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On this day, 11 March 1963, American singer Brenda Lee played Cardiff’s Capitol Theatre. Also on the bill was, Mike Berry, Sounds Incorporated, The Bachelors, Steve Perry, Tony Sheridan and Bob Bain.
Primarily performing rockabilly, pop, country and Christmas music, she achieved her first Billboard hit aged 12 in 1957 and was given the nickname "Little Miss Dynamite". Some of Lee's most successful songs include "Sweet Nothin's", "I'm Sorry", "I Want to Be Wanted", "Speak to Me Pretty", "All Alone Am I" and "Losing You". Her festive song "Rockin' Around the Christmas Tree", recorded in 1958, topped the U.S. Billboard Hot 100 in 2023, making Lee the oldest artist ever to top the chart and breaking several chart records.
Lee was popular in the UK from early in her career. She performed on television in the UK in 1959, before she had achieved much pop recognition in the United States. Her first hit single in the UK was "Sweet Nothin's", which reached No. 4 on the UK singles chart in the spring of 1960. She subsequently had a UK hit (in 1961) with "Let's Jump the Broomstick", a rockabilly number recorded in 1959, which had not charted in the United States, but reached No. 12 in the UK.
Lee first visited England for three days in April 1959 as a last-minute replacement on Oh Boy!. She first toured the UK in March and April 1962 with Gene Vincent and Sounds Incorporated (as her backing group), and she toured the country for a second time in March 1963,
