Vince Eager aka Roy Taylor (b1940)

VINCE Eager – born Roy Taylor – has been entertaining the public for more than 65 years.

From a 12-year-old hitting the high Cs in Ruston and Hornsby’s pantomime to a cruise director on the high seas – and he seized the opportunity to play the King in the meantime.

He was there at rock ’n’ roll’s conception and still proves this simplistic style of music is one of the most enduring.

Yet although he associated with and outlived the likes of Eddie Cochrane, Gene Vincent and Billy Fury, the big hit record evaded him.

Instead, he made a TV and stage career which took him around the world.

His singing debut was in St John in Spitalgate church choir, then into amateur (Ruston & Hornsby)pantomime.

A pupil at the Boys’ Central School he formed a trio called the Harmonica Vagabonds.

Then along came Lonnie Donegan with Rock Island Line and every lad with any musical ambition became hooked on skiffle.

By then an apprentice joiner at Fosters, Vince made a tea-chest bass for Brian ‘Liquorish’ Locking (later to join the Shadows) discovered an old banjo and with Roy Clarke learned the fundamentals of guitar playing.

Mick Fretwell joined on drums and the four rehearsed at Vince’s Stamford Street home.

The breakthrough came in 1957, when they entered the National Skiffle Championship and came second (Vince is still convinced ‘We was robbed’).

After appearing at the legendary Two Is coffee bar, Soho, for an undreamed of £20 a week each, Roy and Mick soon became disillusioned with showbiz and returned home to their apprenticeships.

Vince and Brian stuck it out, becoming the Gumdrops before supporting Marty Wilde.

Vince was signed by promoter Larry Parnes, who already had Tommy Steele, Marty Wilde, Adam Faith and Georgie Fame.

His closest to having a hit record was Why/El Paso which reached the lower end of the Top 20, while his Primrose Lane was a favourite only in an obscure Woman’s Own poll.

After a residency at Churchill’s Club, New Bond Street, he became a regular on the first TV pop music programme Six-Five Special.

Ironically, because it was on BBC, Vince became better known in Scotland where commercial TV had yet to make an impact, than ITV’s Oh Boy presenter Cliff Richard.

He had hoped to represent the UK in the 1960 Eurovision Song Contest, but the sackloads of mail to Broadcasting House about his rendition of the Teenage Years, were not votes, but complaints about his Italian-style suit.

But the BBC did not reject him and he presented Six-Five Special’s successor Drumbeat.

In the early 1970s he toured for three years with his band Clockwork Toys then joined luxury cruise ships as resident singer on both Canberra and Black Watch.

In 1977 he auditioned for Elvis the Musical and was offered the job as title role understudy to PJ Proby, an offer he turned down.

But after Proby left in 1980, Vince took over in Glasgow and carried the show around the world, from Australia to Swaziland and even seven months in Canada.

He returned to sea as a cruise director, in charge of entertainment for cruise ships in the Caribbean and Mediterranean.

He now has his feet more firmly on the ground, living at Radcliffe-on-Trent and is often seen in Grantham, but still tours with various shows and is still in touch with the men who made English rock in the 1960s.

Ironically, Vince was supporting his hero Lonnie Donegan on his final performance in Nottingham, in 2002, whose life was cut short by a heart attack shortly afterwards.