Speech Radio You Have Listened To Lately

[Serial_Apologist]

Me neither, S_A. Actually, I've never been to Egypt.

[LMcD]

On Radio 4 yesterday there was a commendably even-handed documentary on the centenary of the Amritsar massacre*. Unsurprisingly perhaps, General Dyer doesn't come out of it particularly well, and I suppose I shouldn't have been surprised that Prince Philip displayed his usual lack of tact and questioned the casualty figures on the memorial.

* Amritsar 1919: Remembering a British Massacre. Now available on iPlayer - or am I supposed to say 'BBC Sounds'?

[gradus]

An engrossing Life Scientific with Sir Richard Peto. What a cracking good programme this is.

[ferneyhoughgeliebte]

An engrossing Life Scientific with Sir Richard Peto. What a cracking good programme this is.

[johncorrigan]

I don't normally listen to such things you'll understand, but I very much enjoyed 'Open Country' on BBC R4 this afternoon on Sussex Weald Ironworking.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m0004mfg

...among other things the programme cleared up 'Hammer ponds of Sussex' which I had often wondered about since first hearing this delight of English humour.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=csYLZlG74cw

[Eine Alpensinfonie]

Radio 3 Breakfast is largely speech nowadays, the wittering, texting, tweeting, emailing, simpering, giggling, gasping all taking precedence over the music.

[Serial_Apologist]

Rather good discussion on broadcasting impartiality yesterday on Radio 4 - 1.30pm - Call Yourself an Impartial Journalist? - a subject about which I have something of an obsession. Or at least the start of a discussion, assuming it was not just a sop for the likes of us who query the constant bias exhibited by "repected" journalist broadcasters and news interviewers that will be put back in a dusty file drawer with a label on the front saying "Sorted". For the first time in my life I found myself in agreement with Rod Liddle, while feeling that his, of all people's, admission of right wing bias at the Beeb, flowed from a position of triumph.

There was no analysis of power relations in the media and the wider forces re-inforcing them - the suggestion that idological position taking should be avoided in itself amounting to an ideological position. The main conclusion reached by the presenter, Jonathan Coffrey, was that news presentation should always be open-minded and as close to evidence-based as is possible or plausible, given frequent lack of time for referencing such and the fact that we all carry our own baggage of assumptions and prejudices. But at least there must be others than myself who feel very strongly about this.

[DracoM]

https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/w3csyp4t

Cnut King of 'England' and significant bits of Scandinavia.
On BBC World Service.

Significantly better than 'In Our Time' - Bridget Kendall in the Chair.

[LMcD]

Petroc Trelawney made one of his occasional appearances on 'From Our Own Correspondent' this morning with an entertaining piece on the QE2 in Dubai.

[jayne lee wilson]

Feedback R4 on 19 July, repeated Sunday 21/07 20:00 as usual, focussed on Radio 3 with listeners comments, Pickard, attitudes-to etc., and turned out to be surprisingly interesting (and unexpectedly encouraging!)..do take a listen....

[LMcD]

Feedback R4 on 19 July, repeated Sunday 21/07 20:00 as usual, focussed on Radio 3 with listeners comments, Pickard, attitudes-to etc., and turned out to be surprisingly interesting (and unexpectedly encouraging!)..do take a listen....

Thanks Jayne, will do!

[Serial_Apologist]

I listened to the first episode of five of a new series on Radio 4, Sats at 12.30 pm, Lobby Land, purporting to be a comedy about a certain Sam Peakes, who is '... trying to make sense of the madness engulfing British politics" (This week's Radio Times, P127), but, missing an open goal opportunity, managing to be nothing of the kind, staged in front of an audience of trained fleas. What a load of dross. Thanks goodness it's only on for five weeks.

[gradus]

I listened to the first episode of five of a new series on Radio 4, Sats at 12.30 pm, Lobby Land, purporting to be a comedy about a certain Sam Peakes, who is '... trying to make sense of the madness engulfing British politics" (This week's Radio Times, P127), but, missing an open goal opportunity, managing to be nothing of the kind, staged in front of an audience of trained fleas. What a load of dross. Thanks goodness it's only on for five weeks.

Presumably this programme was commissioned by people who found it funny but it beats me why. Perhaps it will find it's stride but there's work to do.

[LMcD]

I listened to the first episode of five of a new series on Radio 4, Sats at 12.30 pm, Lobby Land, purporting to be a comedy about a certain Sam Peakes, who is '... trying to make sense of the madness engulfing British politics" (This week's Radio Times, P127), but, missing an open goal opportunity, managing to be nothing of the kind, staged in front of an audience of trained fleas. What a load of dross. Thanks goodness it's only on for five weeks.

Thank you for confirming the wisdom of our decision to turn it off after about 40 seconds!

[doversoul1]

I very much enjoyed this week's Essay

Monday
Michael Goldfarb remembers the political and social mise-en-scène of films from the 1960s and 1970s, including work by Sam Peckinpah, Sidney Lumet and Derek Jarman. "Mise-en-scène" means the arrangement of the scenery, props, on the set of a film or, more broadly, the social setting or surroundings of an event.[…]

https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m0006ssl

...and more