Sir Cliff Richard reveals he recorded an unreleased version of We’ll Meet Again with Dame Vera Lynn
Sir Cliff Richard recorded a version of We’ll Meet Again with Dame Vera Lynn that has not yet been released.
The 79-year-old singer made the revelation in an interview with LBC’s Nick Ferrari on Friday as he reflected on the wartime icon’s passing.
Dame Vera, dubbed the Forces’ Sweetheart, died on Thursday aged 103 surrounded by her family.
Singing sensations: Sir Cliff Richard has revealed he recorded a version of We’ll Meet Again with Dame Vera Lynn that has not yet been released (pictured together in 1975)
Sir Cliff said: ‘She was just terrific and I remember that particular VE Day (in 1995), when it was all over, we went backstage, so to speak, and met some of the royal family.
‘I said to her, “Vera, do you warm up your voice before you sing?'” “Oh”, she said, “Darling, no, I don’t have time for that, I just open my throat and it comes out like that”.
‘I don’t think I ever saw her actually do a concert but I worked with her and we sung on the same stage.’
Kind words: Sir Cliff went on to describe Dame Vera as ‘a wonderful, wonderful person and a great individual, like The Queen, funnily enough’
Revealing that there was an unreleased duet hidden away in the archives, he added: ‘I did record We’ll Meet Again with her but it’s still in the banks, the troughs, somewhere hidden away. We didn’t get to use it yet.’
He went on to describe Dame Vera as ‘a wonderful, wonderful person and a great individual, like The Queen, funnily enough’.
He added: ‘A great individual to look up to.
‘I don’t know whether I can speak for everybody in Britain but I think most countries need something, something that they can look towards and aim at, and certainly she’s one of those icons that you can look and aim at.’
Two of a kind: Sir Cliff stated, ‘I don’t think I ever saw her actually do a concert but I worked with her and we sung on the same stage’ (pictured in 1975)
He continued: ‘Sometimes I feel that we throw around things like the word legend and icon almost too freely.
‘Every now and then with the passing of Vera Lynn, you’re suddenly reminded, oh my goodness, you know. I was one of the lucky ones.
‘I was never really close to her but I’ve been close to her physically and we actually did work together and I could see, these people that were the remnants of the folks that survived the World War Two were reaching out to her.
‘You know as a pop singer, you get used to being reached out at, but they weren’t reaching out for a pop singer, they were reaching for someone that they truly seemed to love.’
Dame Vera’s death sparked an outpouring of grief for a woman whose name is almost as synonymous with the war effort as Sir Winston Churchill.
During the conflict she flew thousands of miles at great personal risk to perform for soldiers and visiting them in field hospitals.
While her music was a beacon of hope between 1939 and 1945, her words in We’ll Meet Again resonated again in the current coronavirus pandemic.
The Queen even used them to inspire modern Britain to evoke the spirit of its wartime generation and battle through the coronavirus crisis.
Icon: Dame Vera’s death aged 103 on Thursday sparked an outpouring of grief for a woman whose name is almost as synonymous with the war effort as Sir Winston Churchill