Jools Holland’s Annual Hootenanny viewers are left shocked year after year over the beloved yearly TV show.
The programme is a New Year’s Eve staple on the BBC, featuring unique performances from big-name musicians and rising stars as they all gather to ring in the next 12 months.
Tonight’s show to ring in 2025 sees a brilliant line-up including Roger Taylor of Queen, The Boomtown Rats, CMAT and Jungle.
However, everything is not as it seems to a large portion of viewers.
Unbeknown to some, the show is actually filmed way before the big day and then broadcast as if it’s live, with a rousing rendition of Auld Lang Syne and a countdown to midnight.
In the BBC’s defence, they previously described the show as an ‘idealised New Year’s Eve party with a line-up that would surely be impossible to deliver on 31st December’.
Although many people already know the Hootenanny ‘secret’, some viewers are only just getting the memo – and Sir Rod Stewart was the one who gave the game away most recently after performing on the last Hootenanny to ring in 2024.
Posting on X at the start of 2024, SarahO_Connell wrote: ‘Rod Stewart is currently performing live in Las Vegas. This is how I found out that Jools Holland’s Hootenanny was pre-recorded!’
Indeed, in the early hours for people in the UK, the Maggie May rocker was already over in Sin City ringing in the New Year on CNN’s own broadcast.
‘Wait is Rod Stewart in Vegas or London? I’ve seen him on two separate NYE shows #CNNNYE #hootenanny,’ asked @fans81_football, while @dollynoocat explained: ‘It’s not live on #Hootenanny.’
Someone had a much darker take on the whole thing, as @Rabidandy wrote: ‘The fact that #Jools Holland #Hootenanny is filmed in mid December and presented as it if its live it annoying.
‘I feel like I’m watching a lie. What would have happened if Rod Stewart had died between filming and now? Be a bit awkward…’
Another distraught viewer, AzariasTor, added: ‘#Hootenanny – my heart was broken when I learned that this was not live, but recorded earlier in the year. Devastated!’
Social media user SteveOliver1963 wasn’t having any of it, as he wrote: ‘#Hootenanny 2 songs in. Is it going to be boogie Woogie all night. Also the show is not even live. Turning 📴. 👎🏻’
Some viewers really aren’t impressed by the delay, even though it makes perfect sense if Jools and the team want the same stellar lineups each year.
‘No offence to Rick Astley but could not face 30 minutes so #Hootenanny is on – which I went off when I saw them queuing to film it one November. Utterly pointless not live,’ complained MatthewRimmer.
And Grizzpk ranted: ‘They are all pretending it’s 2024 when it was recorded knocks me sick #Hootenanny.’
Jools’ Annual Hootenanny will air at 11.30pm on BBC Two on Wednesday, December 31. It will be available to stream on BBC iPlayer after airing
This article was originally published on January 1, 2024.
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