Blue Peter the 50th anniversary) the opening arrangement of the tune was reworked to include elements of "Barnacle Bill" once again. The closing theme for 2008 is the same as opening signature tune. In September 2011, the series returned to using "Barnacle Bill" though with the opening bars and drum roll omitted (along with the "Sailor's Hornpipe") and the traditional closing signature tune not used. 1958–1989: The earliest episodes featured stock footage of a sailing ship under the opening credits. By the late 1960s, Blue Peter's opening sequence featured extracts of that edition's filmed inserts or an event in the studio where
Blue Peter at the beginning and end of each broadcast; however, in recent years the traditional finale tune has returned, with Nial Brown rearranging the closing tune from 2004 to 2006, and Dave Cooke doing so as of January 2007. From September 2007 to June 2008 the closing theme was slightly extended and rearranged, once again by Dave Cooke. For the start of the September 2008 series "Barnacle Bill" was dropped as the signature tune after nearly fifty years of use and replaced by an arrangement of the very similar traditional dance tune "Sailor's Hornpipe". On 14 October (the same week as