The sad news of Flick Colby’s death at the weekend immediately evoked nostalgic memories of her dance troupe Pan’s People, from the days when Top of the Pops was in it’s pomp and at the peak of it’s powers.

When I first started watching Top of the Pops at the age of 11 in 1974, my pre-pubescent status meant that I was irritated by the three minute break for dancing by Pan’s People, because it delayed me from seeing my favourite acts like Slade, Sweet and Mud. Within a year or two, coinciding with my arrival into the world of adolesence, I was clammering for their three minute performance!! Pan’s People glided around the stage effortlessly, performing to a chart hit, where the act were not able to perform it in the studio that particular week. And Flick Colby was responsible for engineering the choreography for the Pan’s People routines.

Flick Colby formed Pan’s People in 1966 with Babs Lord, Ruth Pearson and Dee Dee Wilde. Louise Clarke and Andi Rutherford were recruited to complete the famous line up. Their performances on Top of the Pops were synonymous with a cheekiness that made their inherent sexiness and sensuality palatable and acceptable to a family audience.

It’s Legs and Co and Arlene Phillips’s Hot Gossip, the troupes who came after them, who are remembered for their risque and more blatantly sexual performances. But Pan’s People courted their fair share of controversy too, inciting the wrath of Mary Whitehouse when they corrupted the Jim’ll Fix It studio!! Their final performance on Top of the Pops was in April 1976, dancing to Silver Star by The Four Seasons – a performance that was aired a few weeks ago on BBC4’s re-run of Top of the Pops. Legend and folklore say that Pan was a Greek god that loved to play his pan pipes. He presided over the shepherds and their flocks, the mountains, hunters, and rustic music. Therefore there is a certain irony that Pan’s People bowed out from Top of the Pops a couple of months before Greek crooner, Demis Roussoss, appeared wailing like a Greek mountain goat, with his No1 hit “Forever and Ever”!!

Pan’s People were an integral part of Top of the Pops, at a time when the TV show had real clout and influence. A performance by a band or solo artist on the programme almost guaranteed chart success – and that Chart rundown / countdown at the beginning of the show, underscored by CCS’ “Whole Lotta Love” was what it was all about!! The unveiling of the new Top 30 between 12-45 and 1pm ( after Laurie Mayer’s Newsbeat ) on Johnnie Walker’s Radio 1 lunchtime show was a massive deal – adults and schoolchildren would be glued to their transistor radios in their lunchbreaks!!

But let’s leave the last thought and the last dance to Flick Colby, who brought glamour and chic to the institution that was Top of the Pops…….

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