Just before midnight last night I was looking at the official website of Tony Hart in an attempt to find the theme tune to his 1980s kids show Hart Beat. My aim – ultimately achieved – was to stream it through the stereo in order to prove to friends what a fine piece of electro it is. (My Delicious page shows the bookmark with yesterday’s date.)
It was consequently quite weird to wake up a few hours later and see on the news that Hart has died at the age of 83. It’s only with the benefit of hindsight that you realise how great his various TV series were. The clip below shows the title sequence – a typography enthusiast’s dream – and music in all its glory, as well as the first half-minute or so of a random Hart Beat episode with a slightly peculiar and spatula-heavy scripted intro.
RIP.
The Conversation {5 comments}
It’s all rather lovely isn’t it? I agree – it IS a fantastic piece of music in its own right. I actually hunted it down myself a few months ago in similar fashion.
Of course nowadays you couldn’t possibly do a show like Heartbeat. The Guardian and Daily Mail would no doubt expose the show as a sham – I highly doubt that Jo didn’t know the location of the spatula all along. More TV Beeb fakery shame.
yeah but whos that music by?????
The music for Hart Beat is by David Owen Smith, according the the credits in this clip : http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=&feature=related
I don’t know who he is, although as it’s a BBC kids show from the mid-80′s I guess he may well have been one of the Radiophonic workshop staff musicians. The music certainly has a ‘paddy kingsland’ sort of feel to it, but who knows.
Hello, I’m David Owen Smith. Many thanks for your kind commments about the Hartbeat theme music.
I wrote many pieces of background music for Take Hart, including the title music and also the gallery tune for the very last series of that programme. I was alas not one of the radiophonic workshop staff. I was commissioned to write the Hartbeat theme by the show’s producer.
Prior to that I was a pop guitarist/vocalist and appeared on Top of The Pops in 1977 playing guitar for The Banned (see youtube – I’m the one with the red trousers!!)
I’m hoping to get the Hartbeat theme tune in downloadable form in the near future.
How will we find out where and when the theme tune is available? It is fantastic.
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