New Year Honours: The Arts - Old singing stars set a Sixties note

THE SIXTIES reverberated through the honours list as the singers Dusty Springfield and Tom Jones were joined by the artist Bridget Riley.

Dusty Springfield's OBE will prove highly popular. The 59-year-old singer, best remembered for her husky voice, kitsch blonde image and heavy black eye make-up, is seriously ill with breast cancer. She issued a statement saying: "I'm deeply and genuinely honoured. This is the biggest surprise of my life."

By contrast, a very contemporary performer to be honoured is the young actor Robert Carlyle. One of the stars of The Full Monty and Trainspotting, he is appointed OBE. But the biggest award to the acting profession is a knighthood for Nigel Hawthorne, best known as the supremely suave and cunning civil servant in Yes Minister and Yes, Prime Minister and, on stage and screen, as George III in The Madness of King George.

Andrew Davis, who has become a familiar figure on television, conducting the Last Night of the Proms, also receives a knighthood.

The world of the visual arts sees two of its best-known ambassadors honoured. There is a knighthood for Nicholas Serota, director of the Tate Gallery, and chairman of the Turner Prize judges, while the veteran artist Bridget Riley becomes a Companion of Honour. Since the Sixties, she has dazzled the world with her flickering and shimmering images. Riley has been described as "an abstract painter in the grand tradition".

Duncan Kenworthy, who produced the box office sell-out Four Weddings and a Funeral, is appointed OBE, as are two veteran pop heart-throbs, Tom Jones and David Essex. Roger Moore, 71, who has starred as The Saint and James Bond, is appointed CBE - not for services to acting, but in the diplomatic list for his work on behalf of Unicef.

The comedian Lenny Henry, described by his wife, the actress Dawn French, as "loud and revolting", is appointed CBE for services to comedy, drama and Comic Relief.