Sir Cliff Richard (born Harry Rodger Webb; 14 October 1940) is a British singer and actor. He has total sales of over 21.5 million singles in the United Kingdom and as of 2026, is the third-top-selling artist in UK singles chart history, behind the Beatles and Elvis Presley.
Richard was originally marketed as a rebellious rock and roll singer in the style of Presley and Little Richard. With his backing group, the Shadows, he dominated the British popular music scene in the pre-Beatles period of the late 1950s to early 1960s. His 1958 hit single "Move It" is often described as Britain's first authentic rock and roll song. He had a successful screen career with films including Expresso Bongo (1959), The Young Ones (1961), Summer Holiday (1963) and Wonderful Life (1964), and his own show on BBC Television. Increased focus on his Christian faith and subsequent softening of his music led to a more middle-of-the-road image, and he sometimes ventured into contemporary Christian music.
In a career spanning more than 65 years, Richard has amassed several gold and platinum discs and awards, including two Ivor Novello Awards and three Brit Awards. More than 130 of his singles, albums and EPs have reached the UK Top 20, more than any other artist. Richard has had 67 UK Top 10 singles, the second highest total for an artist (behind Presley). He holds the record, with Presley, as the only act to make the UK singles charts in all of its first six decades (1950s–2000s). He has achieved 14 UK No. 1 singles, and is the only singer to have had a No. 1 single in the UK in each of five consecutive decades. He also had four UK Christmas No. 1 singles, two of which were as a solo artist; "Mistletoe and Wine" and "Saviour's Day".
By the late 1990s, Richard had sold more than 250 million records worldwide, making him one of the best-selling music artists of all time. He has never achieved the same popularity in the United States despite eight US Top 40 singles, including the million-selling "Devil Woman" and "We Don't Talk Anymore". In Canada, he had a successful period in the early 1960s, the late 1970s and early 1980s, with some releases certified gold and platinum. He has remained a popular music, film and television personality at home in the UK as well as Australia, New Zealand, South Africa, Northern Europe and Asia, and retains a following in other countries. When not touring, he divides his time between Barbados and Portugal. In 2019, he relocated to New York.
1940–1958: Childhood and adolescence
Cliff Richard was born Harry Rodger Webb on 14 October 1940 at King George's Hospital (now King George's Medical University), Victoria Street, in Lucknow, which was then part of British India. His parents were Rodger Oscar Webb, a manager for a catering contractor that serviced the Indian Railways, and the former Dorothy Marie Dazely. His parents also spent some years in Howrah, West Bengal. After the violence of Direct Action Day, they decided to relocate to Britain permanently. Richard is primarily of English heritage, but he had one great-grandmother who was of half-Welsh and half-Spanish descent, born of a Spanish great-great-grandmother named Emiline Joseph Rebeiro.
The Webb family lived in a modest home in Maqbara, near the main shopping centre of Hazratganj in Lucknow. Dorothy's mother served as the dormitory matron at the La Martiniere Girls' School. Richard had three sisters, Joan, Jacqui and Donna (1942–2016).
In 1948, following Indian independence, the family embarked on a three-week sea voyage to Tilbury, Essex, England, aboard the SS Ranchi. The Webbs moved from comparative wealth in India, where they lived in a company-supplied flat at Howrah near Calcutta, to a semi-detached house in Carshalton, north Surrey. Harry Webb attended a local primary school, Stanley Park Juniors, in Carshalton.
In 1949, his father obtained employment in the credit control office of Thorn Electrical Industries, Enfield, and the family moved in with other relatives in Waltham Cross, Hertfordshire, where he attended Kings Road Junior Mixed Infants School, until a three-bedroom council house in nearby Cheshunt was allocated to them in 1950, at 12 Hargreaves Close.
He then attended Cheshunt Secondary Modern School from 1952 to 1957. As a member of the top stream, he stayed on beyond the minimum leaving age to take GCE Ordinary Level examinations and gained a pass in English literature. He then started work as a filing clerk for Atlas Lamps. A development of retirement flats, Cliff Richard Court, has been named after him in Cheshunt.
Harry Webb became interested in skiffle. When he was 16, his father bought him a guitar, and in 1957, he formed the school vocal harmony group The Quintones, before singing in the Dick Teague Skiffle Group.
1958–1963: Success and stardom
Harry Webb became lead singer of a rock and roll group, the Drifters (distinct from the US group of the same name). The 1950s entrepreneur Harry Greatorex wanted the up-and-coming rock 'n' roll singer to change his name. The name Cliff was adopted as it sounded like "cliff face", which suggested "Rock". It was "Move It" writer Ian Samwell who suggested the surname "Richard" as a tribute to Webb's musical hero Little Richard.
Before their first big appearance, at the Regal Ballroom in Ripley, Derbyshire in 1958, they adopted the name "Cliff Richard and the Drifters". The four members were Harry Webb (by then going under the stage name "Cliff Richard"), Ian Samwell on guitar, Terry Smart on drums and Norman Mitham on guitar. None of the other three played with the later and better known Shadows, although Samwell wrote songs for Richard's later career. Agent George Ganjou saw the group perform in London, and recommended them to Norrie Paramor for an audition.
For Richard's debut session, Paramor provided him with "Schoolboy Crush", a song previously recorded by American Bobby Helms. Richard was permitted to record one of his own songs for the B-side; this was "Move It", written and composed by the Drifters' Samwell while he was on board a number 715 Green Line bus on the way to Richard's house for a rehearsal. For the "Move It" session, Paramor used the session guitarist Ernie Shears on lead guitar and Frank Clark on bass.
There are various stories about why the A-side was replaced by the intended B-side. One is that Norrie Paramor's young daughter raved about the B-side; another was that influential TV producer Jack Good, who used the act for his TV show Oh Boy!, wanted the only song on his show to be "Move It" as opposed to "Schoolboy Crush". Richard was quoted as saying:
It's wonderful to be going on TV for the first time, but I feel so nervous that I don't know what to do. I shaved my sideburns off last night... Jack Good said it would make me look more original.The single went to No. 2 on the UK singles chart. John Lennon credited "Move It" as being the first British rock record.
In the early days, Richard was marketed as the British equivalent of Elvis. Like previous British rockers such as Tommy Steele and Marty Wilde, Richard adopted Elvis-like dress and hairstyle. In performance he struck a pose of rock attitude, rarely smiling or looking at the audience or camera. His late 1958 and early 1959 follow-up singles, "High Class Baby" and "Livin' Lovin' Doll", were followed by "Mean Streak", which carried a rocker's sense of speed and passion, and Lionel Bart's "Living Doll".