Go-Jos

The Go-Jos were a British TV dance troupe, created for the BBC1 TV music chart show Top of the Pops in late 1964, appearing regularly on the show until mid-1968. They were the first of a series of five dance troupes on the programme. They also appeared on other BBC and ITV shows, finally disbanding in 1971.

Formation

The troupe were formed by Jo Cook, who had been a member of the TV dance troupe the Silhouettes in the early 1960s. She then became a founder member of the Beat Girls, appearing in the weekly pop show on BBC2, The Beat Room, from July 1964. She was forced to leave the Beat Girls in October 1964 due to a contractual dispute.

In November 1964, Top of the Pops producers had decided a dance troupe was needed to perform when the act was not available. Jo Cook won the job of providing this troupe, and so created the group, the Go-Jos, named after herself Their first performance was on 19 November 1964 dancing to Baby Love by The Supremes. The group usually danced on Top of the Pops to the latest pop hits dressed in the mini skirts and high boots that were fashionable at the time.^[1]. The Go-Jos were not fully resident; they typically only appeared every few weeks.

Top of the Pops

In the first few months on Top of the Pops, Linda Hotchkin and Jane Bartlett performed with Pat Hughes. Pat Hughes left in early 1965 and Jo Cook herself appeared over the next few months.

The troupe changed again in later 1965 when Jo Cook finally quit dancing to focus on choreography. Barbara von der Heyde and Thelma Bignell joined, and Jane Bartlett temporarily left, creating a three-person group.

Jane Bartlett rejoined in early 1967, and the group expanded to six in 1968 with the addition of Lesley Larbey and Wendy Hilhouse.

However the BBC decided in mid-1968 to replace the Go-Jos with Pan's People on Top of the Pops.

Their final performance was on 27 June 1968 dancing to Jumping Jack Flash by The Rolling Stones.

Only one Top of the Pops performance by the Go-Jos is known to survive, Reflections by Diana Ross and the Supremes^[2], transmitted on the 26th of December, 1967.

The Jo Cook Dancers

Jo Cook created a second group, the Jo Cook dancers which appeared on the last two series of Thank Your Lucky Stars. This group had two distinct phases:

Season 5 Summer Spin (Apr 3 1965 -> Jun 26 1965): A new group of four dancers (Sacha Davis, Linda Lawrence, Susan Robinson, Diane South) was used primarily in fashion sequences with Jackie Cryer.

Season 6 (Oct 2 1965 -> Dec 31 1966): The Go-Jo dancers (Linda Hotchkin, Jane Bartlett, Barbara von der Heyde and Thelma Bignell) were used, in performances with a chart band.

Timeline

The following chart shows the timeline of the GoJos on Top of the Pops and the Jo Cook dancers and GoJos on Thank Your Lucky Stars.

Later years

The group continued for several years appearing on a variety of TV shows, including the Val Doonincan show and the Goodies. As The Go-Jos, they worked with Lulu again in 1967 on the music and comedy series Three of a Kind, which also featured Mike Yarwood.

The group appeared in the film Moon Zero Two in 1969.^[3]

Jo Cook and Linda Hotchkin appeared in Top of the Pops: The True Story in 2001 talking about their time on Top of the Pops^[4]

References

External links

• Gojos performances, biographies and interviews