It took 60 years, but Mary has demo copy of first single

A FORMER ‘label-mate’ of Sir Cliff Richard has been given a demonstration copy of her first single – 60 years after she recorded it.

Mary Marshall, now Cassaday, was in her early 20s when she recorded the double A side, My Island Home/Kiss, Kiss, Kiss for Columbia in 1958.

Though she had a copy of the single that went on sale, she did not have a demo, which record companies sent to radio stations for promotional purposes.

‘I called [Vinyl] Vaughan Davies to congratulate him on winning the Overcoming Adversity section at The Guernsey Press Pride Awards 2018 night,’ said Mary.

‘When I went to his shop later, with my daughter, Hayley, to donate some vinyl, he said he had a surprise for me and gave me the record.

‘I was delighted as I think the superior sound quality of vinyl bears no comparison with other formats. Vaughan is a wonderful chap who has done a great job in helping to bring vinyl back and he does a lot for charity too.’

The record was made through promoter Denis Preston with legendary producer Joe Meek, of The Tornados’ chart-topper Telstar fame, as engineer.

‘I was quite nervous in the studio and at one point I giggled,’ said Mary.

‘When Joe came out of the control room at first I thought I was in trouble, but he told me it was great and asked if I could do the same again.’

Mary remembers doing personal appearances with the young Sir Cliff in places such as Denmark Street, London’s Tin Pan Alley, and she said he was extremely nice.

Despite the record’s popularity in places such as South Africa, Sri Lanka and Greece, Mary recalls getting only about £6 in royalties after her career path changed.

In 1959, she came to Guernsey to perform at a sell-out show at St George’s Hall for the island’s ‘Mr Entertainment’, impresario Sydney James. Sydney set his sights on managing the singer but they fell in love and married in Guernsey the following year, with Ronnie Ronalde as Sydney’s best man.

‘It would not have been easy to keep going backward and forward and by the early 1960s groups were beginning to take preference over solo artists,’ said Mary.

Mary’s daughters, Hayley and Cindy, were born in 1965 and 1969 respectively.

Mary gave her last show in 1974 but she remained a director of Sydney and Mary James Productions, which brought hundreds of performers to Guernsey, to the delight of locals and visitors.

At the company’s peak its artists performed to 72,000 people in one season.

Mary said it was somewhat ironic that Sydney had tried to obtain copies of her debut single to sell at their Old Time Music Hall productions but he had not been able to get any.

Sydney died in 1985. Mary has been married to former fire chief James Cassaday since 1994.