Sheila Tracy (née Lugg; 10 January 1934 – 30 September 2014) was a British broadcaster, writer, musician, and singer. She began her career as a

trombone The trombone (german: Posaune, Italian, French: ''trombone'') is a musical instrument in the brass family. As with all brass instruments, sound is produced when the player's vibrating lips cause the air column inside the instrument to vibrat ...

player during the 1950s. in all-female bands.

Biography

Sheila Lugg was born in

Mullion, Cornwall Mullion ( kw, Eglosvelyan) is a civil parishes in England, civil parish and village on the The Lizard, Lizard Peninsula in south Cornwall, England, United Kingdom. The nearest town is Helston approximately to the north. Mullion civil parish enc ...

in 1934. She attended Truro Girls School and studied

piano The piano is a stringed keyboard instrument in which the strings are struck by wooden hammers that are coated with a softer material (modern hammers are covered with dense wool felt; some early pianos used leather). It is played using a musica ...

violin The violin, sometimes known as a ''fiddle'', is a wooden chordophone (string instrument) in the violin family. Most violins have a hollow wooden body. It is the smallest and thus highest-pitched instrument (soprano) in the family in regular ...

and

at the

Royal Academy of Music The Royal Academy of Music (RAM) in London, England, is the oldest conservatoire in the UK, founded in 1822 by John Fane and Nicolas-Charles Bochsa. It received its royal charter in 1830 from King George IV with the support of the first Duke ...

, then was a member of the

Ivy Benson Ivy Benson (11 November 1913 – 6 May 1993) was an English musician and bandleader, who led an all-female swing band. Benson and her band gained prominence in the 1940s, headlining variety theatres and topping the bill at the London Palladium, ...

All Girls Band between 1956 and 1958. Subsequently, she formed a vocal/trombone duo, The Tracy Sisters, who appeared in variety, on radio and television, as well as in cabaret all over the world. When the act broke up, she joined

BBC Television BBC Television is a service of the BBC. The corporation has operated a Public service broadcasting in the United Kingdom, public broadcast television service in the United Kingdom, under the terms of a royal charter, since 1927. It produced t ...

as an announcer and worked mostly in television until 1974 when she became the first female newsreader on

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 Talk radio, spoken-word programmes, including news, drama, comedy, science and history fro ...

on 16 July. She also qualified as a Special Policewoman in London. On

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 ...

Tracy devised and presented the ''Truckers' Hour'', based on a format she had learnt about on a visit to the USA. Two of the books she wrote are ''Bands, Booze & Broads'' (1995), a collection of her interviews with the American sidemen who played with the top bands in the 1930s, 1940s and 1950s; and ''Talking Swing'' (1997), on British musicians of the same era. She became a popular lecturer on

P&O Cruises P&O Cruises is a British cruise line based at Carnival House in Southampton, England, operated by Carnival UK and owned by Carnival Corporation & plc. It was originally a subsidiary of the shipping company P&O and was founded in 1977. Alon ...

and wrote two other reference works. In 1997, she was given the

Freedom of the City of London The Freedom of the City of London started around 1237 as the status of a 'free man' or 'citizen', protected by the charter of the City of London and not under the jurisdiction of a feudal lord. In the Middle Ages, this developed into a freedom or ...

and became an Associate of the

. She was a former President of the British Trombone Society. She was married to actor John Arnatt from 1962 until his death in 1999. The couple had one son, born in 1965. Tracy died at the age of 80, on 30 September 2014, at the Princess Alice Hospice in

Esher Esher ( ) is a town in Surrey, England, to the east of the River Mole, Surrey, River Mole. Esher is an outlying suburb of London near the London-Surrey Border, and with Esher Commons at its southern end, the town marks one limit of the Greate ...

, Surrey. She was survived by her son."Sheila Tracy: Former radio and TV host dies"
BBC News, 1 October 2014

Books

*1983, ''Who’s Who on Radio'' *1984, ''Who’s Who in Popular Music'' *1995, ''Bands, Booze And Broads'', Edinburgh:

Mainstream Publishing Mainstream Publishing was a publishing company in Edinburgh, Scotland. Founded in 1978, it ceased trading in December 2013.Charlotte WilliamsMainstream to cease publishing 1 March 2013, The Bookseller.com' (Retrieved 30 December 2016) It was ass ...

, *1997, ''Talking Swing: British Big Bands'', Edinburgh: Mainstream Publishing,

References

External links

*
British Trombone Society

{{DEFAULTSORT:Tracy, Sheila 1934 births 2014 deaths Alumni of the Royal Academy of Music British jazz trombonists British radio personalities British women writers People educated at Truro High School People from Cornwall