The picture on the left No 7 is with some of the dancers from the Pavilion, including on the right, Rainey, the lady who was to become my second wife. And I loved it! We did pop songs with orchestras and sketches like this Dracula one, (pictured right No 6 ). STV did a one-off special around me and then we did eight weeks in my own series. Later we did the London Palladium together and it was one of my greatest moments. Sometimes we’d be gigging in the same place like Aberdeen or whatever and we’d give him a lift back in our van. I would then meet him at gigs he did with the Humblbums. In 1978 I supported Billy Connolly on his British tour.Īt this time I actually lived next door to him in Hyndland and we’d blether quite a lot. Old friends still call me Chris but I think the change worked. I was with the same management company as Billy Connolly and the boss, Frank Lynch, told me to change my name, suggesting Chris McClure wasn’t showbiz enough. If only Hughie had let me sing an up tempo song…. I remember Hughie Green was quite brutal with some of the other acts. It’s their night.Īround this time I did OPPOTUNITY KNOCKS, after auditions at the Locarno. I learned it was my job to make the punters enjoy themselves. This is really were I learned the business. In fact, we started a trend in the north-east playing American music with all the local bands copying us.
In those days every wee village had a hall and we’d fill the lot of them. We were a unit – we split the money five ways, and the bands success grew. The boys weren’t annoyed at my name now fronting the band because we were all such good friends and there was no animosity at all. We figured we needed a new name so the band became the Chris McClure Section, and it looked good on the drum! (No 4) In 1971 I heard STV producer David Bell was looking for a singer for a new show called STRAMASH. I even did some impersonations at the time, people like Johnny Mathis and Kirk Douglas. Anyway, it went really well and we did some Drifters and Buddy Holly songs and I introduced harmonies into the band. I had sung since my days in the BB’s and I loved music.įor the first gig I think we got about £2-a-night. One day I saw a wee ad in the local paper for a band looking for a singer. I was 19 and I had been working as a clerk at the William Brock flour mill in York Street, sometimes helping load the vans when work in the office was quiet. I had joined local group The Fireflies at the time. You’ll never guess what it was called locally – The Black Man!”” – and the audience laugh at that. There’s a point in the new show where I say to the audience,“”One of the first places I played in Glasgow was a pub in Govan. My mum married a Norwegian seaman and he was brilliant. I’m curious to know more about him now, but back then it wasn’t so important. I did meet him once though, when I was wee.Īll I can remember is this black face with big eyes looking down at me. I’m not entirely sure of the story, but I think my granny wasn’t too keen on my mum marrying him. I never knew my father, an American entertainer called Chris Gill, who would come over here and play the lead in shows like Bye Bye Birdy. I think she was about eighteen when she had me.
This is my mum Leanorra, who actually used to be a dancer – one of the Morganettes – at the Pavilion, and it’s only now I realise what a pivotal role that theatre was to play in my life. Later on though, I became a director at Motherwell and it was nice to get away from the labelling you can suffer from some of the eejits in Glasgow. Staying across the road from Ibrox was really handy because I’d go to see them play everybody. I played for the BOYS BRIGADE and the school team on a Saturday.įormer Scotland boss Andy Roxburgh was in the team and I remember he didn’t like to header the ball! “I enjoyed my time at school in Bellahouston, but my real love was football. CHRISTIAN, the artist formerly known as Chris McClure, is one of Scotland’s great showbiz survivor stories.įor 50 years, the Ibrox-born singer has entertained audiences from village halls to the Royal Albert Hall.