DANA@50 Turn Your Radio On 1972 (FoD#87)

Reasons to be cheerful, part 87. The Val Doonican Show featured 20-year-old DANA on Saturday 18 March 1972. Her unusual flying through the airwaves performance of this 1939 gospel song is really good and the audience loved it. A week later the Ray Stevens version it was based on entered the UK singles chart at #43, peaking at 33. But turn your radio on today and you certainly won't hear DANA's joyful rendition, because it never appeared on a single or album. This dizzy video more than makes up for that, though. The song is not about turning a radio on, of course, but turning yourself on to God.

Well come and listen in to a radio station
Where the mighty hosts of heaven sing
Turn your radio on, turn your radio on
If you wanna feel those good vibrations
Coming from the joy that His love can bring
Turn your radio on, turn your radio on

Turn your radio on and listen to the music in the air
Turn your radio on and glory share
Turn the lights down low and listen to the Master's radio
Get in touch with God, turn your radio on

Don't you know that everyone has a radio receiver
All you've got to do is listen to the call
Turn your radio on, turn your radio on
If you listen in you will be a believer
Leaning on the truth that will never fall
Get in touch with God, turn your radio on

Turn your radio on and listen to the music in the air
Turn your radio on and glory share
Turn the lights down low and listen to the Master's radio
Get in touch with God, turn your radio on

Turn your radio on and listen to the music in the air
Turn your radio on and glory share
Turn the lights down low and listen to the Master's radio
Get in touch with God, turn your radio on
Get in touch with God, turn your radio on
Turn your radio on

Written by Albert E. Brumley

Trivia 1: Val Doonican left us five years ago today: "Michael Valentine Doonican (3 February 1927 – 1 July 2015) was an Irish singer of traditional pop, easy listening, and novelty songs, who was noted for his warm and relaxed style. A crooner, he found popular success, especially in the United Kingdom where he had five successive Top 10 albums in the 1960s as well as several hits on the UK Singles Chart, including "If the Whole World Stopped Lovin'", "Walk Tall" and "Elusive Butterfly". The Val Doonican Show, which featured his singing and a variety of guests, had a long and successful run on BBC Television from 1965 to 1986, and Doonican won the Variety Club of Great Britain's BBC-TV Personality of the Year award three times." (Wikipedia)

Trivia 2: "Val, a fellow Irish person, was a huge star with a very laid-back style. Nonetheless he was the ultimate professional in his work. I had often seen him on television and it was a thrill to be working with him. Val's a fine painter too and Damien and I still have the beautiful watercolour he gave us before we went to live in America." (DANA, All Kinds of Everything autobiography 2007)