Cliff's rock steady at 60

BORN only days after John Lennon, he grew up to be hailed as Britain's answer to Elvis Presley. But long after Lennon and Presley were destroyed by their own celebrity, clean-cut Cliff is still as popular as ever.

Can it really be that Sir Cliff Richard, the Peter Pan of Pop, is 60 tomorrow?

Yes it's true, and he is off on a cruise around the Mediterranean with 100 friends to celebrate. He will spend the big day in Monte Carlo. Somehow we already know he will not be found slumped unconscious at the gaming tables. That's just not his style.

Sir Cliff has never done things by the pop star book. Not for him the string of groupie girlfriends, the addictions, the Rolls Royce parked in the pool. When it comes to sex, drugs and rock'n'roll, only the latter applies. And then only just.

He certainly began his showbiz career as a rocker, complete with quiff and snarling lip. With those teeth he was half Presley, half Tommy Steele, and he made an instant impression on the audience at the York Rialto in 1959.

Among the crowd was Pat Jennings, then 16 years old. Even though Cliff's music has mellowed since then, she remains a huge fan. And she remembers that Rialto night as if it were yesterday.

"He was our Elvis," recalled Mrs Jennings, now 56 and living off Stockton Lane, York.

"It was brilliant. I remember queuing out all night for tickets.

"He stayed at the Priory Hotel in Fishergate. We lived in Howard Street just over the road.

"After he had finished at the Rialto we waited outside the hotel until he came.

"We saw him and he gave us his autograph. He was quite friendly."

Mrs Jennings has seen Cliff many times since, and he has never disappointed. When the film Summer Holiday came to York ABC, she and a friend went to see it every night. Even his smash hit musical Heathcliff, panned by the critics, receives qualified praise.

"To be honest, his acting wasn't up to much. But his singing was really good."

It is fashionable to sneer at Sir Cliff and poke fun at his fans. But perhaps his critics are just jealous of his phenomenal, unrelenting success.

Sir Cliff was born Harry Roger Webb in Lucknow, India, in 1940. Eight years later his family moved to England.

Music quickly became his passion and at school he formed a five piece vocal group, The Quintones. He left at 16 to work in a lamp factory, and by night performed with The Dick Teague Skiffle Group. In 1958 he formed his own band, Harry Webb and the Drifters.

A promoter who booked them to play in Ripley, Derbyshire, suggested he change his name to Cliff Richard. Almost from that moment he became a sensation.

The first hit came in 1958 when he was just 18: with the backing of The Shadows, Move It reached number two in the charts. Since then he has notched up a barely believable 126 more hits, including 14 number ones. And he has twice represented Britain in the Eurovision Song Contest.

No one, not Elvis, not The Beatles, not the Spice Girls, can match this British record. Hits in every decade since the Fifties make Sir Cliff the most enduring performer in the business.

He is also a film star: in the Sixties he starred in a series of hit movies. Heathcliff proved that he is still box office gold. And The Millennium Prayer, a song that received little radio airplay, became the first number one of 2000, confirming his fans' loyalty.

Those fans struggle to put their devotion to Cliff into words. Mrs Jennings got The Young Ones LP for her 18th birthday and has a collection of his albums and videos. At her office in York District Hospital hangs a calendar of Cliff, the subject of some mickey-taking by her colleagues. But ask her to explain what it is about the man that inspires her affection, and she can't.

Val Sanderson, President of the Cliff Richard Fan Club of Yorkshire, did a little better. "He's a professional. He's a good singer. What you see is what you get," she said. "He still looks good even though he's 60. It's hard to put it into words. I think that when he's singing, it seems as though he's singing to you."

Her Cliff epiphany came with the screening of the film The Young Ones at the York Odeon. "I can remember thinking I had to go and see it. I don't know why.

"I asked my friend to come with me. She said, 'I don't know if I like Cliff Richard'. I said, 'if you come with me to see Cliff Richard, I'll come with you to see Adam Faith'. Of course, Adam Faith never did come."

Now Mrs Sanderson has a collection of Cliff's 50 albums and most of his singles at her home in Badger Hill, York. Even though East Yorkshire fans have a club of their own, Mrs Sanderson's Yorkshire fan club still boasts 360 members. Only a dozen are men, but the age range goes from a girl of eight to a woman of 90.

Every one of these fans will have endured a gentle ribbing from non-believers now and again. They may be riled by Sir Cliff's squeaky-clean image, or by his overt Christian faith - a Boston Spa religious group has even hailed him as a modern-day prophet.

And that gossip about his sexuality won't go away. "I don't think there's anything in the rumours," Mrs Sanderson said. "It's usually men who say he's funny. I think it's because they're jealous."

She has met Cliff on several occasions and says he is a natural gentleman.

"He just makes you feel special. He doesn't come over as a superstar. He's very nice and ordinary.

"You get nervous and he'll say before you go, 'you'll want a photograph' - even though you've forgotten all about your camera."

Members of the Yorkshire fan group collected £700 for a 60th birthday present for Cliff and voted to buy him a hand-crafted, £400 bird table for his beloved garden. Cliff chose the design himself from a selection of four.

The rest of the cash will go to the Jill Dando crime fighting institute, set up in memory of Cliff's great friend.

And tomorrow night 20 fan club members will celebrate the milestone with a meal in a York restaurant, complete with balloons and birthday cake.

There will also be a toast to Sir Cliff. And what else could it be but: "Congratulations".