Mike Batt

Michael Philip Batt (born 6 February 1949) is an English singer-songwriter, musician, arranger, record producer, director, and conductor. He served as the Deputy Chairman of the British Phonographic Industry. Batt created the novelty pop band The Wombles, after recording the theme song for the animated BBC series of the same name. He also composed the song "Bright Eyes" for the 1978 animated film Watership Down. Batt promoted the early career of singer Katie Melua after signing her to his label, Dramatico. He wrote, arranged and produced her debut album Call Off the Search and her following two albums. Batt has conducted the London Symphony, Royal Philharmonic, London Philharmonic, Sydney Symphony and Stuttgart Philharmonic. Michael Philip Batt was born in Southampton, England, and attended Peter Symonds School, in Winchester. Batt began his career in pop music when he was 18 by answering an advertisement placed by Ray Williams in the New Musical Express on behalf of Liberty Records. He was initially signed as a songwriter and artist to Liberty, but at the age of 19 became the head of A&R for the label. He signed and produced Tony (TS) McPhee's band, The Groundhogs and produced their first album, Scratching the Surface. He produced, co-wrote and played piano on Hapshash and the Coloured Coat's second album, Western Flier. Additionally, in 1969, Batt was credited as producer/artist on a Liberty single covering The Beatles' "Your Mother Should Know". In the early 1970s, Batt was asked by the producers of a new children's television programme to write the theme music. Instead of taking his £200 fee, Batt asked for the character rights for musical production. He produced his first hits as a singer-songwriter/producer with The Wombles in 1974. The collaboration resulted in eight singles and albums that achieved gold certification. Batt worked with various artists as a songwriter and producer, including Steeleye Span on their album All Around My Hat (1975). Also in 1975, at the end of the summer, he entered the UK Singles Chart with the only hit under his own name "Summertime City" (credited to "Mike Batt with the New Edition"). The song, used as the theme music for the BBC series Seaside Special, reached number 4. Batt produced Elkie Brooks' version of "Lilac Wine" in 1978. The song was a hit in the UK and across Europe. He also wrote the song "Bright Eyes" for the animated film version of Watership Down. Recorded by Art Garfunkel, it reached the number 1 spot on the UK Singles Chart and was number 1 in six countries. Batt also wrote the score for the film Caravans, released in 1978. As a singer, Batt's solo albums included Schizophonia and Tarot Suite (1979, Epic Records) (both with the London Symphony Orchestra). From these albums came the European hit songs "Railway Hotel", "Lady of the Dawn" and "Ride to Agadir". He worked on these recordings with such fellow artists as Colin Blunstone and Roger Chapman as singers on Tarot Suite. A version of "Introduction (The Journey of a Fool)" from Tarot Suite was used as the theme for the Sydney radio station Triple M, from its first broadcast in 1980 until the 1990s. Over the course of May 2010, this theme tune, still based on the main central riff from "Introduction (The Journey of a Fool)" was re-recorded by Slash, former Guns N' Roses guitarist, as a new theme to mark the 30th anniversary of Triple M in Sydney. This was released to air at the end of June 2010. In 1980, Batt released the solo album Waves, recorded at Wisseloord Studios in Hilversum, Netherlands. In the same year, he sailed with his family aboard his boat, Braemar, ending up in Australia after two and a half years, travelling via France, the West Indies, South America, Central America, Mexico, Los Angeles, Hawaii and Fiji. In 1981, on the Los Angeles-Sydney leg of the sea voyage, he was commissioned to write a piece for the 50th anniversary of the Australian Broadcasting Corporation which became the musical fantasy production Zero Zero. Batt designed, co-directed and starred in the studio-based production of Zero Zero shot at Gore Hill studios in Sydney and aired by Channel 4 TV in the UK in the week of the channel's broadcast launch in 1982. The album, featuring Batt with the Sydney Symphony Orchestra, was released on Epic as a Mike Batt solo album. Batt's character Number 17 falls in love and is sent to an emotional decontamination centre called Zero Zero. The single, "Love Makes You Crazy", was released by Sony on Epic Records. Returning to the UK in 1983, Batt wrote, produced and arranged three more Top Ten hits, "Please Don't Fall in Love" (for Cliff Richard), "A Winter's Tale" (for David Essex, with lyrics co-written by Tim Rice) and "I Feel Like Buddy Holly" (for Alvin Stardust). In the same year, he helped write lyrics for Abbacadabra. In 1983, he wrote and produced "Ballerina (Prima Donna)", which, recorded by Steve Harley, peaked at number 51 in the UK. With Richard Stilgoe, Batt co-wrote the lyrics to the title song of Andrew Lloyd Webber's "Phantom of the Opera", producing and arranging the single by Steve Harley and Sarah Brightman. Batt's and Stilgoe's lyrics were later partially replaced by those of Charles Hart. Batt's arrangement of the song is still used in the stage version. The album The Hunting of the Snark, based on Lewis Carroll's poem, was recorded in 1984. However, the album was withheld from sale after a dispute with Sony Music, to whom Batt had leased the self-financed masters. Batt went ahead with a promotional concert at the Royal Albert Hall in 1987, which he filmed at his own expense and was shown on BBC2. In the late 1980s, Batt also produced, arranged and conducted Justin Hayward's album with the London Philharmonic Orchestra entitled Classic Blue and the music for The Dreamstone. A number of stars performed for the Dreamstone soundtrack; including Billy Connolly, Ozzy Osbourne, former British heavyweight boxing champion Frank Bruno, and Bonnie Tyler. Batt performed the programme's theme song, "Better Than A Dream". The first series was completed and broadcast in 1990 and lasted for three more series, ending in 1995. In January 1990, Batt was appointed joint musical director of the Melbourne Summer Music Festival with the State Orchestra of Victoria. Among the classical concerts and other programming he conducted, curated and performed on that visit to Australia, he programmed another costumed concert, The Hunting of the Snark, with narration by Michael Parkinson and the Bellman played by Keith Michell. On a second visit that year, Batt took the opportunity to mount a more ambitious version of the fully expanded show score at the Hills Centre in Castle Hill and at the State Theatre, Sydney. Having tried out the show in Australia, Batt moved towards securing funding and a theatre to mount the show in London's West End, and subsequently did so at the Prince Edward Theatre, opening on 24 October 1991. The production was designed and directed by Batt and starred Philip Quast as the Bellman, David McCallum as Lewis Carroll, and Kenny Everett as the Billiard Marker. There was a 50 piece live orchestra on stage, hidden variously by venetian blinds and gauzes upon which the scenery was projected entirely from more than 200 projectors and involved 12,000 hand-prepared still slides often moving in rapid succession to create animation. This visual technique had been developed by Batt over the years since the launch of his first solo album Schizophonia and had been used in his Zero Zero TV production of 1982. The show ran for seven weeks at the Prince Edward Theatre. In 1995, Batt made a solo album for Sony Germany, Arabesque. Batt was then commissioned to write the official anthem for the inauguration of the Channel Tunnel by the Queen, entitled "When Flags Fly Together". This was performed for the Queen and President Mitterrand, along with many senior politicians, by The Band of the Royal Engineers, and sung by Robert