Remembering Ball we had with comedy duo
THE recent sad death of comedian and actor Bobby Ball was a low point at a time when we could do with some laughs.
The Derby Telegraph recently devoted a page to pictures of Bobby in Derby, often with co-star and partner Tommy Cannon, in the 1990s and the first decade of this century.
But I can recall when the pair appeared in Derby 20 years before that. In the mid to late 1970s Derby and Burton branch of the National Union of Journalists held a number of press balls – big social events with stars at top venues.
As well as providing great entertainment they raised money for journalists and local charities.
One of these was at the Talk of the Midlands (or its later name) cabaret venue in Mill Street and I was one of the organising committee looking for acts to perform.
Unusually in this year we went for a double bill – big-name jazz musician Chris Barber and his band and a pair of comedians who had made their name in northern clubs and already got the nation laughing with their early television appearances – Cannon and Ball.
The pair did two spots and in the interval between them Maurice Lovett, of Bass, auctioned off some special commemorative bottles of beer brewed at Burton by visiting royalty.
I can’t remember the exact words but back on stage the comics took advantage of the auction to start off their second slot.
Tommy pointed out somebody had just paid X number of pounds for a particular bottle of beer.
“How much?” queried Bobby. “The silly so-and-so. He could have bought a bottle of mild for just 75p at the bar.” And so the jokes went on. Great laughs on a great night.
With colleagues I was busy running round looking after guests and seeing that everything was running. I never spoke to Cannon and Ball and I don’t have a photo from their appearance. The duo soon went on to greater things on television and stage. That quip about the beer from 30-plus years ago still makes me laugh. Rock on!
Other stars and venues at this series of press balls were: jazz/blues singer George Melly with John Chilton’s Feetwarmers, followed the next year by Nottingham pop group Paper Lace, both at Tiffanys in Babington Lane, and comedian Dickie Henderson at Romeo and Juliet’s in Colyear Street.
Kevin Palmer, by email