Tommy Cannon on his return to the stage without Bobby Ball

by techlowdown · 14 October 2022

Tommy Cannon says he’ll be “constantly looking” for Bobby Ball during his first official return to the stage since his comedy partner’s death.

Ball, who the comic describes as his “pal for 60 years”, died aged 76 in October 2020 after catching Covid-19.

Cannon, who lives near York, will perform at the Junction in Goole, East Yorkshire, on 21 October.

“I know he’s looking down and saying, ‘come on Tommy lad, you can do it’,” the 84-year-old told the BBC.

Cannon met Ball while working in an Oldham factory as a welder in the early 1960s.

The double act – whose real names are Thomas Derbyshire and Robert Harper – started out as comics on the cabaret circuit in the north of England.

They rose from playing working men’s clubs to star at the London Palladium and, at their height, had their own Saturday night ITV show.

Speaking about Ball’s death, Cannon told BBC Look North: “It happened so quick, he went into hospital and his son rang me in midweek and said ‘I don’t think me dad is going to make it, they’ve had to turn him over on his belly’.

“The weekend came and he’d passed away.”

Ball, who is remembered in a statue in the Lancashire town of Lytham where he lived for more than 20 years, was famous for twanging his braces on stage, while saying: “Rock on, Tommy.”

Cannon continued: “There’s an emptiness that will never go away, I go on stage now and I’m constantly looking for him, waiting for him to shout ‘rock on Tommy’.

“It’s weird to think about doing it, never mind actually going out and doing it.”