TopPop

''TopPop'' was a Dutch television programme. It was the first regular dedicated pop music television series in the Dutch language area. The Netherlands broadcaster AVRO aired the programme weekly from 22 September 1970 to 27 June 1988. Presenter Ad Visser hosted for its first fifteen years. The creator and original director of ''TopPop'' was Rien van Wijk. Many other directors followed: Egbert van Hees, Geert Popma, Henk Renou, Chris Berger, Jessy Winkelman, Wim van der Linden, Bert van der Veer and Charly Noise. Although ''TopPop'' was inspired by British music programme ''Top of the Pops'', it had its own character.

Description

The main approach was to let music artists mime to their latest hit record in the ''TopPop'' studio. However, most music acts in the Dutch pop charts were foreign to the Netherlands, and frequently not available for a performance in the studio. If this was the case, it was sometimes possible for the ''TopPop'' camera crew to meet the artist at another location. Consequently, artists were filmed around the world, including Tom Browne in a studio in New York City, David Cassidy at the airport in Schiphol, and Barry White at his home in Los Angeles. If there was no way to feature the artists on ''TopPop'', their promo video would be played - if one existed, since prior to the 1980s these were not routinely created. If all else failed, there was a fourth option that the programme frequently had to resort to: hit songs were played to a dance routine by dancer and choreographer Penney de Jager and her troupe. When music videos became more common on television, the popularity of ''TopPop'' decreased and the programme was stopped in 1988. ''TopPop'' was chosen as the programme of the century in a poll in 2000 by Televizier.

For many Dutch and Flemish viewers, ''TopPop'' was the primary source of information about pop music. ''TopPop'' compiled its own hit chart, based on viewers' top-ten lists, sent in on postcards, from 1970 to 1974, from 1978 to 1982 and from 23 February 1986 to 10 July 1988. However, it used the Dutch National Hitparade, a sales-based list, from 1974 to 1978 and from 1982 to 1986.

In the last programme of each year, the annual complete Top 10 was broadcast. There were performances by studio guests, and there were polls among viewers on the most popular artist, group and DJ. Looking back on the year 1976, Ad Visser and Krijn Torringa were sitting behind a desk in an office which made it a parody of ''Van Oekel's Discohoek''. This absurd programme was itself a parody of ''TopPop''.

Notable performances include one in 1977, by Iggy Pop, who refused to leave his dressing room and then, during a rehearsal, stormed dramatically and unexpectedly onto the studio floor. He spent most of the song writhing on the floor without a shirt on, miming his hit single and destroying some plants that had been put on the floor as decoration. For many young viewers in the Netherlands, this was their first encounter with punk rock.

Some ''TopPop''-made videos were of such quality, the performing artist chose to use it as their promotional video. Examples are the 1974 sequence of an eye-patched David Bowie miming to "Rebel Rebel", and Nena walking through a wood-cuttery at Crailoo near Hilversum, imagining a post-war devastated area fit for the Cold War atmosphere of her 1983 hit "99 Red Balloons".

The famous archive of performances can be viewed online.

File:Gerry Beckley (America) - TopPop 1972 1.png, America (1972)
File:Middle Of The Road 925-3455.jpg, Middle of the Road (1972)
File:Fairport Convention - TopPop 1972 8.png, Fairport Convention (1972)
File:ABBA1974TopPop.jpg, ABBA (1974)
File:BowieTopPop1974-2.jpg, David Bowie (1974)
File:Golden Earring - TopPop 1974 5.png, Golden Earring (1974)
File:Brian Eno - TopPop 1974 11.png, Brian Eno (1974)
File:Focus - TopPop 1974 5.png, Focus (1974)
File:Slade - TopPop 1974 1.png, Slade (1974)
File:Ivan Heylen - TopPop 1974 2.png, ' (1974)

Variety of music style

The list of performers during 18 years of TopPop is of course quite large. Most stunning is the variety of music style: from mainstream (ABBA, Charles Aznavour, Bee Gees, The Carpenters, John Denver, Everly Brothers, Elton John, the Pointer Sisters ) to new or experimental (David Bowie, Kate Bush, Joe Jackson, Roxy Music), and from middle of the road music (Boney M., Middle of the Road, Nana Mouskouri) to ska and punk ( The Beat, Elvis Costello, Ian Dury and The Blockheads, Iggy Pop, Siouxsie and the Banshees).

References

External links

TopPop archive

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Dutch music television series
1970s Dutch television series
1980s Dutch television series
1970 Dutch television series debuts
1988 Dutch television series endings
Pop music television series