Although best known as the reliable bobby PC George Dixon,
Jack Warner was one of the radio stars of World War II in the hugely popular Garrison Theatre.
Born Jack Waters (his sisters were the equally popular Elsie
and Doris Waters aka Gert and Daisy) his early career was as a motor mechanic
and as test driver at Brooklands. Coming from a showbiz family he became aprofessional in the mid-30s partnering up
with pianist Jeff Darnell as a comical version of the Western Brothers. He also
teamed up with pianist Bobby Alderson who was to accompany Warner on his
musical comedy routines for the rest of his life. The pair made a number of
pre-war broadcasts on both BBC radio and the nascent television service.
In late 1939 Warner was approached by BBC Variety Orchestra
conductor Charles Shadwell to appear in a show he was putting together with
producer Harry S. Pepper. That show was Garrison
Theatre in which he played the role of a cockney private. Like that other
wartime comedy ITMA, its catchphrases became common parlance: 'Mind my bike!',
'de-da-de-da' and 'little gel' (played by Shadwell's daughter Joan Winters). He
would also read aloud letters to 'my bruvver Sid' which became famous for their
'P.S.' gags and the use of the term 'blue pencil' were swear words might have
appeared which had the audience in stitches. "Yesterday the colonel caught
his thumb in a tank. His only remark was twenty-four blue pencils"
Warner also wrote dozens of comic monologues and songs that
he continued to perform for many years like He
Didn't Orter-a-Et It, Sealions and
Sills, Claude and his Sword, Frank and his Tank and Walkin' Hup and Dahn the Rollway Lines.
One of the best remembered is the Funny
Occupations song with its tongue-twisting references to a bunger-up o'
rat-'oles, a fumper and flattener of fevvers and a caster-up of alabaster
plaster.
Although Garrison
Theatre only ran for a year Warner was now a star name. He continued to
appear in his comedy persona in Saturday
Social, Jack's Dive, Music-Hall and Variety Bandbox. After the war he took up film acting in both
comedy and serious roles with The Captive
Heart (1946) being his first feature film. An appearance as Joe Huggett in Holiday Camp (1947) and three sequels
led to a return to radio in 1953 to reprise the role in the cosy family sitcom Meet the Huggetts. Warner co-starred
with film wife Ethel Huggett played by Kathleen Harrison. The series ran until
1961.
Meanwhile the role in the Ealing film The Blue Lamp as PC George Dixon and the character's resurrection
in the BBC series Dixon of Dock Green
(1955-76) meant that Jack would be forever remembered as "an ordinary
copper who's patrolling his beat, around Dock Green".
In 1978 as part of the Radio 2 series It's a Funny Business, comedy writer and producer Mike Craig talked
to Jack Warner about his career. It's not had a repeat since 1990 so here's
your chance to hear it again.
This is the first in a series of four blog posts marking the
75th anniversary of VE day.
Disaster in Ambridge. No, so far the Borsetshire village
remains COVID-19 free. But as a result of the pandemic the stock of recordings
of the Radio 4 serial have run dry. New episodes are currently being recorded
but with a difference as some of the actors record their lines at home (Tim Bentinck, who plays David Archer pictured above).
According to The Archers website "Storylines
will continue and you will still hear about the comings and goings in Ambridge,
but you will hear its residents as you have never heard them before. Instead of
multiple characters interacting each episode will have fewer characters and you
will have an insight into more of their private thoughts".
These new episodes air from 25 May so to fill a three week
gap this month we'll hear a selection of 'classic' episodes from the last
twenty years. But while the programme takes a furlough, and for those with a
longer memory, here's a chance to go back into the last century.
I've previously written about the night that Grace Archer died in 1955 and the passing of Doris Archer in October 1980. From just three
months earlier comes this omnibus edition. The omnibus versions had started in
January 1952 on Saturday evenings but moved to Sunday mornings in the summer of
1955. For 30 years they were introduced by Tom Forrest (played by Bob Arnold)
who would directly address the listener and regale them with a countryside
story and segue into the opening scene. This edition was heard on 24 August
1980 just days after the death of actor Norman Shelley who played Colonel Danby.
Moving on a few months the programme marked its 30th
anniversary with this New Year's Day edition from 1981 as a party is about the
start at Brookfield Farm.
The day before that 30th anniversary edition radio critic Gillian Reynolds explored the popularity of the serial in this edition of the Radio 4 arts magazine Kaleidoscope titled An Everyday Story.
In this omnibus edition from 14 February 1982 there's havoc on the roads of Ambridge - though it takes place 'off mic' - with the death of (spoiler alert) Polly Perks.
From August 1983 Jack Woolley (played by the late Arnold
Peters) is hit by the news that his former wife Valerie (they'd divorced in
1974) has just died.
This is a bit of a rarity called Vintage Archers from Christmas Day 1986 as various characters get together over the holiday period and remember times past leading to the replay of some old clips including a reappearance of Grace Archer.
From 1987 yet another programme celebrating the genesis of the The Archers. From the documentary strand The Saturday Feature Barry Norman looks behind the scenes of the programme that was originally introduced as a farming version of Dick Barton. An Everyday Story of Country Folk was first heard on 27 June 1987.
By May 1989 The
Archers hit the magic 10,000 episodes. From 25 May this is edition number
9,999.
The following day the special edition features Terry Wogan
who's staying at Grey Gables whilst taking part in a pro-celebrity golf
tournament. He's greeted by Pru Forrest, played by Judi Dench, a character
who was seemingly silent in the 70s and 80s though she'd previously been played by Mary Dalley After this episode Pru once again lost her tongue.
Roland White looks at the programme's history for that
week's Radio Times.
No special guests for the 12,000th episode on 24 January
1997 as we join the action at Grange Farm.
In this Radio Times
article from the same week Alison Graham asks whether the serial has come too
far away from its roots as "an everyday story of country folk".
A couple of documentaries about The Archers. From 1991 Archers fan and radio critic Gillian
Reynolds looks at the first forty years. It includes the voices of creator
Godfrey Baseley, BBC executive Jock Gallagher, editor William Smethurst, actors
June Spencer (Peggy Woolley) and Tim Bentinck (David Archer) Susie Riddell
(Kate Aldridge), scriptwriter Mary Cutler and agricultural advisor Anthony
Parkin. Apologies for the iffy quality of this recording.
From December 2000 is this edition of The Archive Hour in which Simon Hoggart looks at the how the
development of the characters and storylines has adapted to reflect changing
social roles and attitudes.
Finally some fun from 2001 when the Dead Ringers team pay an affectionate tribute to the show on its 50th anniversary. Starring Jon Culshaw, Jan Ravens, Mark Perry and Kevin Connelly this edition first aired on 1 January 2001.
So the question was: Broadcast on radio in 1937, Britain's
first quiz programme was a test of what? (a) Mental arithmetic (b) General
knowledge or (c) Spelling? This was the question posed to a contestant on last
night's Beat the Chasers (ITV). And
the answer...
UK radio's first on-air contests were write-in affairs. The
first was The Query Programme aired
on 2LO on 7 May 1924. Unbilled artistes had to be listed in correct Radio Times billing, the three listeners
with the closest entries being invited to the studio at Savoy Hill for the
evening. Subsequent programmes, there were seven in all, generously offered
five guineas to the most successful entrant and runners-up prizes of three
guineas and one guinea.
Another write-in competition was Puzzle Corner ("Hello Puzzlers") which became a feature
of the show Monday Night at Seven (and
later Monday Night at Eight) that had
started in 1937. The show featured a number of elements such as music, comedy
sketches and a short drama, Inspector
Hornleigh Investigates being the best known, and, from January 1938, Puzzle Corner. With general knowledge
questions, anagrams and a musical medley it proved immensely popular and ran
until 1949, by which time it was part of The
Family Hour. It got a TV spin-off in 1950 as part of Kaleidoscope and then as a stand-alone show (1953-55).
But the first quiz game to be battled out on air in real
time, and the subject of that Beat the
Chasers question, was a Spelling Bee broadcast as part of Children's Hour on Thursday 25 November
1937. Billed as An Inter-Regional
Spelling Competition the Radio Times
tells us that "this is an experiment which, it is hoped, will prove
amusing. Mac (Derek McCulloch aka Uncle Mac) will conduct a spelling
competition for boys and girls in several different regions simultaneously, and
listeners will hear how the competitors got on".
A further transatlantic version was held in March followed
by further UK-only inter-city competitions chaired by Freddie Grisewood, some dialect
versions ("none of the words will be found in the Oxford dictionary")
and even a TV version on the pre-war BBC service.
The idea on was revived on
BBC radio during the war under the chairmanship of Ronnie Waldman pitting together
teams such as Actors v Actresses or GIs v Tommies, and post-war with Lionel
Gamlin being the most regular 'spelling-master'. UK broadcast spelling bees
fizzled out in the early 50s but they remain popular in the US with the
National Spelling Bee running since 1925 with TV coverage for the last 20-odd years
on ESPN.
Radio 2 has been pausing for thought for half a century now.
The two or three minutes of faith-led reflection is a surprisingly enduring
programme element on an increasingly pop-orientated network, like some Reithian
religious hangover. On a busy, frenetic breakfast show such an item can feel
anachronistic and in danger of leading to a clunky gear change. But equally it
can be seen as a welcome moment to take stock, consider others, to literally
pause for thought.
Pause for Thought
first aired at 8.55 am on Monday 6 April 1970 and replaced the weekday editions
of Five to Ten. It was just one part
of the religious output on BBC Radio 2 at the time that included two services
on Sunday: People's Service (1945-80)
just before Family Favourites and the
long-running Sunday Half-Hour (1940-2013).
Generally speech-based, Pause for Thought
was initially not always led by a minister or religious representative.
Depending on the theme for the week actors, writers and musicians made regular
appearances. In the first few months we heard from Cliff Richard, Derek Nimmo,
J.B. Priestley, Larry Adler and Joyce Grenfel. The programme proved to be very
popular with an audience in excess of 1 million and an anthology of talks from
the series published by the BBC - available for 25p from all good bookshops.
Schedule changes in October 1972 meant that Pause for Thought was no longer a
stand-alone programme but part of the Early
Show at 6.15 am and repeated during Terry Wogan's breakfast show at 8.45. By
1990 there were three daily editions with an extra slot in the wee small hours during
what was then Night Ride. Whilst the
talks had always been pre-recorded the overnight and early ones were now on
tape but the breakfast show edition was live.
Though the times have varied over the intervening years the
three weekday editions of Pause for
Thought continue to this day, overnights in a pre-recorded version on OJ
Borg's show and then two different editions live during Vanessa Feltz's and Zoe
Ball's shows. No longer produced in-house by what is now the department of
Religion and Ethics, its contracted out to TBI Media.
Over the years some of the contributors have become established
radio names; I'm thinking of the likes for Rev Frank Topping, Rev. Roger Royle,
Fr Brian D'Arcy and Rev. Ruth Scott. Here are a selection of recordings from
the last 50 years:
This is an early example from August 1970 in which actor
Peter Pacey reads from a selection of the recent translation of the Apocrypha.
From December 1984 a decidedly more light-hearted affair for
Terry's final breakfast show (the first time around) from the BBC's Religious
Affairs Correspondent Gerald Priestland who was a regular contributor with his Priestland's Postbag.
Although the Pause for
Thought mainly used outside contributors BBC religious department staff
also appeared including producers David Winter and John Newbury. A programme
favourite for many years was Roger Royle who would consider listener's letters
in what was titled Royle Mail. This
edition dates fromFebruary 1985.
From January 1986 a slightly more fanciful affair from
religious author Stuart Jackman.
By the 1990s the live editions had become more of a
conversation between presenter and contributor to make the change of pace and
topic less jarring and often adding an element of humour. From Wogan's return
in January 1993 this is Rabbi Hugo Gryn.
Ruth Scott was a hugely popular contributor who sadly died
last year. Here she is with Terry in April 2006.
Anglican Bishop Rob Gillion uses the fact that Wogan has
just been voted the station's Ultimate Icon as the springboard for his talk in
October 2007.
Bringing things up-to-date and marking the PFT's 50th anniversary last week is
writer and comedian Paul Kerensa who kindly name-checked me in his opening
remarks. Paul is speaking to Amol Rajan who was covering the breakfast show.
When Pause for Thought
started in 1970 it was replacing the existing daily religious slot Five to Ten which, it won't surprise you
to learn was on at 9.55 am. Originally billed as "a story, a hymn and a
prayer" it started on the Light Programme in December 1950. The Radio Times explains that the aim
"has been to provide those who are busy at work with an opportunity for a
brief recollection of the great spiritual truths of Christianity - something
healthy and helpful to brood on during the day". The stories were mainly
but not exclusively biblical, the hymns recorded for solo and choral verses
with organ accompaniment and a short prayer "short enough for a housewife
to pause and join in without risking the cooking and a worker to do the same
without inviting the sack." This example of Five to Ten dates from April 1958.
I can't leave the subject without also briefly mentioning Thought for the Day over on Radio 4. It
too is fifty years old this month having replaced Ten to Eight sandwiched in-between the two editions of Today, which it turn replaced Lift Up Your Hearts (1939-65),
or Lift Up Your Skirts according to
one episode of I'm Sorry I'll Read That
Again. Thought for the Day has
had more of a controversial history than Pause
for Thought, and I'll cover that in a future post.
From today's perspective the furore over Broadcasting in the Seventies seems like
a storm in a teacup. But at the time it threatened the corporation with
industrial action, the withdrawal of
labour by the Musician's Union and letters from the great and good describing
it as a threat to "the unique role the BBC has played in the cultural and
intellectual life of the country".
It was fifty years ago this week that a number of BBC
national radio programme changes came occurred brought about by the
implementation of the policy document Broadcasting
in the Seventies. Essentially the plan was to redefine the characteristics
of each of the four radio networks: Radios 1, 2, 3 and 4 and move away from the
existing mixed programming - a style of programming that had existed since
Reith's day. We're now used to tightly formatted radio output but at the time
this was both novel and controversial. But, if listeners expected an overnight
shift in the sound of the favourite station this didn't really happen and it
took years for it to pan out - the result of insufficient funds and
insufficient wavelengths.
There were several factors that convinced the BBC to act and
shake-up its radio services. Financially the Government was tightening the
purse strings and refusing any licence fee increases, whilst at the time the
BBC had ambitions to expand their services and to adopt new technology (the roll-out of colour TV and
VHF stereo for instance). Radio listening
figures, particularly those in the evening, had started to fall. There was also
a notion to hive off the new Open University programmes, as well as existing
schools programmes, onto a separate VHF network paid for by government -
something which never happened and continued to lead to AM/FM splits and
headaches for schedulers for another couple of decades. The BBC had been forced
to start a new pop service in 1967 with the launch of the pirate-replacement
Radio 1. And finally, with a view to what might happen, and did arrive four
years later, there was the threat of commercial radio competition.
The document, published in July 1969, was part of a process
that had started over a year before with a wealth of consultation and working
parties during which the Corporation had, for the first time but by no means
the last, used independent management consultants, in this case McKinsey and
Co.
On streamlining network radio the report had this to say:
"Traditionally, broadcasting has been based on the
principle of mixed programming. On a single channel, the public is offered the
whole range: news, documentaries, plays, music, light entertainment, serials,
sport - all types of programmes, covering all interests and all 'brow' levels. But experience, both in this country and abroad, suggests
that many listeners now expect radio to be based more on a different principle
- that of the specialised network, offering a continuous stream of one
particular type of programme, meeting one particular interest. One channel
might offer pop, another serious music, another talk programmes, and so on".
When the document was released on Thursday 10 July 1969 the
Corporation held staff briefings, press conferences and published a special
edition of the staff magazine Ariel.
The proposals were discussed on air including an hour long Q&A session on
the Third Programme the following Tuesday. This is how that evening's Radio Newsreel covered the news with the
summary: "Radio 1 strictly pop. Radio 2 carrying light music from Sinatra
to Lehar. Radio 3, perhaps only on VHF, with more classical music and Radio 4
with mostly talk". The newsreader
is Peter Barker and the reports from Brian Curtois and Jim Biddulph.
In 1969 Radio 1 and Radio 2 shared a great deal of
programming but, to quote the report, "to their respective fans, Emperor
Rosko and Eric Robinson barely inhabit the same planet let alone the same air
waves". So Radio 1 was to be an "all-pop network". No surprises
here but at the time it still carried some jazz shows. Radio 2 was to play
"light music" and to shed some of its speech elements. So Any Questions? and Midweek Theatre moved over to Radio 4, and Woman's Hour would follow two years later. News Time with Derek Cooper was dropped and Your Hundred Best Tunes transferred over to Radio 2 from Radio
4. Another programme, still running to this day as part of the Radio 2 breakfast show, also started with the religious slot Pause for Thought replacing Five to Ten.
It was the changes to the Third Programme that caused the
most uproar, not unlike the protests over the 1957 cut in hours and the
introduction of Network Three. Now it was such luminaries as Sir Adrian Boult,
James Cameron, George Melly, Jonathan Miller and Henry Moore who supported the
Campaign for Better Broadcasting and fired off letters to The Times.
Since the network shake-up in September 1967 the Third
Programme title had been retained for the evening schedule of music, drama,
arts and talks - the same highbrow mix that had defined the station since its
launch in 1946. In addition the wavelengths carried a daytime schedule of
classical music as the Music Programme, on weekday evenings there was a Study
hour of further education programmes and on Saturday afternoons the Sports
Service.
Under Broadcasting in
the Seventies the proposal was to re-badge the whole lot as Radio 3 and to
continue the music programming into the evening. The Sports Service was dropped
and moved over to Radio 2 to become Sport
on 2. Sport wasn't totally lost on Radio 3 however as it still carried Test Match Special. Meanwhile some speech programming would move
over to Radio 4. In addition the idea of having Radio 3 as a VHF only service
was floated, with the medium wave frequencies used to supplement local radio
expansion. (Radio 3 did finally become FM only in February 1992).
What also caused upset was the decision to axe the Scottish
Symphony Orchestra, the London Studio Players, the BBC Chorus, the BBC Training
Orchestra and, heard only on Radio 2, the Northern Dance Orchestra. Earlier
proposals from the internal Policy Study group had also put the Concert and the
Northern Ireland Orchestras in the frame. In the event there was a reprieve, at
least in the short-term. Writing in The
Listener Director-General Charles Curran admitted that the Government
basically said "You have too many orchestras but we want you to continue
to employ them because somebody has to. They are needed nationally".
The Scottish SO continues to this day, the London Studio
Players stayed playing until 1984, the BBC Chorus went back to its original
name of the BBC Singers in 1972, the Training Orchestra was finally wound up in
1977, the Northern Ireland Orchestra was subsumed into the Ulster Orchestra in
1981 and the NDO became the Northern Radio Orchestra in 1975 but was disbanded
in 1980.
The longer lasting changes were seen on Radio 4 this week in
1970. As well as inheriting some speech programmes from Radios 2 and 3 the
proposals saw an increase in news and current affairs coverage and plans to "develop
the four main news and magazine periods - breakfast time, lunch time, early
evening, and late evening". Today
with Jack de Manio and The World at One
with William Hardcastle already existed but new to the schedules were the
teatime PM "the news magazine
that sums up your day and starts off your evening." Replacing Home This Afternoon (a magazine show
aimed a older listeners) and produced by
the WATO team, PM was presented by William Hardcastle to cover the hard news and
either Derek Cooper or Steve Race (who also regularly hosted Home This Afternoon), who would look
after the lighter elements.
There was another half-hour news programme at 7 pm, News Desk with former US correspondent
Gerald Priestland and newsreader Meryl O'Keeffe. Priestland describing the
programme as "news with a human voice". Finally, taking a more
serious tone and a more international outlook was The World Tonight with Douglas Stuart, which replaced Ten O'Clock. Though News Desk was dropped in 1976 - replaced by The World in Focus which itself ended in July 1977 when the Six O'Clock News was extended from 15 to
30 minutes - PM and The World Tonight remain key programmes.
Elsewhere on Radio 4 some other equally long-lasting
programmes were launched: Week Ending
(1970-98), Start the Week with
Richard Baker and Analysis with Ian
McIntyre who said of the programme that "our business was to get behind
the news and dig and illuminate and go a bit further." You and Yours would follow in October
1970. Music shows didn't completely disappear, there was Steve Race's daily Invitation to Music for instance and
occasional classical concerts. The report also covered local radio and expected the network
to expand to 40 stations, though financial restrictions saw this stall at 20
until 1980. On regional production the idea was the phase out the opt-outs from
Radio 4, apart from Scotland, Northern Ireland and Wales and to restructure the
BBC English regional map around eight production centres rather than the old
Regional and Home Service ones determined by transmitter range.
In the lead-up to the on-air changes for the week commencing
4 April 1970 the Radio Times printed
a series of Q&As with BBC management. Here's the final set with Ian
Trethowan, MD Radio and Gerard Mansell, Director of Programmes, Radio.
The magazine also published this example weekday schedule to
summarise to give listeners an idea of what to expect.
So did Broadcasting in
the Seventies make a difference. It's an unequivocal yes. Station
controllers had inherited mishmash
schedules from the old Home, Light and Third. Listening habits had changed;
there was TV to divert you, particularly in the evening, more folk listened in
the car and on their transistor radios. No longer would the family sit round
the wireless to enjoy an evening of mixed entertainment. In the era of
increasing consumer choice radio schedulers had to make it easier for listeners
to find what they wanted. Having said that the sound of the networks didn't totally
change overnight, it was more of a gradual shift. As Trethowan admitted " the
changes were not nearly as dramatic as we made out in public." There was
still music on Radio 4, drama serials on Radio2 and current affairs on Radio 3.
But the real issue was financial. Although the final report
put such considerations well down the list it still talked of predicted annual deficit
in the radio budget of £4.5 million by 1974. The figure in the earlier McKinsey
report was worse with an £8m deficit forecast by 1972. The Corporation had been
frustrated in its attempts to get an increase in the licence fee by Wilson's
government which was too embroiled in devaluation issues and cabinet
in-fighting. At a Downing Street meeting in 1966 the PM had told the BBC "drastically to prune its
expenditure".
Typically the BBC fudged and delayed any economies but by
the time of the 3-day week and the oil crisis it was squeezed even further and
broadcasting hours were trimmed back and programme sharing invoked between
Radios 1 and 2 and between Radios 3 and 4.
I'll leave the final word on this to listener Frederick
Chamberlain who sent in his A Listeners
Prayer to the BBC in 1968:
Were I in charge of the BBC,
The Radio Programmes - they would be-
Channel 1 - Pop all day; low brow sounds, to some quite gay.
Channel 2- that would go-harmonic music for the medium brow.
Channel 3-Symphonic noise, for the high brow girls and boys,
Prose and Poetry, Opera too, not for the many but just for the few.
Channel 4-Would surely be -talks-religion-plays and
views-odds and ends and of course the News.
And so-all-would be satisfied-
Not one listener ere denied. The full document and an article on the evolution of BBC radio post 1967 by Dr Alban Webb is on the History of the BBC website.
Yesterday broadcaster Steve Martin tweeted "BBC
colleagues - recreate the NBH experience at home by randomly changing the
thermometer (thermostat) and
releasing some pet mice".
A mouse you say? In the studio? Yes, unexpected rodent sightings
did seem to be commonplace around the BBC and I've dug out audio evidence of a
couple of incidences.
First, the now infamous mouse-related episode up at Media
City in January 2013 during Shelagh Fogarty's 5 live show. As guest Mike
Linnell spots the unwelcome intruder there are girlie screams from Shelagh as she
hops onto her chair in a scene reminiscent of an old Tom and Jerry cartoon. "It's
on the bloody table," she exclaims.
This all happened just a month after another mouse had
popped up during Kate Kinsella's weather forecast, presumably from a London
weather studio, during Iain Lee's BBC Three Counties morning show. This one is "quite
sweet actually" as Kate rejects Iain's suggestion to despatch it with a
book or a block of wood.
Local radio is under the cosh at the moment. Commercial
stations dominated by the Global/Bauer duopoly relentlessly head towards
networked shows and centralised production. In my home town the Viking FM
breakfast show comes from Sheffield, 70 miles away, and just last week the rockin'
church in Preston closed its doors. That
said the number of stations on offer, on DAB and online, continues apace. Last
year hardly a month passed without yet another fresh addition to one of the
existing brands.Localness hasn't been
totally abandoned as this year OFCOM are expected to announce further community
radio licences this month.
Meanwhile the BBC is feeling particularly unloved both by
the Government and the public whose perception of the Corporation barely extends
beyond Question Time and the Today
programme. Calls to 'scrap the licence fee' always overlook the funding model
for radio in general, and BBC local radio in particular. But BBC local stations
continue to demonstrate their worth. Consider the coverage of the flooding in
the last three weeks - and how often is it that adverse weather shows the
strength of a truly local service? - with some commendable reporting on many
stations. And only last week Radio
Cornwall's Donna Birrell wrote of the important personal connections that radio
makes when relating the story of 'Clara from Bude'.
Local radio did enjoy something of a golden age in the 1980s
and 90s when new stations were coming on stream, AM and FM services were
splitting, broadcast hours expanding and budgets increasing. But it wasn't
always like this. The birth of a BBC local radio network was years in
development with co-funded experimental stations run of shoestring budgets and
reliant on Radio 2 and Radio 4 programmes to fill the holes in the schedule.
Independent local radio, when it finally arrived, offered a true livelier
alternative to those lucky enough to have a station in their area but,
hamstrung by regulatory restrictions , struggled to make a profit and was not
averse to some BBC-style programming like Swops and Trades and Late Chemists
Rotas.
This weekend the documentary The Village Loudspeaker - the nickname Dave Bassett gave Plymouth
Sound when it started - reflects on the evolution of local radio. It's a
bi-media effort with a half-hour television version on the BBC News Channel and
an hour long radio version on Radio Solent on Sunday afternoon.
Here's the TV documentary:
Producer Richard Latto has been digging around in the
archives and sourcing material from private collectionsto uncover video that's not been seen since
its first broadcast. There are also newly-recorded interviews with the likes of
Martin Kelner, Johnnie Walker, Les Ross, Graham Dene, Louise Churchill, Darren Lethem, Tony Gillham, Duncan Warren,
Stephanie Hurst, Chris Burns, John
Foster and Graham Mack.There are over
40 video clips to support this programme on the BBC Radio Solent website here.
Richard says “This isn’t a definitive history of local
radio, it’s a flavour of local radio and a chance to reflect on how it has
changed and evolved over the years. With all the recent changes, especially in
the commercial sector, local radio has generated a lot of discussion from both
industry insiders and listeners, who have heard it evolve at great pace.” This is the radio version of The Village Loudspeaker:
On this blog I've written about the first 19 ILR stations
and many of the early BBC local stations as they hit their 50th anniversaries.
See under the 'Down Your Local' label. See also The People's Radio blog post.
