Who was the first rock and roll band to play the Royal Albert Hall?
There was a time when the very idea of pop music at the Royal Albert Hall would have felt like ravens leaving the Tower of London.
After all, the Royal Albert Hall, opened in 1871 by Queen Victoria herself, was meant to house only the highest of high culture. If this was to house the arts, it was to house symphonies, ballet and opera. This was, of course, when it wasn’t hosting foreign dignitaries, political rallies and other high-minded affairs. Or at least, that’s the reputation it has. The truth is something a lot more complicated.
If you look close enough, there have been more than a few events held at the Albert Hall which flew in the face of its reputation as the artistic hub of high society. In 1926, the hall hosted the Charleston Championship of the World at a time when people were still arguing that the Charleston was a symbol of cultural decay.
For a period of time, the hall was also the home of British boxing. First hosting a tournament between American and British servicemen in 1918, then putting on several cards in the century since. This was despite quite a bit of pushback, as its license was repeatedly revoked after residents of South Kensington complained about the noise levels. Yet this is still a venue that’s hosted everyone from Lennox Lewis to Muhammad Ali and everyone in between.
Thus, once pop music arrived in the 1950s, it was only a matter of time before those acts started turning up on the Albert Hall’s hallowed stage. Since then, legendary gigs have been played at the venue by everyone from Bob Dylan to Public Enemy to St Vincent, but the question remains, which rock act got there first?
Who was the first rock act to play the Royal Albert Hall?
The early days of rock ‘n’ roll were a little too violent for a space as rarefied as the Albert Hall, so no rock act played the venue in the 1950s, during the glory days of early rock ‘n’ roll. The venue was too busy, finally cottoning on to jazz music at the time. It was also probably not going to risk hosting a trend that was, thanks to the Bill Haley movie Rock Around The Clock, quite literally destroying movie theatres across the world.
No, it wasn’t until the early 1960s that pop finally made its way onto the stage of the Royal Albert Hall. On September 15th 1963, one day after the last night of that year’s actual proms, came The Great Pop Prom, a celebration of pop music that contained two sets from the greatest rock ‘n’ roll bands of all time. So, the question of who was the first rock ‘n’ roll band to play the Royal Albert Hall becomes, quite fittingly, a toss-up between The Beatles and The Rolling Stones.
Of course, we could just call it a draw, but where’s the fun in that?! On the one hand, you’ve got the fact that The Beatles were headlining the whole thing, playing a full set to a packed-out Royal Albert Hall full of screaming Beatlemaniacs. One could very easily count them as being the first rock act to truly “play” the Royal Albert Hall and take their place as a British cultural export up there with anything the country has produced in its storied existence.
Alternatively, the Stones went on before them. So… it’s them innit?
