Monday 9 December 2013

Trumpton Riots

Childhood memories will come flooding back with this celebration of the work of Oliver Postgate and Peter Firmin from Christmas Day 1995.

First a quick review of what else was on offer that day from the pages of the Radio Times.

On 1FM it was Chris Evans at breakfast, live one assumes, followed by Simon Mayo, Danny Baker, Wendy Lloyd and a Radio Tip Top Christmas special. The evening line-up included Peter Cunnah, D-Ream front man, reviewing the year’s dance music and a concert from Wet, Wet, Wet.

As was tradition for many years Roger Royle (he's back again this Christmas Day) was on Radio 2 before Don Maclean’s Good Morning Christmas. Daytime shows included Ken Bruce, Aled Jones and a Disney special. The late night DJ, sitting in for the holidaying Derek and Ellen Jameson, was Martin Kelner.

Radio 3 presenters doing the Christmas shift were Penny Gore, Paul Gambaccini, Piers Burton-Page and Susan Sharpe. Aside from classical music offerings there was a Dave Brubeck concert in celebration of his 75th birthday and Jeremy Nicholas spinning some old 78s in The Shellac Show.

The war in Bosnia had finally come to an end in December 1995 so Radio 5 Live had several shows live from the area with Sheena MacDonald and Liz Barclay. The station also had three different reviews of the year with Robin Lustig presenting Spotlight 95, Bill Hamilton presumably concentrating on the positive news only in Now the Good News and Sybil Ruscoe also in retrospective mood in the daily Ruscoe on Five.

Radio 4 was still providing the kind of music programme that have long since disappeared from its schedules: opening the day was Brian Kay and in the evening the BBC Singers gave us “music in a lighter vein”.  From 7 to 8.40 a.m. Russell Davies hosted Morning Cordial and during the day amongst the repeats were three new series: Walter’s Festive Frolics with John Walters, At Bertram’s Hotel, a Michael Bakewell  adaptation of the Agatha Christie novel starring June Whitfield and Trumpton Riots. Comedy came from The Masterson Inheritance, I’m Sorry I Haven’t a Clue and News Quiz of the Year with Barry Took in the chair.

Commercial radio listings for Christmas Day 1995

But back to the world of the Graculus, Professor Yaffle, Blue String and magic bean plants in the first programme in a five-part series paying tribute to children’s TV of the 70s (in fact the 60s and 70s), Trumpton Riots. In episode 1, Nogs, Togs and Clangers, Brian Cant remembers the creations of Postgate and Firmin’s Smallfilms outfit: Bagpuss, Noggin the Nog, Ivor the Engine, The Clangers and Pogle’s Wood.
 

1 comment:

Robin Carmody said...

One legend's tribute to two others, you could say. (All the 'Trumpton Riots' programmes were presented by people associated with children's shows of the era, but not the ones they paid tribute to - so Brian Cant didn't present the ones about Play School or Trumptonshire.)

The Talk Radio presenters named by surname only in the "Best of" compilations - a good excuse for not broadcasting live on Christmas Day on a station so driven by phone-ins and topicality that everything pretty much *had* to be live - were Simon Bates, (ahem) Jonathan King, Tommy Boyd and Anna Raeburn.

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