K SPECIAL
VA - ITV @ 70 1955-2025 - 75 Original Classic ITV Themes (Updated Improved Remastered Expanded Edition) (2CD) (2025)
An update to my original 2015 compilation which celebrated 60 years of ITV (Independent Television) in the UK where I collated 60 classic ITV themes. This newly expanded set now features 75 iconic ITV theme tunes.
ITV's launch
The first ITV service to launch was Associated-Rediffusion in London on September 22, 1955. The first news bulletin was broadcast at 10 PM on ITV's launch night.
TV Times is a British television listings magazine. From 1955 until 1991, it was the only source of seven-day listings for ITV and, from 1982, Channel 4 (as well as S4C in Wales in an enclosed local supplement titled Sbec). The magazine did not circulate nationally until 1968 as some (usually smaller) regional stations opted to produce their own listings publications. Until the market was deregulated, its nearest rival was Radio Times - owned then by the BBC and at the time the only source of weekly BBC television and radio schedules. However, the two magazines were very different in character, and viewers wanting the full listings for the coming week were required to purchase both publications. The TV Times branding was also used for several broadcast spin-offs on ITV, including the Miss TV Times and The TV Times Awards during the 1970s and 1980s.
ITV, legally known as Channel 3, is a British free-to-air public broadcast television network. It is branded as ITV1 in most of the UK except for central and northern Scotland, where it is branded as STV. It was launched in 1955 as Independent Television to provide competition, eliminating what had been the monopoly of BBC Television (established in 1936).
ITV is the oldest commercial network in the UK. Since the passing of the Broadcasting Act 1990, it has been legally known as Channel 3 to distinguish it from the other analogue channels at the time: BBC1, BBC2 and Channel 4.
The origins of ITV lie in the passing of the Television Act 1954, designed to break the monopoly on television held by the BBC Television Service.
The act created the Independent Television Authority (ITA, then IBA after the Sound Broadcasting Act) to heavily regulate the industry and to award franchises. The first six franchises were awarded in 1954 for London, the Midlands and the North of England, with separate franchises for Weekdays and Weekends.
The first ITV service to launch was London's Associated-Rediffusion on 22 September 1955, with the Midlands and North services launching in February 1956 and May 1956 respectively. Following these launches, the ITA awarded more franchises until the whole country was covered by fourteen regional stations, all launched by 1962.
The network has been modified several times through franchise reviews that have taken place in 1963, 1967, 1974, 1980 and 1991, during which broadcast regions have changed and service operators have been replaced. Only one service operator has ever been declared bankrupt, WWN in 1963,
with all other operators leaving the network as a result of a franchise review. Separate weekend franchises were removed in 1968 (with the exception of London) and over the years more services were added; these included a national breakfast franchise from 1983 onward - operating between 6:00 am and 9:25 am - and a teletext service.
The Broadcasting Act 1990 changed the nature of ITV; the then regulator the IBA was replaced with a light-touch regulator, the ITC; companies became able to purchase other ITV regional companies and franchises were now being awarded based upon a highest-bidder auction, with few safeguards in place. This heavily criticised part of the review saw four operators replaced, and the operators facing different annual payments to the Treasury: Central Independent Television, for example, paid only £2,000—despite holding a lucrative and large region - because it was unopposed, while Yorkshire Television paid £37.7 million for a region of the same size and status, owing to heavy competition.
Following the 1993 changes, ITV as a network began to consolidate with several companies doing so to save money by ceasing the duplication of services present when they were all separate companies. By 2004, the ITV network was owned by five companies, of which two, Carlton and Granada had become major players by owning between them all the franchises in England, Wales, the Scottish borders and the Isle of Man. That same year, the two merged to form ITV PLC with the only subsequent acquisitions being the takeover of Channel Television, the Channel Islands franchise, in 2011; and UTV, the franchise for Northern Ireland, in 2015.
1979 dispute
ITV suffered an eleven-week industrial dispute in 1979, leading to the subsequent shutdown of almost all ITV broadcasts and productions. It began at London's Thames Television when electricians, who were EETPU members, refused to accept what they considered to be a derisory pay increase. The management attempted to operate a normal service, but other transmission staff, who were ACTT members, refused to co-operate, pointing out that equipment and wiring turned on by non-EETPU members could be potentially dangerous. Thames management interpreted this as a walkout. When Thames' management consequently ordered the striking staff to "return or else", the broadcasting union, the ACTT, instructed members at thirteen other ITV stations to walk out in solidarity. The only company unaffected was Channel Television, as the unions recognised that industrial action there could lead to the station's closure, as its small audience made it vulnerable to any loss of advertising revenue.
ITV viewers encountered blank television screens on the morning of 10 August 1979, and were left without any programmes. Later on, this apology caption would broadcast in 14 of the 15 ITV regions:
INDEPENDENT TELEVISION
We are sorry that programmes have been interrupted. There is an industrial dispute. Transmissions will start again as soon as possible.
Strangely, the caption achieved ratings of around one million, from TV sets left on in the hope that the strike would end. Only one ITV company broadcast anything during this time, that being Channel Television, who broadcast a time-restricted service of local programming, films and imported television series (on film, as Channel had no videotape facilities at the time).
All other regions showed a specially made apology caption generated by the IBA, which was for a time amended to include an appeal on behalf of the West Yorkshire Police in their hunt for the Yorkshire Ripper. The only other content broadcast outside of the Channel Television region was the IBA's Engineering Announcements.
Post-1979 strike
Programming resumed at 5.38pm on Wednesday 24 October 1979. The strike ended with victory for the unions involved in the dispute, estimated to have cost the companies £100 million in lost revenue. Channel alone lost £10,000 per week due to the strike. Technicians saw a 45% increase in their salary, from £8,000 to £11,620. Returning viewers were greeted with a new jingle, "Welcome home to ITV", sung by the Mike Sammes Singers.
The first night's schedule back after the strike was filled by programmes already "in the can" before the strike commenced. Both Crossroads and Coronation Street aired special introductions to their first episodes back, to inform viewers of the events in both soaps, where they left off back in July 1979.
The first night schedule was networked from Thames Television in London to all ITV regional companies across the United Kingdom as part of their national emergency schedule, and was as follows:
5.45pm – ITN News at 5.45 with Leonard Parkin
6.05pm – The Muppet Show (with special guest: Dudley Moore)
6.35pm – Crossroads
7.00pm – George and Mildred
7.30pm – Coronation Street
8.00pm – 3-2-1 with Ted Rogers (guests starring Norman Wisdom and Anna Dawson)
9.00pm – Quatermass (Part 1)
10.00pm – News at Ten with Alastair Burnet and Anna Ford
10.30pm – Film: Chinatown (1974)
1.00am – Closedown
When the strike ended, ITV had the task of luring back viewers from the BBC. This proved difficult as production of original programming had stopped and would not be available for several months; ITV therefore suffered in the ratings at the hands of the BBC. Two and a half months after ITV began broadcasting again, it was finally ready to air additional original programming and viewers began switching back. This strike was to be the last ever major strike for ITV as the power of the broadcasting unions began to wane, even though minor disputes plagued the television industry in the 1980s, and the dispute was the longest in the history of British television.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ITV_(TV_network)
https://tvark.org/branding/itv-network/itv-regions
Look-in was a children's magazine centred on ITV's television programmes in the United Kingdom, and subtitled "Junior TVTimes". It ran from 9 January 1971 to 12 March 1994.
http://juniortvtimes.blogspot.com/
Hundreds of complete issues can be downloaded here:
https://lookoutchecklist.weebly.com/1971.html
So, in celebration of 70 years of ITV here is my own compilation of 75 of the very best themes. All tracks are the 100% original versions performed by the original artists, not some unknown orchestra on some unknown label as we so often see clogging up the shelves in HMV and on Amazon. A number of tracks were extremely hard to find and have never appeared on CD and had to be digitally transferred from vinyl, VHS video tape, DVD and Blu-ray, precisely edited and cleaned up in Audacity to complete this collection.
Many tracks have been upgraded from better sources with better sound quality than the previous collection I put together 10 years ago in 2015.
I hope you enjoy this newly updated and much improved compilation.
CD1: Tracks 1-36 Time: 79:01
CD2: Tracks 1-38 Time: 78:50
Note: Both complete issues (1955 and 2025) are included in the artwork folder.
K
PLEASE THANK K for this great set.
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Track lists
CD1
1 Harry Rabinowitz - London Weekend Television (70's Ident) 0:08
2 The Barry Gray Orchestra - Thunderbirds 3:09
3 Ron Grainer and his Orchestra - Man in a Suitcase 2:13
4 Johnny Hawksworth; The Harry South Orchestra - Thames Television (Salute to Thames) / The Sweeney (Original Opening and Closing Themes) 3:29
5 The South Bank Orchestra, conducted by Denis King - The Adventures of Black Beauty 2:25
6 The Settlers - Follyfoot 2:40
7 Tony Hatch and his Orchestra - Emmerdale Farm 2:16
8 The Derek Scott Orchestra - General Hospital 3:20
9 The Don Harper Orchestra - World of Sport 1:42
10 The Roger Webb Orchestra - Strange Report 2:01
11 Tony Christie - The Protectors 3:17
12 John Barry and his Orchestra - The Persuaders! 2:10
13 John Barry and his Orchestra - The Adventurer 2:07
14 Laurie Johnson and the London Studio Orchestra - The Avengers 2:18
15 Tony Hatch and his Orchestra - The Champions 2:08
16 Jack Parnell - ATV (Associated Television) (70's Ident) 0:13
17 Tony Hatch and his Orchestra - Crossroads 2:00
18 The Frank Barcley Group - Miri Mawr 1:53
19 Michael Vickers - How 0:58
20 Ted Dicks - Catweazle 1:17
21 The Laurie Johnson Orchestra - The Professionals 1:52
22 John Scott - Return of the Saint 2:49
23 The Barry Gray Orchestra - Captain Scarlet 1:51
24 The Simon Park Orchestra - Van der Valk 2:21
25 Alexander Faris - Upstairs Downstairs 3:10
26 The Laurie Johnson Orchestra - Thriller (Opening and Closing Themes) 1:13
27 Ron Grainer and his Orchestra - Tales of the Unexpected 2:23
28 The Roger Webb Orchestra - Hammer House of Horror 2:52
29 Andy MacKay - Armchair Thriller 1:26
30 Paul Patterson - Hammer House of Mystery and Suspense 1:50
31 Shawn Phillips - World in Action 3:39
32 Keith Mansfield - The Big Match (1968-1972 Theme) 1:20
33 Syd Dale - Tarrant on TV 1:52
34 Dudley Simpson - The Tomorrow People 1:53
35 Edward Michael - Timeslip 2:27
36 Johnny Pearson and his Orchestra; John Malcolm Orchestra - ITV News at Ten / ITN News (The Awakening / Non-Stop) 4:19
CD2
1 Malcolm Sargent - Anglia Television (70's Ident) 0:06
2 Peter Fenn - Sale of the Century 2:11
3 The Laurie Johnson Orchestra - This Is Your Life 1:44
4 Joe Loss and his Orchestra - Opportunity Knocks (The Muscle Man Theme) 2:14
5 Max Harris - The Strange World of Gurney Slade 2:10
6 Edwin Astley - Department S 2:10
7 Edwin Astley - The Saint 1:46
8 Edwin Astley - The Baron 1:47
9 Edwin Astley - Danger Man 1:49
10 The Milton Hunter Orchestra - Budgie 2:43
11 David Ordini; The Gary Mann Orchestra - The Big Match (1974-1980 Theme) 2:35
12 The Johnny Hawksworth Orchestra - Man About the House 1:47
13 Sam Fonteyn - Please Sir! 1:53
14 Tony Russell - On the Buses 1:50
15 Dick James - The Adventures of Robin Hood 2:29
16 Derek New arr. Ron Goodwin - Yorkshire Television (1969-1989 Ident) 0:04
17 The Barry Gray Orchestra; Gary Miller - Stingray / Aqua Marina 2:46
18 The Barry Gray Orchestra - Joe 90 2:17
19 The Barry Gray Orchestra - U.F.O. 2:10
20 Dennis Waterman - Minder 3:14
21 Laurie Johnson and the London Studio Orchestra - Jason King 2:02
22 The Laurie Johnson Orchestra - Freewheelers 2:53
23 Eric Spear and his Orchestra - Coronation Street (Lancashire Blues) 2:05
24 Peter Reno and Simon Haseley - Crown Court 3:03
25 Christopher Gunning - Poirot 2:12
26 Barrington Pheloung - Inspector Morse (ITV Version) 2:12
27 Jack Parnell - ITC Entertainment (60's Ident) 0:09
28 Barry Gray feat. Don Spencer - Fireball XL5 2:36
29 The Murgatroyd Band - Magpie 2:25
30 Andrew Bown - Ace of Wands 3:15
31 Telltale - Rainbow 2:54
32 Jackie Lee - The Adventures of Rupert Bear 2:17
33 The Laurie Johnson Orchestra - The New Avengers 2:14
34 Ron Grainer and his Orchestra - The Prisoner 2:18
35 Edwin Astley - Randall and Hopkirk (Deceased) 1:40
36 Alan Tew - The Hanged Man 1:32
37 Mountain - Weekend World 1:14
38 Ronnie Aldrich and his Orchestra feat. Peter Hughes - The Benny Hill Show 2:04
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Music weaves itself into the fabric of our emotions, dances through the corridors of memory, and whispers to the soul of who we are. Sharing these stories deepens the connection, turning the experience into something timeless and profound.
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