Joseph Elliott Needham Cooper (7 October 1912 – 4 August 2001), pianist and… Read Full Bio ↴Joseph Elliott Needham Cooper (7 October 1912 – 4 August 2001), pianist and broadcaster, best known as the chairman of the BBC's long-running television panel game Face the Music.
Cooper was born at Westbury-on-Trym, near Bristol, England. He was educated at Clifton College, and then at Keble College, Oxford, where he was an organ scholar, During the 1930s he worked initially as a church organist and piano teacher before joining the GPO Film Unit, where he wrote incidental music for documentaries, including Mony a Pickle (1938) and A Midsummer Day's Work (1939). Here his colleagues included the poet W.H. Auden and the composer Benjamin Britten. He had already embarked on a promising career as a concert pianist when the outbreak of World War II forced him to give up the concert platform for the duration of hostilities. He resumed his career in 1946, studying briefly with Egon Petri and making his London debut in 1947.
Cooper made a number of successful recordings and also began broadcasting on radio. In 1954 he accepted an invitation to work on the BBC radio quiz show Call the Tune. In 1967 the show transferred to television under the title Face the Music. Transmitted on BBC2 and repeated on BBC1, it ran until 1979 and was briefly revived in 1983-4. The show kept Cooper in the public eye, and the "Hidden Melody" round, a regular feature of the show in which he improvised in the style of a composer and cloaked a well-known tune in his elaboate extemporization, served as a vehicle for his great pianistic talent. Face the Music also featured the Dummy Keyboard, in which Cooper played a well-known piano piece on a silent keyboard and the panel had to identify it. The music was gradually faded in for viewers at home.
During the 1960s, Cooper occasionally appeared as one of the presenters of Here Today, a daily 15-minute light current affairs programme broadcast by the independent company TWW, which served South Wales and the West of England. He became known for his acerbic, rather irascible interviewing style and for the fact that he regularly played out the programme with a gentle piano piece.
Cooper was awarded the OBE in 1982. He was married twice, first to Jean Greig from 1947 until her death in 1973, and then Carol Borg, from 1975 until her death in 1996.
Retrieved from "http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joseph_Cooper"
Cooper was born at Westbury-on-Trym, near Bristol, England. He was educated at Clifton College, and then at Keble College, Oxford, where he was an organ scholar, During the 1930s he worked initially as a church organist and piano teacher before joining the GPO Film Unit, where he wrote incidental music for documentaries, including Mony a Pickle (1938) and A Midsummer Day's Work (1939). Here his colleagues included the poet W.H. Auden and the composer Benjamin Britten. He had already embarked on a promising career as a concert pianist when the outbreak of World War II forced him to give up the concert platform for the duration of hostilities. He resumed his career in 1946, studying briefly with Egon Petri and making his London debut in 1947.
Cooper made a number of successful recordings and also began broadcasting on radio. In 1954 he accepted an invitation to work on the BBC radio quiz show Call the Tune. In 1967 the show transferred to television under the title Face the Music. Transmitted on BBC2 and repeated on BBC1, it ran until 1979 and was briefly revived in 1983-4. The show kept Cooper in the public eye, and the "Hidden Melody" round, a regular feature of the show in which he improvised in the style of a composer and cloaked a well-known tune in his elaboate extemporization, served as a vehicle for his great pianistic talent. Face the Music also featured the Dummy Keyboard, in which Cooper played a well-known piano piece on a silent keyboard and the panel had to identify it. The music was gradually faded in for viewers at home.
During the 1960s, Cooper occasionally appeared as one of the presenters of Here Today, a daily 15-minute light current affairs programme broadcast by the independent company TWW, which served South Wales and the West of England. He became known for his acerbic, rather irascible interviewing style and for the fact that he regularly played out the programme with a gentle piano piece.
Cooper was awarded the OBE in 1982. He was married twice, first to Jean Greig from 1947 until her death in 1973, and then Carol Borg, from 1975 until her death in 1996.
Retrieved from "http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joseph_Cooper"
More Genres
No Artists Found
More Artists
Load All
No Albums Found
More Albums
Load All
No Tracks Found
Genre not found
Artist not found
Album not found
Search results not found
Song not found
Mazurka No.5 in B flat Op.7 No.1
Joseph Cooper Lyrics
No lyrics text found for this track.
The lyrics are frequently found in the comments by searching or by filtering for lyric videos
The lyrics are frequently found in the comments by searching or by filtering for lyric videos
@knighthavok4161
The piano took a blood donation 😂
@Michelle6998832
Good one!
@steverisakid
Oop- 🤭😂
@brianthesecond7610
Lol 😂
@step6584
No, a blood sacrifice.
@j_najjs_
Dad jokes LMFAO
@teki4535
The piano was covered in blood because the pianist had weak skin. She said that this usually happens when she plays
@Kinobambino
Woah that's interesting
@GMJ7320
Yeah bro all these videos saying this piece is the hardest are just plain lies
@jaredmann3452
The pianist in question is Yefim Bronfman. He had cut his finger prior to playing with the Bartok’s 3rd piano concerto with the London Symphony Orchestra.