Simon Philip Bates (born 17 December 1946) is an English

disc jockey A disc jockey, more commonly abbreviated as DJ, is a person who plays recorded music for an audience. Types of DJs include radio DJs (who host programs on music radio stations), club DJs (who work at a nightclub or music festival), mobil ...

and radio presenter. Between 1976 and 1993 he worked at

BBC Radio 1 BBC Radio 1 is a British national radio station owned and operated by the BBC. It specialises in modern popular music and current chart hits throughout the day. The station provides alternative genres at night, including electronica, dance ...

, presenting the station's weekday mid-morning show for most of this period. He later became a regular presenter on Classic FM. He hosted the breakfast show on Smooth Radio from January 2011 until March 2014, and took on the same role at

BBC Radio Devon BBC Radio Devon is the BBC's local radio station serving the county of Devon. It broadcasts on FM, DAB, digital TV and via BBC Sounds from studios in the Mannamead area of Plymouth. According to RAJAR, the station has a weekly audience of 1 ...

from January 2015 until January 2017. He was the first presenter of

BBC Two BBC Two is a British free-to-air public broadcast television network owned and operated by the BBC. It covers a wide range of subject matter, with a remit "to broadcast programmes of depth and substance" in contrast to the more mainstream a ...

's '' Food and Drink'' programme in 1982.

Early life and career

Bates was raised in

Suffolk Suffolk () is a ceremonial county of England in East Anglia. It borders Norfolk to the north, Cambridgeshire to the west and Essex to the south; the North Sea lies to the east. The county town is Ipswich; other important towns include ...

and

Shropshire Shropshire (; alternatively Salop; abbreviated in print only as Shrops; demonym Salopian ) is a landlocked historic county in the West Midlands region of England. It is bordered by Wales to the west and the English counties of Cheshire to ...

and educated at Adams' Grammar School before working for radio stations in

New Zealand New Zealand ( mi, Aotearoa ) is an island country in the southwestern Pacific Ocean. It consists of two main landmasses—the North Island () and the South Island ()—and over 700 smaller islands. It is the sixth-largest island coun ...

and

Australia Australia, officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a sovereign country comprising the mainland of the Australian continent, the island of Tasmania, and numerous smaller islands. With an area of , Australia is the largest country by ...

. Bates returned to the UK in 1971 to join the BBC, initially working for

BBC Radio 4 BBC Radio 4 is a British national radio station owned and operated by the BBC that replaced the BBC Home Service in 1967. It broadcasts a wide variety of spoken-word programmes, including news, drama, comedy, science and history from the BBC's ...

as a continuity announcer and newsreader and then joining

BBC Radio 2 BBC Radio 2 is a British national radio station owned and operated by the BBC. It is the most popular station in the United Kingdom with over 15 million weekly listeners. Since launching in 1967, the station broadcasts a wide range of content. ...

in 1972 also reading the news and announcing as well as presenting a number of music programmes including "Sweet 'n' Swing", "Night Ride", "Late Night Extra" and, from March 1974, "The Early Show". Bates left

in January 1976 and joined

in May the same year standing in for Tom Browne to host the Sunday Top 20 show before presenting the Sunday morning show two months later

Broadcasting career

BBC Radio 1

Initially a weekend presenter playing new pop records, Bates took over the weekday mid-morning programme in November 1977 and remained for 16 years, with up to 11 million listeners. Two long-running features of his programme were "The Golden Hour" and " Our Tune". Bates inherited "The Golden Hour" from

Tony Blackburn Anthony Kenneth Blackburn (born 29 January 1943) is an English disc jockey, singer and TV presenter. He first achieved fame broadcasting on the pirate stations Radio Caroline and Radio London in the 1960s, before joining the BBC, on the BBC ...

. Listeners had to guess the year from records played and clues given by Bates. "Our Tune" ran from 1980 at 11am. Over

Nino Rota Giovanni Rota Rinaldi (; 3 December 1911 – 10 April 1979), better known as Nino Rota (), was an Italian composer, pianist, conductor and academic who is best known for his film scores, notably for the films of Federico Fellini and Luchino Visco ...

's theme to

Franco Zeffirelli Gian Franco Corsi Zeffirelli (12 February 1923 – 15 June 2019), was an Italian stage and film director, producer, production designer and politician. He was one of the most significant opera and theatre directors of the post-World War II era, ...

's film ''

Romeo and Juliet ''Romeo and Juliet'' is a tragedy written by William Shakespeare early in his career about the romance between two Italian youths from feuding families. It was among Shakespeare's most popular plays during his lifetime and, along with ''Ham ...

'' (1968), Bates read a sentimental story sent by a listener, ending with a record chosen by the correspondent. In "The Birthday File" Bates played music by stars celebrating a birthday. Bates' programme featured

Jonathan King Jonathan King (born Kenneth George King; 6 December 1944) is an English singer, songwriter and record producer. He first came to prominence in 1965 when "Everyone's Gone to the Moon", a song that he wrote and sang while still an undergraduate, ...

to comment about music and interviewed stars at the

BRIT Awards The BRIT Awards (often simply called the BRITs) are the British Phonographic Industry's annual popular music awards. The name was originally a shortened form of "British", "Britain", or "Britannia" (in the early days the awards were sponsored ...

. In 1989 his summer series "Round The World" was broadcast from a different country each day. He went round the world in 67 days and raised £300,000 for Oxfam. Bates presented the Sunday afternoon

Top 40 In the music industry, the Top 40 is the current, 40 most-popular songs in a particular genre. It is the best-selling or most frequently broadcast popular music. Record charts have traditionally consisted of a total of 40 songs. "Top 40" or "cont ...

from 2 April 1978 to 26 August 1979 and from 8 January 1984 to 23 September 1984. He presented BBC TV's ''

Top of the Pops ''Top of the Pops'' (''TOTP'') is a British Record chart, music chart television programme, made by the BBC and originally broadcast weekly between 1January 1964 and 30 July 2006. The programme was the world's longest-running weekly music show ...

'' regularly from 1980 to 1988. He presented the station's roadshow before retiring from the duties after his round-the-world trip in 1989. When Matthew Bannister arrived to modernise Radio 1, Bates was thought to be under threat. Bannister says in ''The Nation's Favourite'' that he feared Bates's supposed subversive influence rather than his broadcasting style. Bates resigned in summer 1993 before the station could dismiss him, playing "Life Is a Rock (But the Radio Rolled Me)" by Reunion as his last record. Bates was on all five national BBC stations – apart from his stint at

and his broadcasts for

and

, he also presented a

Prom A promenade dance, commonly called a prom, is a dance party for high school students. It may be offered in semi-formal black tie or informal suit for boys, and evening gowns for girls. This event is typically held near the end of the school y ...

concert on

BBC Radio 3 BBC Radio 3 is a British national radio station owned and operated by the BBC. It replaced the BBC Third Programme in 1967 and broadcasts classical music and opera, with jazz, world music, drama, culture and the arts also featuring. The sta ...

in 1987 and presented a digest of the daily papers on the original BBC Radio 5 (now

BBC Radio Five Live BBC Radio 5 Live is a British national radio station owned and operated by the BBC that broadcasts mainly news, sport, discussion, interviews and phone-ins. It is the principal BBC radio station covering sport in the United Kingdom, broadcas ...

) in 1990.

After Radio 1

After leaving Radio 1 he worked for Irish-based long wave station

Atlantic 252 Atlantic 252 was an Irish longwave radio station broadcasting across Ireland and Great Britain on 252 kHz (1190 metres) from its 1988 purpose-built transmission site at Clarkstown radio transmitter, County Meath, which provided service to Atla ...

, reviving "Our Tune" and then presented a TV version of the feature daily for

BBC1 BBC One is a British free-to-air public broadcast television network owned and operated by the BBC. It is the corporation's flagship network and is known for broadcasting mainstream programming, which includes BBC News television bulletins, ...

's '' Good Morning with Anne and Nick'' in 199495 and later for

Sky One Sky One was a British pay television channel operated and owned by Sky Group (a division of Comcast). Originally launched on 26 April 1982 as Satellite Television, it was Europe's first satellite and non- terrestrial channel. From 31 July 1989, ...

. During these few years he also became the face of the VSC often seen before films that had come out on rental video, describing the classification of the film. This was lampooned by comedians such as

Harry Enfield Henry Richard Enfield (born 30 May 1961) is an English comedian, actor, writer and director. He is known in particular for his television work, including '' Harry Enfield's Television Programme'' and ''Harry & Paul'', and for the creation and ...

and

Ben Elton Benjamin Charles Elton (born 3 May 1959) is an English comedian, actor, author, playwright, lyricist and director. He was a part of London's alternative comedy movement of the 1980s and became a writer on the sitcoms '' The Young Ones'' and ''Bla ...

. Bates appeared himself in a parody of these announcements in adverts for the video game ''

Primal Rage ''Primal Rage'' is a fighting game developed and released by Atari Games to arcades in August 1994. The game takes place on a post-apocalyptic version of Earth called "Urth". Players control one of seven large beasts that battle each other to de ...

''. From September 1995 to April 1996, Bates broadcast for Talk Radio UK (now TalkSport) as the breakfast show presenter. He was then heard on London's

Liberty Radio Liberty Radio is a UK radio broadcaster and company based in London, England that, , is transmitted free to air from the Astra 2F satellite at 28.2° East to most of Europe, and on the Internet, but not on analog or DAB terrestrial radio. . Lib ...

as mid-morning presenter until 1997. In 1997, Bates joined Classic FM, presenting the weekly Classic Romance programme and was also heard on BBC Southern Counties Radio presenting a Sunday morning show until late 1998. In addition, between 1996 and 1998, Bates presented a show on the Classic Gold Network on weekday evenings. He then moved to London's

LBC LBC (originally the London Broadcasting Company) is a British phone-in and talk radio station owned and operated by Global and based in its headquarters in London. It was the UK's first licensed commercial radio station, and began to broadcast ...

as breakfast host from 1999 to 2002.

Classic FM

Bates originally appeared on Classic FM in 1997, presenting the weekly ''Classic Romance'' show. In mid-2002 he was offered his first daily slot, presenting the drivetime show. From June 2003 he hosted the Classic FM weekday breakfast show and the one-hour "Classic FM at the Movies" programme, discussing films and film music on Sunday evening. In September 2006, his programme's hours changed from 711am to 8amnoon. In 2010 Bates was moved to mid morning (9am to 1pm) and shortly afterwards it was announced he left the station in January 2011 to present a show on Smooth Radio.

Gold

As well as his daily show for Classic FM, Bates could also be heard on the

Gold Gold is a chemical element with the symbol Au (from la, aurum) and atomic number 79. This makes it one of the higher atomic number elements that occur naturally. It is a bright, slightly orange-yellow, dense, soft, malleable, and ductile ...

Radio Network every Sunday morning from 8am to noon.

Smooth Radio

On 17 August 2010, it was announced that from January 2011 Simon Bates would take over as host of the Breakfast Show on Smooth Radio, leaving Classic FM after 13 years of broadcasting. Bates' show replaced local programming on a number of regional radio stations and began on 4 January 2011, except for Scottish stations which continued with locally produced shows. He brought back both "The Golden Hour" and "Our Tune" to the show. " The Golden Hour" aired every day from 9am to 10am as it did originally, while Our Tune aired each morning at 8:40am. Other features in the show included the Thousand Pound Minute, where listeners needed to answer ten questions correctly within 60 seconds to win £1,000. In September 2012 the radio industry news website ''

Radio Today Radio Today is a 24 hours radio station in Bangladesh that started airing in May 2006. It is currently available in Dhaka, Chittagong, Cox's Bazar, Khulna, Bogra, Sylhet, Mymensingh, Barishal, Kushtia, Comilla. Information It started as the ...

'' reported that Bates had started to present a separate breakfast show for Smooth Radio's sister station,

Smooth 70s Smooth 70s was a British radio station dedicated to music from the 1970s. Launched by GMG Radio as a sister station to Smooth Radio, it first aired on 27 December 2011, replacing a temporary station GMG had launched for the Christmas period. Th ...

. Smooth Radio did not publicise the show, but confirmed Bates was providing "a little content" when asked about the programme. The content was " voice tracked" from the main breakfast show. Bates left Smooth Radio on 21 March 2014.

BBC Radio Devon

Bates, who lives on a farm in mid-Devon, started hosting the

breakfast show from 6:30am to 10am on weekdays from 12 January 2015. He also featured the Golden Hour from 9am to 10am, the years ranged from 1956 to 2004.

2017

Bates left BBC Radio Devon on 8 January 2017 to "move on to other things." Gordon Sparks took over the breakfast show. On 2 October 2017, Bates participated in Radio 1 Vintage, doing an interview about his time on BBC Radio 1.

2020

In 2020, Bates was hired to do the voice over for Channel 5's weekly countdown of the 30 biggest selling singles of one year in the UK (known under a number of titles such as ''Britains Favourite 80s Songs'', ''The 90s Greatest Hits 1990 -1999'', ''Britain's Biggest 90s Hits'' and ''Britain's Favourite 90s Songs'').

References

External links

Radio Rewind biography
{{DEFAULTSORT:Bates, Simon 1946 births English radio DJs Classical music radio presenters Living people People from Birmingham, West Midlands People educated at Adams' Grammar School BBC Radio 1 presenters BBC Radio 2 presenters Top of the Pops presenters