Sandra Barry

Our pick of the pops

British singer Sandra Barry started out on the radio and in film before launching herself into the world of pop under several aliases.

Schoolgirl Sandra Alfred spent the 1950s taking part in talent shows and making a name for herself on the radio, in the light entertainment programme Educating Archie, and in film, playing a naughty fourth former in the classic 1954 British comedy The belles of St Trinian’s.

In 1957 she cut her first record, a novelty number, and it took her another six years before she tried again, under the moniker Mandy Mason, on the Parlophone label

For her next release, she recorded Really gonna shake, issued on the Decca label in March 1964 and credited to Sandra Barry and the Boys. (The Boys in question later became cult Mod group the Action.)

In 1965 she joined the Pye record label, where she was to issue three singles. The first, The end of the line – penned by Tony Hatch, the man behind dozens of songs by Petula Clark, Jackie Trent

and others – is more highly regarded for its flip, the excellent We were lovers (when the party began), a cover of the Exciters’ US release.

When it failed to sell, she came back with a feisty

– but equally unsuccessful – remake of Lloyd

Price’s 1960 release Question. (The B-side,

the cheerful You can take it from me, was

another Hatch composition.)

For live appearances she was backed by the

Jet Blacks, which included future Led Zeppelin

bassist John Paul Jones.

Her final single for Pye was 1966’s Stop! Thief,

backed with I won’t try to change your

mind. Both sides were written by Tony