Golden days of seaside shows saw Engelbert Humperdinck top the Blackpool bill before heading to Las Vegas

Today we have two tenors and a baritone.

By virtue of his huge success in the charts, we have to start with Engelbert Humperdinck (real name Arnold George Dorsey, born in India in 1936) and it was as Gerry Dorsey that he appeared in cabaret in the Lobster Pot group's Blackpool venues in August, 1964.

Tom Jones's manager, Gordon Mills, relaunched Gerry and it was with the name of a German composer of the 19th century that the singer headed 1967's Spring Bank Holiday concerts at the Blackpool Opera House.

He had a number one hit, Release Me, in the bank and had just released There Goes My Everything, which was to stop at number two, before the Last Waltz hit the top in the autumn.

The 1968 summer season show at the ABC Theatre saw Engelbert topping in Blackpool before Las Vegas.

Like the Austrian composer, the rest is history!

John Hanson (1922-1998) is best remembered for his principal roles in the musicals The Student Prince and The Desert Song, which he brought to the Winter Gardens Pavilion for summer seasons in 1969 and 1970.

The singer had twice toured to the Grand Theatre for one-week visits as the Red Shadow in The Desert Song in 1954 and 1957, and in the title role of The Student Prince in 1962.

But in 1966 his Grand visit in his adaption of the film musical Smilin' Through (under the stage title When You're Young) failed to win a West End booking.

His last appearance on the Fylde Coast was at the Ashton Theatre, St Annes, in the musical Lilac Time, in April, 1973.

The baritone in our line-up is Edmund Hockridge (1920-2009) who spent the Second World War period in Britain with the Royal Canadian Air Force (he was from Vancouver) and did more than 400 broadcasts for the BBC.

A few years later the BBC invited him back and, more significantly, the handsome Canadian landed the role of Billy Bigelow in the Drury Lane production of the musical Carousel, opening in June, 1950.

Edmund, better known in the business as Ted, toured in the show and it played two weeks at the Blackpool Opera House in the spring of 1952.

He also starred in the West End as Sky Masterson in Guys and Dolls, the Judge in Can-Can, and Sid Sorokin in The Pyjama Game, becoming a big star of radio, television and record albums.

He switched his stage work to summer season shows and concerts, starring in four seasons at the North Pier between 1958 and 1965 and in several Sunday concerts at the Opera House.

A Gazette review of his 1958 appearance noted: "This glorious singer makes a tremendous impression with a selection that includes songs from his shows."

Edmund returned to Blackpool for a week in May, 1991, with the Hockridge family musical act in the Hiss and Boo Music Hall at the Grand Theatre.