Harry Roy

---

title: "Harry Roy" type: doc version: 1 created: 2026-02-28 author: "Wikipedia contributors" status: active scope: public tags: ["1900-births", "1971-deaths", "english-jazz-bandleaders", "english-jazz-clarinetists", "dance-band-bandleaders", "dirty-blues-musicians", "parlophone-artists", "20th-century-english-male-musicians", "people-from-stamford-hill", "musicians-from-the-london-borough-of-hackney"] description: "British clarinetist and dance band leader (1900–1971)" topic_path: "arts" source: "https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Harry_Roy" license: "CC BY-SA 4.0" wikipedia_page_id: 0 wikipedia_revision_id: 0

::summary British clarinetist and dance band leader (1900–1971) ::

::data[format=table title="Infobox musical artist"]

Field	Value
name	Harry Roy
image	[[File:Harry Roy.jpg
caption	Harry Roy, circa 1934.
background	non_vocal_instrumentalist
birth_name	Harry Lipman
birth_date
birth_place	Stamford Hill, London, England
death_date
death_place	London
instrument	Clarinet
associated_acts	Syd Roy, Eddie Carroll, Joe Daniels, Nat Temple, Ray Ellington, Stanley Black, Ivor Moreton and Dave Kaye
::

| name = Harry Roy | image = [[File:Harry Roy.jpg|200px|Wills's Cigarettes No. 47]] | caption = Harry Roy, circa 1934. | image_size = | background = non_vocal_instrumentalist | birth_name = Harry Lipman | alias = | birth_date = | birth_place = Stamford Hill, London, England | death_date = | death_place = London | origin = | instrument = Clarinet | occupation = | years_active = | label = | associated_acts = Syd Roy, Eddie Carroll, Joe Daniels, Nat Temple, Ray Ellington, Stanley Black, Ivor Moreton and Dave Kaye | website = | current_members = | past_members =

Harry Lipman (12 January 1900 – 1 February 1971), known professionally as Harry Roy, was a British dance band leader and clarinet player from the 1920s to the 1960s. He performed several songs with suggestive lyrics, including "My Girl's Pussy" (1931), "She Had to Go and Lose It at the Astor" (1939), and "When Can I have a Banana Again?" (1943) {{cite web | url = https://archive.org/details/HarryRoyAndHisMayfairHotelOrchestra-41-50 | title = Harry Roy & his Mayfair Hotel Orchestra – She had to go and lose it at the Astor (1939) | accessdate = 17 July 2009 | work = Internet Archive | url-status = live | archiveurl = https://web.archive.org/web/20100130162448/http://www.archive.org/details/HarryRoyAndHisMayfairHotelOrchestra-41-50 | archivedate = 30 January 2010 | df = dmy-all

Life and career

Roy was born Harry Lipman in Stamford Hill, London, England to a Jewish family and after learning piano from the age of seven, went on to study clarinet and alto saxophone at the age of 16. He and his brother Sidney formed a band which they called the Darnswells Dance Band, with Harry on saxophone and clarinet and Sidney on piano. During the 1920s, they performed in several prestige venues, such as the Alhambra and the London Coliseum, in bands such as the Original Lyrical Five and the Crichton Lyricals. They had a three-year residency at the Café de Paris, and toured South Africa, Australia and Germany.

By the early 1930s, Harry Roy was fronting his own band, the RKOlians and broadcasting from the Café Anglais and the Mayfair Hotel. In 1931, he wrote and sang "My Girl's Pussy", which has since been the subject of many cover versions and remakes. In 1935, he married Elizabeth Brooke (stage name: Princess Pearl), daughter of the White Rajah of Sarawak, with whom he appeared in two musical films, Everything Is Rhythm (1936) and Rhythm Racketeer (1937).

During the Second World War, Roy toured with the Tiger Ragamuffins. He was at the Embassy Club in 1942, and a little later, toured the Middle East, entertaining troops with singer Mary Lee. A popular wartime song by his band was "When Can I Have a Banana Again?" (1943).

In 1948, Roy travelled to the United States, but was refused a work permit. Returning to Britain, he reformed his band and scored a hit with his recording of "Leicester Square Rag".

By the early 1950s, the big band era had come to an end. Roy's band split up, but he still drifted in and out of the music scene. In the 1950s, he ran his own restaurant, the Diners' Club, but it was destroyed by fire. In 1969 Roy returned to music, leading a quartet in London's Lyric Theatre's show Oh Clarence and his own Dixieland Jazz Band resident during the summer at the newly refurbished Sherry's Dixieland Showbar in Brighton, but he was by then in failing health. He died in London in February 1971.

Personal life

Roy was married twice, first to Elizabeth Brooke in 1935. After his divorce from Elizabeth Brooke in 1947, Roy married Sonia Stacpoole, a dancer at the Windmill Theatre in Soho during the 1940s

References

References

1. St. Pierre, Roger. "Hotcha-Ma'Cha-Cha!". EMI.
2. (1992). "[[Encyclopedia of Popular Music". [[Guinness Publishing]].
3. Chris Han. (2013-08-16). "8 Sexually Explicit Songs From the 1930s - CollegeHumor Post".
4. Leigh, Spencer. (2008). "This Record Is Not to Be Broadcast: 75 Records Banned by the BBC 1931–1957". Acrobat Music Group.
5. (2007-12-28). "Harry Roy - She Had To Go And Lose It At The Astor, 1939". YouTube.
6. (2009). "Encyclopedia of Popular Music". Muze Inc and Oxford University Press.
7. "Archived copy".
8. "Arthur Calkin with Harry Roy".
9. "Harry Roy'S Tiger Ragamuffins - British Pathé". Britishpathe.com.
10. (2005). "Forever Francie : my life with Jack Milroy". Black & White Publishing.
11. "Defining Moment: The banana returns to Britain, December 30 1945".
12. Dacre, Peter. (1963-08-18). "The Royal Gazette".
13. "The Windmill Theatre Now - From the 1949 magazine 'Film and Art Reel.'".
14. windmill3. (2010-11-20). "Windmill Theatre.Revudeville.Sonia Stacpoole".

::callout[type=info title="Wikipedia Source"] This article was imported from Wikipedia and is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Content has been adapted to SurfDoc format. Original contributors can be found on the article history page. ::