > 0:36:53It was Britons almost literally putting their toes in the waters of foreign culture.
0:36:53 > 0:36:58It wasn't even reflective of the Spain of the time, either, because the Spain of the time
0:36:58 > 0:37:02was Franco's Spain, ultra-conservative, you know, horribly repressive.
0:37:02 > 0:37:06In Sylvia's home country of Sweden, then strongly left-wing,
0:37:06 > 0:37:10Y Viva Espana was seen by some as a pro-Franco anthem.
0:37:10 > 0:37:15I was standing in a flower shop and suddenly somebody behind me said...
0:37:15 > 0:37:19"Murderer." I said "What?"
0:37:21 > 0:37:25They connected me with Franco and his way of treating people,
0:37:25 > 0:37:28so, "How can you sing this?
0:37:28 > 0:37:33"You must be a murderer too, you must be a dictator or a fascist."
0:37:33 > 0:37:39I was standing, I took the telephone and I heard, "Fascist..." Click.
0:37:42 > 0:37:46But in reaction to this, on the opening night of her British tour,
0:37:46 > 0:37:50Sylvia decided to make her hit into an unlikely protest song.
0:37:51 > 0:37:55I am going to sing No Viva Espana.
0:37:55 > 0:37:59# This year I'm ba-da ba-da... No viva Espana
0:38:01 > 0:38:03# I'm not taking the Costa Brava plane
0:38:03 > 0:38:04# No viva Espana... #
0:38:07 > 0:38:12And there were my record company sitting in the audience, like, "Oh, what is she doing?"
0:38:16 > 0:38:21By the mid-1970s, with Spanish beaches getting overcrowded,
0:38:21 > 0:38:24British holidaymakers followed the sun to Cyprus and Greece
0:38:24 > 0:38:30and seemingly from nowhere, a new Greek pop star appeared on the horizon.
0:38:30 > 0:38:36Demis Roussos had originally been in the 1960s Greek prog-rock group Aphrodite's Child,
0:38:36 > 0:38:39along with future film composer Vangelis.
0:38:39 > 0:38:43But he emerged as a fully-formed star in the mid-1970s,
0:38:43 > 0:38:46as one of the decade's least likely sex symbols.
0:38:49 > 0:38:52Demis Roussos is such a fascinating, fascinating character
0:38:52 > 0:38:55because the Demis Roussos I first knew,
0:38:55 > 0:38:59as indeed that most people probably first knew was this enormous man
0:38:59 > 0:39:04in a kaftan, Abigail's Party and these luscious...
0:39:04 > 0:39:08he is kind of like Barry White in a way, it that he is sort of ultra-masculine,
0:39:08 > 0:39:13just his sheer bulk is ultra- masculine and that made him a kind of weird kind of heart throb
0:39:13 > 0:39:17but the voice that comes out of that frame is this tremulous kind of vibrato.
0:39:17 > 0:39:24# For ever and ever, for ever, never you'll be the one... #
0:39:25 > 0:39:28Shock reaction with this huge man in this kaftan
0:39:28 > 0:39:30and this very high voice.
0:39:32 > 0:39:37But it was, I mean, once you'd heard it you didn't forget it.
0:39:37 > 0:39:41# You'll be my dream... #
0:39:41 > 0:39:47'He'd be wearing almost traditional Greek dress - like a dress -
0:39:47 > 0:39:50but his voice is like this soprano.
0:39:50 > 0:39:56It's this amazing operatic, emotional...thing.
0:39:56 > 0:39:58And I think women probably went for it.
0:39:58 > 0:40:01And I think there's an awful lot of sex appeal with Demis Roussos
0:40:01 > 0:40:03and I think that sells records.
0:40:03 > 0:40:04'And please don't push!'
0:40:04 > 0:40:08'Everything he does - his voice, his build even,'
0:40:08 > 0:40:10it's something quite incredible.
0:40:10 > 0:40:13For music like that to come out of a man like that. Oh, it's fantastic.
0:40:13 > 0:40:16The way he puts it over, the way he sings it,
0:40:16 > 0:40:19it's that little tone in his voice that no other singer's got.
0:40:19 > 0:40:24He's romantic, he's big and he's gorgeous, he's sexy and he's beautiful!
0:40:24 > 0:40:28Forever And Ever, the classic Demis Roussos second album
0:40:28 > 0:40:30with "Ahh-ahh-ahh-ah" on it
0:40:30 > 0:40:33is just a classic record. Everyone should have that record.
0:40:33 > 0:40:35And there's the Abigail's Party reference which is
0:40:35 > 0:40:38for some people just completely unforgettable.
0:40:38 > 0:40:43Would anybody mind if I turn this next track up?
0:40:43 > 0:40:46Cos it's my favourite, it's Forever And Ever.
0:40:46 > 0:40:48And I'd like us all to hear it.
0:40:48 > 0:40:49Anybody mind?
0:40:49 > 0:40:51- No.- No? Great!
0:40:52 > 0:40:56Mike Leigh's 1977 play, Abigail's Party,
0:40:56 > 0:40:59is one of the most iconic television dramas.
0:40:59 > 0:41:03It sealed for ever Demis Roussos' place as a suburban heart-throb.
0:41:03 > 0:41:05- Oh, isn't he great!- Yes!
0:41:05 > 0:41:07'To Beverly, the Alison Steadman character,
0:41:07 > 0:41:12'she thinks that Demis Roussos is sophisticated,
0:41:12 > 0:41:16'it is upmarket, it's the perfect music for somebody who is ambitious
0:41:16 > 0:41:18'and aspirational, as she is.'
0:41:18 > 0:41:20Do you think he's sexy, Ange?
0:41:20 > 0:41:24Yes. It's a pity he's so fat.
0:41:24 > 0:41:29Yeah, but he doesn't sound it though, does he, when you hear him?
0:41:29 > 0:41:30No, it's funny.
0:41:30 > 0:41:33He's still fantastic though, isn't he?
0:41:33 > 0:41:37'You live in Surbiton, you listen to Demis Roussos.'
0:41:37 > 0:41:39It shows that Surbiton is not your horizon.
0:41:39 > 0:41:43You can look beyond it and that you're interested in European things.
0:41:43 > 0:41:46Ange, imagine making love to this, do you know what I mean?
0:41:51 > 0:41:53'You all right, Laurence?'
0:41:53 > 0:41:56Along with Demis Roussos, another exotic record that might
0:41:56 > 0:41:58have been on Beverly's hi-fi
0:41:58 > 0:42:01featured a plaintive whistling sound from high in the Andes.
0:42:04 > 0:42:09But our first exposure to the panpipes came not from South America
0:42:09 > 0:42:12but from a country thousands of miles away.
0:42:12 > 0:42:17This famous tune is actually a Romanian funeral song and was played
0:42:17 > 0:42:22by Gheorghe Zamfir who made his debut on the Nana Mouskouri show in 1971.
0:42:27 > 0:42:30Everybody was talking about it, they were saying,
0:42:30 > 0:42:36"Did you see that panpipe player?" because he was so brilliant.
0:42:36 > 0:42:41Bringing Zamfir and his band over from Ceausescu's Romania wasn't straightforward.
0:42:41 > 0:42:44I think we had a bit of trouble finally getting
0:42:44 > 0:42:48the authorities to give them visas and there was a member
0:42:48 > 0:42:55of the group who was, erm, assigned, shall I say,
0:42:55 > 0:43:01the job of making sure that nobody defected while they were here!
0:43:01 > 0:43:04It was a bit like the secret police.
0:43:09 > 0:43:12I always thought he came from the Andes you see, I always thought
0:43:12 > 0:43:15George Zamfir was part of, you know...
0:43:15 > 0:43:18It was, I think, one of his albums has the word Andes in the title.
0:43:18 > 0:43:23There was a mini-industry that sprung up over this magical sound that no-one had heard before.
0:43:23 > 0:43:25You could mirror it with the zither.
0:43:25 > 0:43:31I think every now and again a funny instrument breaks into the mainstream.
0:43:38 > 0:43:40Unfortunately the thing about panpipes is
0:43:40 > 0:43:43you can grow tired of them very quickly. You can hear it and go, "Wow!"
0:43:43 > 0:43:46And then you don't want to hear it again for about a decade.
0:43:46 > 0:43:52This week we're going to kick off, amigos, with Incantation and Cacharpaya.
0:43:59 > 0:44:02And sure enough, ten years after Gheorghe
0:44:02 > 0:44:06another panpipe record made its way into the charts.
0:44:07 > 0:44:12Incantation was formed by a group of young British classical musicians in 1981.
0:44:12 > 0:44:16They were hired to play the music for a Ballet Rambert production, Ghost Dances,
0:44:16 > 0:44:19about repression in Pinochet's Chile.
0:44:19 > 0:44:24They'd never seen panpipes before and had to learn to play them from scratch.
0:44:25 > 0:44:28Their instruments arrived in a big crate.
0:44:28 > 0:44:31We opened it, got them out,
0:44:31 > 0:44:35tried to figure out which way up they went and we had
0:44:35 > 0:44:37two or three weeks before the first performance
0:44:37 > 0:44:44to learn how to play this brand-new music and off we went.
0:44:50 > 0:44:55The music in the show was so popular it was released on record.
0:44:55 > 0:44:59It didn't take off straightaway and then it was taken up
0:44:59 > 0:45:03by Sir Terence Wogan on his Radio Two show
0:45:03 > 0:45:07and he played it relentlessly and that was that.
0:45:07 > 0:45:09It was then played on Radio One
0:45:09 > 0:45:12and all of a sudden we were on Top Of The Pops.
0:45:14 > 0:45:19So what's the answer? Do panpipes come from Romania or the Andes?
0:45:19 > 0:45:25My theory is that panpipes went east a very long time ago.
0:45:25 > 0:45:28So in China, they played panpipes
0:45:28 > 0:45:32and at some point peoples migrated
0:45:32 > 0:45:36across the frozen Bering Strait
0:45:36 > 0:45:39and into the Americas
0:45:39 > 0:45:41and they took panpipes with them.
0:45:41 > 0:45:44And so they ended up in the Andes.
0:45:44 > 0:45:49Ethnic, boys, ethnic. That's a Bolivian fisherman's wedding song by Incantation,
0:45:49 > 0:45:52or "in-can-ta-thion", as the gauchos call them back home on the pampas.
0:45:56 > 0:46:00In the 1980s, music from around the world began to break out
0:46:00 > 0:46:02of its easy-listening ghetto.
0:46:02 > 0:46:05Along with the trends for new foods and wider travel,
0:46:05 > 0:46:09there was a desire for more authentic ethnic sounds.
0:46:09 > 0:46:13Music from Africa was hardly known in the UK,
0:46:13 > 0:46:16but was being enthusiastically promoted by a few tiny record labels
0:46:16 > 0:46:18and festivals like WOMAD.
0:46:18 > 0:46:23Its profile was raised further by Radio One DJ Andy Kershaw who,
0:46:23 > 0:46:26bored with rock music, started playing
0:46:26 > 0:46:31bands like the Bhundu Boys on his Sunday evening show.
0:46:33 > 0:46:36# And let's sing with me... #
0:46:36 > 0:46:39I thought, this is good, this is great, this is better than
0:46:39 > 0:46:43that spotty little band from Leicester who just sent me their new EP.
0:46:43 > 0:46:47so before Radio One knew what was happening, and really before I knew
0:46:47 > 0:46:51what was happening, Radio One had a world music programme by stealth.
0:46:55 > 0:47:00And bands like the Bhundu Boys quickly started to attract some unexpected fans.
0:47:02 > 0:47:04I suppose the most emphatic proof I got
0:47:04 > 0:47:08that the Bhundus had that quality to take them beyond
0:47:08 > 0:47:12not just the confines of a beer garden in Highfield Township,
0:47:12 > 0:47:18Zimbabwe but into the much wider world was when my mother,
0:47:18 > 0:47:22to my astonishment, declared her love for the Bhundus' music.
0:47:29 > 0:47:30# It was a dry wind
0:47:30 > 0:47:32# And it swept across the desert... #
0:47:32 > 0:47:35But the big breakthrough for African music came with
0:47:35 > 0:47:38Paul Simon's 1986 album Graceland.
0:47:38 > 0:47:42Controversially breaking the South African cultural boycott,
0:47:42 > 0:47:46Simon mixed his own songs with music from groups like Ladysmith Black Mambazo.
0:47:46 > 0:47:50Initially the group received demos of the songs.
0:47:50 > 0:47:52So he was singing by himself, "Homeless, homeless,"
0:47:52 > 0:47:55and then playing the piano
0:47:55 > 0:47:57and then he was doing some
0:47:57 > 0:48:01- Mambazo exclamation, like... - HE CLICKS
0:48:01 > 0:48:02and so we laugh about that.
0:48:04 > 0:48:11At the beginning, we added the Zulu lyrics which mean "we are homeless."
0:48:11 > 0:48:13THEY SING IN ZULU
0:48:18 > 0:48:21# Sing, homeless
0:48:21 > 0:48:24# Homeless... #
0:48:29 > 0:48:32But the song came at the right time for South Africans
0:48:32 > 0:48:35because, at that time, there was so much violence,
0:48:35 > 0:48:42people were sleeping on the mountains, so this song - it was very good timing for it.
0:48:42 > 0:48:44- # Homeless - Homeless... #
0:48:50 > 0:48:53Paul Simon's Graceland was hugely important
0:48:53 > 0:48:57and it came along in '86 just after I had started this business
0:48:57 > 0:49:02on Radio One and suddenly you had, in the most
0:49:02 > 0:49:06conservative of record collections,
0:49:06 > 0:49:09alongside their Phil Collins and their Elton Johns,
0:49:09 > 0:49:14had also got South African township jive and South African vocal music
0:49:14 > 0:49:19from Ladysmith Black Mambazo sitting alongside the Lionel Ritchie releases.
0:49:19 > 0:49:24Fantastic! That made the job for everyone much easier.
0:49:24 > 0:49:29We feel very honoured that people accept and embrace our music.
0:49:29 > 0:49:35So we said, it's a blessing, especially in a country
0:49:35 > 0:49:38or the continent like the UK.
0:49:38 > 0:49:45When we grew up, we were told about this continent, and the people here are very traditional.
0:49:45 > 0:49:49So when they accept us, we're very grateful.
0:49:56 > 0:49:58MUSIC: "Volare" by The Gipsy Kings
0:50:04 > 0:50:07With the success of groups like Ladysmith Black Mambazo,
0:50:07 > 0:50:11a new generation of international artists came to the fore
0:50:11 > 0:50:14and also got a new name - world music.
0:50:14 > 0:50:17Among the most popular were The Gipsy Kings.
0:50:17 > 0:50:19Originally street musicians from the South of France,
0:50:19 > 0:50:25over the last 20 years, they've sold 80 million records.
0:51:32 > 0:51:36But did this newfound respectability for world music mean that
0:51:36 > 0:51:39the foreign pop one hit wonder was history?
0:51:39 > 0:51:40Of course not!
0:51:45 > 0:51:48# 99 red balloons
0:51:48 > 0:51:50# Floating in the summer sky
0:51:50 > 0:51:53# Panic bells, it's red alert
0:51:53 > 0:51:55# There's something here from somewhere else
0:51:55 > 0:51:58# The war machine springs to life... #
0:51:58 > 0:52:01Catchy foreign pop songs were still regular visitors
0:52:01 > 0:52:05to the British charts in the '80s and '90s.
0:52:05 > 0:52:08Nena's 99 Red Balloons was originally a number one in Germany.
0:52:08 > 0:52:11Translated into English, it didn't make any more sense,
0:52:11 > 0:52:16but it still topped the UK charts in 1984.
0:52:16 > 0:52:18Four years later, Vanessa Paradis
0:52:18 > 0:52:21had a huge hit with Joe Le Taxi.
0:52:21 > 0:52:25# Joe le taxi y va pas partout... #
0:52:25 > 0:52:29For young record buyers of the 1980s, the appeal of foreign pop songs
0:52:29 > 0:52:33was just the same as it had been for their parents.
0:52:33 > 0:52:36I remember really loving Joe Le Taxi by Vanessa Paradis.
0:52:36 > 0:52:40She was 14 or 15 years old, she was incredibly glamorous even though
0:52:40 > 0:52:43she was wearing a jumper and a pair of jeans and she was singing
0:52:43 > 0:52:46about this amazing place called Paris, which sounded so exciting.
0:52:46 > 0:52:49# Et la Seine
0:52:51 > 0:52:54# Et ses ponts qui brillent... #
0:52:54 > 0:52:59Joe Le Taxi was just this record from another world.
0:52:59 > 0:53:02Not another country just on a ferry across from Dover,
0:53:02 > 0:53:08it was just so completely different from anything I knew.
0:53:08 > 0:53:10But there was one form of international pop
0:53:10 > 0:53:13that everybody got to know in the 1980s.
0:53:20 > 0:53:24Latin music had made occasional forays into the charts,
0:53:24 > 0:53:27but over the last 25 years, it's swept all before it.
0:53:29 > 0:53:32I think to us, in Britain, we always have a slight self image
0:53:32 > 0:53:35of being quite grey and buttoned-up and repressed
0:53:35 > 0:53:39and miserable - a people characterised by the hot-water bottle.
0:53:39 > 0:53:43I think to us, Latin music is a chance to get out of ourselves.
0:53:43 > 0:53:47# She will wear you out Livin' la vida loca... #
0:53:47 > 0:53:52And Latin music can now be found in every British city, town and village.
0:53:52 > 0:53:56Inspired by the hits of Ricky Martin and holidays to the Caribbean,
0:53:56 > 0:53:59salsa dancing has become a phenomenon in its own right.
0:54:12 > 0:54:15Salsa and Zumba and all those kinds of things,
0:54:15 > 0:54:18it's the sound of freedom, of sexiness, of liberation.
0:54:18 > 0:54:21People are more open-eared to the music of the world
0:54:21 > 0:54:24and are rather distrustful of things that can fall into stereotypes.
0:54:36 > 0:54:39Because salsa is from a foreign country, it's a bit more exotic,
0:54:39 > 0:54:43I think it has a bit more flavour to it and it's a little bit unusual for people.
0:54:43 > 0:54:47I went on a holiday to Cuba, fell in love with the music,
0:54:47 > 0:54:50the dancing, came back and, in the January, looked for a class
0:54:50 > 0:54:56because it was dark, wet. I wanted something exotic to do.
0:54:56 > 0:54:59Because it's so different to music here, day in, day out,
0:54:59 > 0:55:03as soon as you hear the beat of the Latin music, you start dancing.
0:55:16 > 0:55:19The fashion for salsa shows how firmly foreign music
0:55:19 > 0:55:22has buried itself into the British psyche.
0:55:22 > 0:55:26So firmly that when Latin American superstar Shakira combines
0:55:26 > 0:55:30musical styles from around the world,
0:55:30 > 0:55:33it doesn't sound particularly foreign to us.
0:55:33 > 0:55:35I don't think people even worry about it now.
0:55:35 > 0:55:41Pop become kind of global in a way that people used to think it was once upon a time
0:55:41 > 0:55:43but I think it really has become global now.
0:55:43 > 0:55:46I think lots of different forms of art and forms of dance
0:55:46 > 0:55:50have just been completely incorporated into British culture,
0:55:50 > 0:55:56we don't even think of them as being foreign any more,
0:55:56 > 0:56:00from another place. It is just part of the great big British multi-cultural soup.
0:56:00 > 0:56:05In 70 years, we've gone from being buttoned-up Brits
0:56:05 > 0:56:08who only bought the occasional foreign one hit wonder to now being
0:56:08 > 0:56:12comfortable with music from all around the world.
0:56:12 > 0:56:15It's not that the funny foreign pop song has gone away,
0:56:15 > 0:56:17it just doesn't sound so unusual any more.
0:56:17 > 0:56:20# Vrei sa pleci dar nu ma, nu ma iei... #
0:56:20 > 0:56:23There isn't any room any more for the hit out of nowhere,
0:56:23 > 0:56:28the whacky world music novelty record that gets to number one
0:56:28 > 0:56:31in the charts because there isn't the space for it,
0:56:31 > 0:56:35those records only worked because they were so different...
0:56:35 > 0:56:38And sadly, that means there'll never be another star with
0:56:38 > 0:56:43the exotic appeal of Demis Roussos, but he's kind of irreplaceable anyway.
0:56:43 > 0:56:47# Take me far beyond
0:56:47 > 0:56:52# Imagination
0:56:52 > 0:56:57# You're my dream come true
0:56:57 > 0:57:01# My consolation
0:57:01 > 0:57:05# Ever and ever For ever and ever
0:57:05 > 0:57:09# You'll be the one
0:57:09 > 0:57:12# That shines in me
0:57:12 > 0:57:17# Like the morning sun
0:57:17 > 0:57:21# Ever and ever, for ever and ever
0:57:21 > 0:57:26# My destiny
0:57:26 > 0:57:32# Will follow you eternally. #
0:57:34 > 0:57:37Subtitles by Red Bee Media Ltd