Introduction

Vintage Sixties Live is a non-commercial project, set up to bring together musicians who worked the NE Club Circuit during the fabulous sixties, and we celebrated our first birthday in style at Tudhoe Victory Club on Thursday 14th June.

Alan Leightell (the co-organiser) and myself have been amazed at the incredible success the venture has enjoyed over the last twelve months.

The Vintage Sixties Live website

has had over 30000 “hits”
has been visited by people from over 500 locations in the world during the last few weeks alone
now contains details of over 100 local groups from the Sixties
photos taken during the club nights are regularly viewed by over 1000 people each month
video clips posted on www.youtube.com have received over 12000 viewings
has been featured on at least four radio stations.
has received messages of support from several of the Sixties superstars


The Monthly Club Nights have

featured over 70 different performers and 300 different Sixties tracks
featured performers from as far afield as Australia, Italy, Spain and the USA. A top Sixties tribute group from Holland are scheduled to appear later in the year.
a regular audience made up of people from all parts of Durham, Northumberland, Teesside and even North Yorkshire.
raised over £2000 for local charitable causes and is currently planning another local Charity Spectacular for later in the year.


Malcolm Rocks, has recorded every one of the monthly shows on video and taken literally hundreds of still photographs of the performers over the last year - many of which are displayed on the web site www.vintagesixtieslive.co.uk

Each month we feature almost three hours of non-stop music with guest performers who travel from a wide area – Consett, Yarm, Tyneside, Birmingham and Italy to name but a few – and represent the whole range of Sixties Music – R&B, male vocal, female vocal, harmony, instrumental, ballad, acoustic and rock and roll. In one hastily arranged group, jamming on stage, I counted at least four local performers whose singles had been released in the Sixties with different acts – and they were all performing together.

One night we even had a visit from legendary local drummer Alan White who was happy to jam with his old Downbeats colleagues.

One unexpected development over the year has been the way the club nights have attracted the younger element. Several of the performers were not even born in the Sixties but are happy to perform music of that era just to be part of the atmosphere and camaraderie surrounding Vintage Sixties Live and the opportunity to perform to a full house – which is in itself a rarity in clubland these days.