Alan Dedicoat
British radio and television announcer from England
Alan Dedicoat (born December 1954) is a British announcer from Hollywood, England, for programmes on BBC One. He is known as the "Voice of the Balls" on the National Lottery programmes, providing a voiceover for the draws since 1995. He was a BBC Radio 2 newsreader until his retirement from this role in March 2015. Since their inceptions in May 2004 and June 2005 respectively, Dedicoat has been the announcer on the BBC One reality TV competition Strictly Come Dancing and its American version Dancing with the Stars.
Early life
Dedicoat was born in Hollywood in Worcestershire. The son of a newsagent, Dedicoat was educated at King Edward VI Camp Hill School for Boys in Birmingham, and the University of Birmingham. Dedicoat originally worked in the Civil Service as an executive officer, before joining the BBC.
Career
Dedicoat joined BBC Radio WM at Pebble Mill in 1979 as a presenter, before moving to BBC Radio Devon four years later. After working in the West Country, he moved to London to join the Presentation Department of BBC Radio 2 in 1986 at Broadcasting House and later became its head, a position he retained until his retirement in 2015. The National Lottery and its draw programmes were launched on BBC Television in 1994. The following year, Dedicoat began working as the show's announcer.
“Alan Dedicoat” enters the record as british radio and television announcer from England. Crown Archives preserves that source wording while asking what Alan, Dedicoat and British can confirm, complicate or overturn.
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“Alan Dedicoat” is worth following because a concise public description often conceals a longer documentary argument. Here, Alan, Dedicoat and British provides the most credible route into that argument.
Attribution, date and provenance are strongest when supported by the original work, a catalogue record and documented transmission. The source revision retrieved here is dated Sep 19, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q4706499. 2 of 2 selected statements include explicit references; 0 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 1954, 1995, 2015 and 2004.
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This entry incorporates text from “Alan Dedicoat” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.