Disc Jockey and Radio Presenter
He is most remembered as a former BBC Radio 2 radio presenter.
In the Pink Floyd song, One Of These Days, Nick Mason precedes a threat towards him, "One of these days I'm going to cut you into little pieces," because of his tendency to babble.
After a spell with Radio Luxembourg, Young joined the BBC as one of the first disc jockeys on BBC Radio 1, presenting the weekday mid-morning show from 1967 to 1973 and because of his popularity soon became known as the 'Housewives' Choice'. In 1973, he joined BBC Radio 2, where he presented a regular programme (which he referred to as 'The JY Prog'), until his retirement from broadcasting at the end of 2002. His show was a mixture of music, chat and current affairs and over the next couple of decades, he interviewed every British Prime Minister on the show as well as royalty including Prince Philip, Anne The Princess Royal and Princess Grace of Monaco. His easy, laid back style became the voice of Radio 2. His distinctive theme music was "Town Talk" by Ken Woodman & His Piccadilly Brass. BFN ('Bye for now) was one of his catchphrases.
Although he was offered the opportunity to present a weekend current affairs programme, he turned it down. His radio slot was taken over by the former Newsnight presenter, Jeremy Vine. Shortly after leaving the BBC, Jimmy Young wrote a newspaper column attacking his former employer for instances of "brutality", and making clear that it had not been his idea to leave.
Sir Jimmy Young returned to BBC Radio 2 in 2011 with a special one-hour programme in celebration of his 90th birthday. Sir Jimmy Young At 90, broadcast on Tuesday 20 September 2011 at 10pm, heard him in conversation with his friend and former sparring partner Ken Bruce, looking back over his career. In March 2012 Jimmy Young returned to presenting on BBC Radio 2 after over 9 years when he joined Desmond Carrington on a weekly show entitled 'Icons of the 50s'. Young has been rewarded with several honours over the years: an OBE in 1979; a CBE in 1993; and, at the beginning of 2002, he was knighted for services to broadcasting. Young continues to write a weekly column for the Sunday Express newspaper.
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Famous quotes containing the words disc jockey, disc, jockey, radio and/or presenter:
“This is D.J., Disc Jockey to American turning off. Vietnam, hot dam.”
—Norman Mailer (b. 1923)
“Perhaps all music, even the newest, is not so much something discovered as something that re-emerges from where it lay buried in the memory, inaudible as a melody cut in a disc of flesh. A composer lets me hear a song that has always been shut up silent within me.”
—Jean Genet (1910–1986)
“Radio news is bearable. This is due to the fact that while the news is being broadcast the disc jockey is not allowed to talk.”
—Fran Lebowitz (b. 1951)
“We spend all day broadcasting on the radio and TV telling people back home what’s happening here. And we learn what’s happening here by spending all day monitoring the radio and TV broadcasts from back home.”
—P.J. (Patrick Jake)
“It is more than likely that the brain itself is, in origin and development, only a sort of great clot of genital fluid held in suspense or reserved.... This hypothesis ... would explain the enormous content of the brain as a maker or presenter of images.”
—Ezra Pound (1885–1972)