Aubrey Edward Singer CBE (21 January 1927 – 26 May 2007) was a British broadcasting executive who spent most of his career at the

BBC The British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) is a British public service broadcaster headquartered at Broadcasting House in London, England. Originally established in 1922 as the British Broadcasting Company, it evolved into its current sta ...

. He has been described as "the greatest director general that the BBC never had". Singer was born in

Bradford Bradford is a city status in the United Kingdom, city in West Yorkshire, England. It became a municipal borough in 1847, received a city charter in 1897 and, since the Local Government Act 1972, 1974 reform, the city status in the United Kingdo ...

England England is a Countries of the United Kingdom, country that is part of the United Kingdom. It is located on the island of Great Britain, of which it covers about 62%, and List of islands of England, more than 100 smaller adjacent islands. It ...

, left school aged 17 to train as a

film editor Film editing is both a creative and a technical part of the post-production process of filmmaking. The term is derived from the traditional process of working with film stock, film which increasingly involves the use Digital cinema, of digital ...

, and joined the

in 1949. He was head of the Features Group which included Science & Features, Arts Features, and General Features. This group largely made documentary programmes. Singer took the lead in finding international funding for very ambitious co-productions, leading to the so-called 'Science Spectaculars' written by Nigel Calder, and then the 13-part "personal view" series such as '' Civilisation'' (1969) and ''

The Ascent of Man ''The Ascent of Man'' is a 13-part British documentary television series produced by the BBC and Time-Life Films first broadcast in 1973. It was written and presented by Polish-British mathematician and historian of science Jacob Bronowsk ...

'' (1973). He was also largely responsible for the historic 1967 '' Our World'' global satellite broadcast, which featured

The Beatles The Beatles were an English Rock music, rock band formed in Liverpool in 1960. The core lineup of the band comprised John Lennon, Paul McCartney, George Harrison and Ringo Starr. They are widely regarded as the Cultural impact of the Beatle ...

. Singer was the controller of

BBC2 BBC Two is a British free-to-air public broadcast television channel owned and operated by the BBC. It is the corporation's second flagship channel, and it covers a wide range of subject matter, incorporating genres such as comedy, drama and ...

from 1974 until 1978, who replaced Robin Scott and was replaced himself by Brian Wenham. He spoke to the Oxford University Broadcasting Society in 1975. From 1978 Singer was managing director of

BBC Radio BBC Radio is an operational business division and service of the British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) which has operated in the United Kingdom under the terms of a royal charter since 1927. The service provides national radio stations cove ...

and from 1982 he was managing director of BBC Television. He was appointed a CBE in 1984. After early retirement from the BBC, he established White City Films where he was managing director until 1996. Singer married Cynthia Adams in 1949 and they had two children.

References

External links

Aubrey Singer: Obituary
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The Independent ''The Independent'' is a British online newspaper. It was established in 1986 as a national morning printed paper. Nicknamed the ''Indy'', it began as a broadsheet and changed to tabloid format in 2003. The last printed edition was publis ...

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History of BBC2 Controllers by Ian Jones
1927 births 2007 deaths Mass media people from Bradford BBC executives BBC Two controllers English chief executives British film studio executives Commanders of the Order of the British Empire 20th-century English businesspeople {{UK-tv-bio-stub