Product Description

From singing to the postman when she was two years old to her annual sell-out tours in the 2000s, Barbara Dickson has been captivating her fans for the best part of sixty years. In her autobiography she describes the joys of growing up in Fife with her talented brother and loving parents, of moving to Edinburgh to find her place in the world and the stresses and strains of trying to make a living on the Scottish folk scene.
Not content to have just a successful singing career, she turned to another: acting. A regular on prime-time television, Barbara also took to musicals and was the original lead role in Spend, Spend, Spend. Her hugely successful time onstage earned her many acting accolades but her pursuit of perfection led to complete exhaustion from which she fought hard to recover.
Barbara writes beautifully about the close relationships she cultivated over these years with people such as Willy Russell, Elaine Paige and Billy Connolly. The result is a warm, fascinating story encompassing the best of British music, stage and television.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #15122 in Books
• Published on: 2009-10-15
• Released on: 2009-10-15
• Original language: English
• Binding: Hardcover
• 320 pages

Review

'[Barbara] writes clearly and especially vividly of her time spent on the thriving Scottish folk scene... she displays a dry, modest wit throughout. An interesting tale'

About the Author
Barbara Dickson was brought up in Dunfermline but soon moved to Edinburgh to follow her musical dream. After a lot of perseverance she finally broke through and became a household name with singles such as 'I Know Him So Well' with Elaine Paige, 'Caravan Song' and 'January February'. Barbara later featured onstage in acclaimed musicals and in TV shows as diverse and The Two Ronnies and Top of the Pops. She still tours annually to play to loyal fans and lives in Lincolnshire with her family.

Customer Reviews

Full Circle......The Journey
The name Barbara Dickson means different things to everybody. Folk Singer, Pop Singer, Blood Brothers, I Know Him So Well, Band of Gold, Spend Spend Spend and much more besides. Whatever it means to you, join Barbara on a journey through her life and career, told with honesty and wit. Barbara tells how a girl from Dunfermline became a household name and how she has gone Full Circle and is still going strong. A must read!

great read
had this book for 2 days only and have nearly finished it,its a great read and cant put it down,she writes about how she only had 3 days to record her early folk albums,incidents on stage,antics of the road crew,family,friends,stage,a very down to earth woman who reflects on her life and shares her love of music-A MUST READ.

Boring and lacking in any great substance
I hate to say this as I am a fan of Barbara's, but I really didn't enjoy this book. I'd been looking forward to learning more about Barbara's life, but I have to say, this book didn't tell me much more than I already knew. The problem with it is that it skims over things far too quickly. Barbara was at her most commercially successful during the eighties, but the recordings in this era are glossed over in a few measly pages. Where are the stories about the recording sessions, the songs she sang, the promotional tours and the incidents along the way? They're not here, that's for sure.

The main problem with this book is that it promises so much but delivers so little. It's a known fact that Barbara has turned her back on her pop years and doesn't really like singing many of the songs from this era, but surely an autobiography is about a person's life, so to gloss over whole chunks is a little unfair. While I was about two thirds of the way through this book, I did begin to wonder whether I should bother finishing it as I ran out of interest in the subject. I did finish it, only because I like to see things through to the end, but I was pleased when I could put it back on the shelf and start something else. Sorry!