Return to Rock-and-Roll Page.Chad & Jeremy had a number of hits on the US charts in the mid-60's and made forays into television. They have resumed performing together at various times over the years and served somewhat as pioneers of the soft rock movement in popular music.
Both were born in England, Chad Stuart in late 1943 and Jeremy Clyde less than four months later. They attended public school and met each other while both were students at the Central School of Speech and Drama in London. Both had an interest in music, and both sang and played guitar. They formed a singing duo in the early 60's.
At the time Chad's interest was in writing lyrics, while Jeremy was a talented musician who not only wrote music but was proficient on the flute, piano, banjo and sitar. They developed a sound based on the folk music that was popular in the United States in the early 60's, but was not as popular in the United Kingdom. In 1964 the Beatles had launched the British Invasion period in pop music history, and the timing of Chad & Jeremy could not have been better. They joined the wave.
Their first hit in the United States was Yesterday's Gone in the Summer of 1964, released as by Chad Stuart and Jeremy Clyde. It was a record with a soft sound -- and from a British group -- that caught on and rose to number 21 on the US pop chart. Their follow-up that Fall was A Summer Song, another soft hit, which went top ten and would prove to be the duo's most popular song ever. They flew to the United States and made an appearance on The Dick Van Dyke Show, in an episode appropriately titled The Redcoats Are Coming. Some music fans began to confuse them with another talented British duo with a similar musical style, Peter and Gordon. More hits followed in the year to come for the two, now recording as Chad & Jeremy -- Willow Weep For Me and If I Loved You, the latter from the musical Carousel. Television appearances by the duo began to mount up also -- The Patty Duke Show, Hullabaloo, and Batman, among others. Always more popular in the United States than in their homeland of England (where their highest charting song reached number 37), Chad and Jeremy put their final top forty hits on the US chart in 1965 and 1966 with Before And After, I Don't Wanna Lose You Baby, and Distant Shores.
Progressive rock took hold in the late 60's and early 70's. Chad and Jeremy changed their approach somewhat, releasing Of Cabbages And Kings in 1967 and The Ark the following year. Some believe this to be their best work, but it did not sell well and by 1969 the two split up. Chad Stuart remained in the United Stats and performed for a while with his wife Jill, wrote some musicals and at one point was a guest host on the Smothers Brothers' television show. Jeremy Clyde returned to England and went on to a successful career as an actor on stage and in television and movies. In the late 70's he appeared in the movie Silver Bears with Michael Caine and had the title role in the British television series Sexton Blake and the Demon God; he has continued acting into the 21st century.
Chad and Jeremy reunited briefly in the early 80's and recorded an LP, and some of their earlier recordings from the 60's were released on CD by Sundazed in the late 90's. They reunited again and returned to performing together in 2004, and toured the United States in the Summer of 2006.
Songs recorded by Chad and Jeremy in the 60's such as Yesterday's Gone and A Summer Song helped to set the stage for the soft rock music that was to follow and secured their position as one of the top British Invasion acts.
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Send email to the author, Tom Simon tsimon@tsimon.com.