Paul Barnes (broadcaster)

Barnes was born in July 1939 in Coventry.^[1] He attended Leamington College and Coventry College of Art.^[3]

Prior to working as a broadcaster, Barnes worked in documentary film production, advertising and publishing.^[3]

Barnes's career in broadcasting spanned 49 years.^[4] Barnes's first radio broadcast took place in 1969.^[3] Following this first broadcast, Barnes then became presenter of Out of this Week on BBC Radio 4.^[5] Barnes began presenting Sunday in 1972.^[6] Barnes was the first presenter of Newsbeat on BBC Radio 1^[7] in 1973.^[8] Barnes worked as a presenter and/or reporter on Jazz Notes, Outlook, Sunday, Woman's Hour, The World at One, Today and several other radio programmes during his radio career;^[3] Barnes presented Today between 1975 and 1977.^[9] In the 1970s, Barnes worked as a reporter for Woman's Hour.^[10]

Barnes's career in television began when he was appointed a presenter on Granada TV in Manchester in the very early 1970s.^[5] At ITV, Barnes presented Folio, Anything Goes and The Village Show.^[7] In approximately 1997, Barnes began presenting a show on BBC Local Radio in the East of England called The Late Paul Barnes, which in 2009 was broadcast between 11pm and 1am at the weekend.^[5] The show always involved Barnes signing off in the same way^[11] and focused on jazz and big band music.^[12] In 2011, Barnes received a jazz broadcaster of the year award. Barnes left the BBC in 2018.^[4]

Barnes also once managed a school, for training people to become pilots, at Norwich Airport.^[11]