Annie Nightingale

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Anne Avril Nightingale was born in Osterley, Middlesex, England, on 1 April 1940. She became a fan of blues music as a teenager and began her career as a journalist in Brighton, East Sussex, where she spent a short time at the Brighton and Hove Gazette as a general reporter.

She then became the only woman in the newsroom at The Argus in Brighton, where she wrote a pop music column called ‘Spin With Me’ and worked as a general reporter, court reporter, feature writer, and diarist.

During the early 1960s, Nightingale worked in television, both as a reporter for the BBC’s Southampton- and Bristol-based news programme South Today, and light entertainment and music programmes for ITV’s Southern TV.

She was invited to host a short-lived sister TV show to Ready, Steady, Go! called That’s For Me for Associated-Rediffusion, where she booked guest musicians who had not previously been seen on television, such as The Yardbirds.

She also hosted other specials for Associated-Rediffusion, including The Glad Rag Ball at Wembley (starring The Rolling Stones), and the British Song Festival in Brighton. She also made numerous appearances on Ready, Steady, Go! and was a guest on their New Year’s Eve Specials.

The following year, Nightingale co-hosted the music series, Sing A Song Of Sixpence, with host Ronan O’Casey. Later, she appeared in the BBC TV series A Whole Scene Going and on Juke Box Jury.

She launched a chain of fashion boutiques in the 1960s, which swiftly became known as Snob. She also became a well-known fashion model at the time while writing regular columns for leading youth magazines, including Town, Fabulous, Honey 19, and Petticoat. She specialised in writing about teen issues, burgeoning feminist perspectives and social issues.

She also wrote for the music magazine Disc and Music Echo and was the pop music columnist and feature writer for Cosmopolitan when it launched in the UK in 1970.

Annie Nightingale spun her first disc as a Radio 1 presenter in 1970 – the first-ever female DJ on the station to do so. She remained a broadcaster there for 53 years.

In 1978, Annie also became the main presenter of The Old Grey Whistle Test on BBC2, replacing longtime host Bob Harris.

During her time with the show, it moved away from its traditional bias towards country music, blues rock and progressive rock and embraced popular modern styles such as punk rock and new wave. She left the series in 1982.

As a DJ, she travelled and performed all over the world, from Ibiza to Paris, New York, Los Angeles, Austin, Barcelona, Warsaw, and at major European festivals such as Sziget in Budapest and Roskilde in Denmark, as well as at all the major British festivals, including Glastonbury.

She also broadcast TV and Radio documentaries during visits to Russia, Romania, Iraq, Chile, the Philippines, USA, France, Ibiza, Japan, China, India and Cuba.

While in Havana in 1996, she was injured during a mugging, resulting in multiple injuries requiring an air-lift to a London hospital, since which she wore the distinctive shades which became part of her image.

She was awarded an OBE in 2002 for her services to radio broadcasting. In 2010, she received a Guinness World Records title for the longest career as a female radio presenter (pictured).

She was made an MBE in 2002 and appointed Commander of the Order of the British Empire (CBE) in the 2020 New Year Honours.

Nightingale published two autobiographical books: Chase The Fade (1981) and Wicked Speed (1999). Her 2020 memoir, entitled Hey Hi Hello, celebrated five decades of pop culture.

She was married twice – eloping to Brighton when she was 19 with writer Gordon Thomas, with whom she had two children (they divorced in 1968) and marrying actor Anthony Baker in 1978. They also later divorced.

Her final appearance on BBC Radio 1 was in December 2023, when she presented a “Best of 2023” show.

Annie Nightingale died on 11 January 2024, aged 83, following a short illness.