In 1960, in the lovely coastal town of Skerries, County Dublin, there were two rival skiffle groups. In true “Wild West” fashion, they decided that the town wasn’t big enough for both of them, so they did the obvious thing and merged to form a showband. For a while, they laboured under the name, “The Euphonics”, which they took from the Greek phrase meaning “pleasant sounds”, but soon they took a name more suited to their academic background, “The Graduates”.

From the day he climbed into the pulpit of his local church and sang a verse of “McNamara’s Band” while his grandfather tolled the church bells, lead guitarist and vocalist, Tony Keeling, always wanted to be a singer.  Andy Radley, Fergus O’Brien, Gerry Bradley and Colm McCormack made up a strong brass section while Tommy Coleman, George Hand and drummer Paddy Landy joined Keeling in the rhythm section. The Graduates played for two seasons at the local Red Island Holiday Camp, and then, astutely guided by manager Gerry Wickham, they turned professional and embarked on the roller-coaster of one-night stands, records and radio and television appearances.

Their first record, an interpretation of a  Del Shannon song “Kelly”, which they found on the B-side of his hit single “Two Kinds Of Teardrops”, shot up to No.8 in the Irish singles charts and their other records “Anything That’s Part Of You”, “Just My Baby And Me”, “Edelweiss” and “Crystal Chandelier” all made the charts. They made appearances on RTE television on The Showband Show and The Go 2 Show and on Gay Byrne’s radio show, The 17 Club.

In April 1966, they travelled to the U.S.A. where they played in New York, Chicago, Detroit and Boston, and returned in 1967, when they also took in a brief tour of Canada. Like most of the top showbands at the time, they had a big following on the Irish circuit in Britain, and played there regularly.