On July 23, 1962, Telstar relayed a TV broadcast from the United States to Europe.

[mahatmakanejeeves]

First publicly accessible TV broadcast from United States to Europe by Telstar satellite was today 1962:

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Sun Nov 11, 2018: He would have turned 81 today: Roger LaVern of The Tornados

Hat tip, This Day In Rock:

1938 – Born on this day, Roger Lavern, keyboards, The Tornadoes — 1938 – Born on this day, Roger Lavern, keyboards, The Tornadoes, (1962 UK & US No.1 single ‘Telstar’). The first major hit from a UK act on the American chart.

They said he was born in 1938, but they get a lot of dates wrong, both days and years. I'm going with the obituary. Also the preferred spelling for the name of the group seems to be "The Tornados," without the "e."

Roger LaVern

Roger LaVern, who has died aged 75, was the keyboard player in The Tornados who, in 1962, became the first British group to reach No 1 in America, with Telstar; his rewards, however, were more sexual than financial.

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Roger LaVern (top right) with The Tornados in 1964 Photo: REX

5:59PM BST 28 Jun 2013

The Tornados were the creation of the record producer Joe Meek, who assembled a line-up of session musicians to act as house group for the artists he managed; at the same time they worked on tour for the impresario Larry Parnes, backing Billy Fury and other singers. But it was Telstar, a tribute to the world’s first communications satellite, that made their name, with initial sales of five million worldwide. It went on to become the biggest-selling instrumental of all time, and for a while The Tornados were seen as serious rivals to The Shadows.

Driven by a small electronic keyboard known as a clavioline, and opening with the sound of “radio signals” from outer space, Telstar was recorded in Meek’s studio during a short break from The Tornados’ summer season with Billy Fury at Great Yarmouth. LaVern played a piano in the rhythm section, as there was no time for him to lay down the main melody line. The clavioline and associated sound effects were overdubbed later. ... Yet Telstar seemed to capture the excitement of the early space age. As well as reaching No 1 in the States, it spent 25 weeks in the UK charts, five of them at No 1. The Tornados went on to record three more Top 20 hits — Robot, Ice Cream Man and Globetrotter, which made it to No 5 — but their time in the limelight was short-lived. Within a year or so of Telstar, pop instrumentals were giving way to the Mersey Sound.

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But eventually his hands seized up with Dupuytren’s Contracture and he had to return to Britain for a series of operations which took 10 years to correct the condition. His professional career was over, and at one point in the early 1990s he was reduced to working as a security guard for Associated Newspapers.

He was born Roger Keith Jackson on November 11 1937 and brought up at Kidderminster. His father, George, a director of a confectionery company, had wide contacts in the entertainments world and Roger would recall being bounced, aged nine, on the knee of Oliver Hardy until he was nearly sick. .... After seven operations over 10 years, by 1996 LaVern’s hands were partially restored and he returned to performing at charity gigs. In 2011 he received a Lifetime Achievement Award from the STAR Foundation, in the House of Lords, for his charitable work.

Roger LaVern’s wife Maria survives him.

Roger LaVern, born November 11 1937, died June 15 2013

Here's what he was known for:

Telstar (instrumental)



German picture sleeve

Released: 17 August 1962
Recorded: 22 July 1962

"Telstar" is a 1962 instrumental written and produced by Joe Meek for the English band the Tornados. The track reached number 1 on the U.S. Billboard Hot 100 in December 1962 (the second British recording to reach number 1 on that chart in the year, after "Stranger on the Shore" in May), and was also a number one hit in the UK Singles Chart. It was the second instrumental single to hit number 1 in 1962 on both the US and UK weekly charts.

Later in 1962, Meek produced a vocal version of "Telstar" titled "Magic Star", sung by Kenny Hollywood. It was released as a single by Decca Records (cat. nr F11546), with "The Wonderful Story of Love" on the B-side, written by Geoff Goddard. The musical director for both songs was Ivor Raymonde.

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The Tornados - Telstar - New improved stereo remix
5,525,880 views Aug 24, 2013

johnreynolds71
40.3K subscribers

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The Tornados -Telstar - orig video
106,451 views Dec 28, 2017

johnreynolds71
40.3K subscribers

[rurallib]

1. I remember watching that

It was somewhere around 1PM central time. They had a short spot of a Cubs baseball game and I was a huge Cubs fan in those days.

[AllaN01Bear]

2. telestar broadcast.

[mahatmakanejeeves]

7. Thanks for that, a lot. NT

[jpak]

3. The Telstar reciever "horn" was located in western Maine

We had class trips to see it and everyone in Maine went outside to see it at night when it passed over.

The local high school is named Telstar to this day.

It was a big deal.

[Sneederbunk]

5. The background stories for Tornados member Heinz Burt

as well as Joe Meek are fascinating.

[agingdem]

6. One of my all time favorite instrumentals

speaking of Telstar...I remember watching Walter Cronkite track the satellite and when it "passed over" my hometown of El Paso, Texas he reported it as El Paso, New Mexico...growing up I always felt El Paso was unwanted Texas step-child and he confirmed it...

[mahatmakanejeeves]

8. Odd factoid I did know until Wikipedia clued me in:

The Tornados

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The Tornados were an English instrumental group of the 1960s that acted as backing group for many of record producer Joe Meek's productions and also for singer Billy Fury. They enjoyed several chart hits in their own right, including the UK and U.S. No. 1 "Telstar" (named after the satellite and composed and produced by Meek), the first U.S. No. 1 single by a British group. Today Dave Watts has his own version.

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"Do You Come Here Often?"

The B-side of the final single that the group released, in 1966, "Do You Come Here Often?", is considered to be the first openly "gay" pop record release by a UK major label.[3] It started off as a standard organ-inspired instrumental, but Joe Meek decided that the organ playing was a little too jazzy for the style of the group. To remedy this, around two-thirds in, a casual conversation between what appears to be two gay men (Dave Watts playing keyboards and Robb Huxley playing guitar) was overdubbed.[4] The song was featured, along with other gay-flavoured releases, on a 2006 compilation CD, Queer Noises.[4]

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[3] Petridis, Alexis (4 July 2006). "'Wilder, madder, gayer than a Beatle's hairdo'". The Guardian. London. Retrieved 27 January 2010.
[4] Jon Savage (12 November 2006). "Meek by name, wild by nature". The Guardian. London. Retrieved 27 January 2010.

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