Nat Temple

The Stage Wednesday June 4, 2008

Band leader Temple dies.

Nat Temple, one of Britain’s most famous big band leaders, has died aged 94.
Temple won fame providing the music and appearing on the sixties TV satire show Breakfast with Braden, with Bernard Braden and his wife Barbara Kelly.
He also played music and appeared on many other TV shows including Crackerjack, Dick Emery at Large, The Time of Your Life with Noel Edmonds, The Russell Harty Show, Tune Times with Temple, and Nuts in May with Frankie Howerd.
Born in Stepney, East London in 1913, Temple formed his own band in 1944. Among his early singers were Frankie Vaughan, Lita Roza and Anne Shelton.
For many years, he provided the resident house band for Decca Records.
In 1993 he was awarded the Gold Badge of Merit for services to music by the British Academy of Songwriters, Composers and Authors.
He died on May 30, aged 94. A full obituary will appear in a future issue of The Stage newspaper.