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I had started doing occasional radio work in 1933 when I had been approached by
Archie Harding, the North Regional Programme Director, to read some verses in a
feature programme about May Day in England. 'We need a working-class voice,'
Harding explained. I was it. For several years afterwards I was the
'working-class voice', the 'rough voice', 'sailor's voice', 'navvy's voice',
'tramp's voice', and sometimes '2nd Narrator (northern voice)'.
Harding, the grey eminence of creative broadcasting had, almost singlehanded,
created the form of radio documentary known as the feature programme. On
leaving Oxford, he had gone straight into radio, convinced that this new medium
held the key to a new, important art form in which the spoken work would really
come into its own. He maintained that radio was a tool for poets; with it one
could manipulate words in the way that John Heartfield manipulated visual
images to create his photomontages.
After a brief studio apprenticeship, he became part of an experimental unit at
Broadcasting House, and there produced his radio adaptation of John Reed's Ten
Days That Shook the World, a work which, though never actually broadcast, was
said to be a near masterpiece. Harding was unusually modest about it and said
that his role as adapter had been a simple one.
His next major work, a superbly documented account of a rising by Asturian
miners - Crisis in Spain - was indeed brilliant. I can still recall the feeling
of tremendous excitement that I experienced when I listened to it for the first
time. It had the sweep and intellectual passion of Eisenstein at his best,
combined with the kind of inexorable unfolding of events which one encounters
in the great ballads.
With the production of Crisis, Harding left the comparatively obscure world of
experimental broadcasting for the limelight of public broadcasting. He had
become a force to be reckoned with. From now on, he was told, the writing and
production of documentary programmes was to be his sole activity. 'Choose your
own subjects, old boy.'
Any misgivings as to the subject matter of Crisis in Spain were quickly
shrugged off. Harding was a very bright young man. Just up from Oxford. Got to
give him his head for a while. A certain degree of rebelliousness is inevitable
in the young. He'll grow out of it. Give him a few responsibilities and he'll
knuckle under. You'll see, he'll turn out to be a very useful chap in the
Corporation.
So this white-headed boy, this establishment nominee was given the go-ahead to
produce more brilliant programmes. And he did, a whole fistful of them, and
they were outstanding, and each one was more politically pointed than the one
before. The 'heid yins' became more disturbed and began to ask each other
whether young Harding was ever going to toe the line. Their support was finally
withdrawn after the production of his Portrait of Warsaw, a much publicised New
Year's Eve broadcast of a programme which juxtaposed Chopin's romantic Poland
against the realities of the Pilsudski regime. It brought the Polish Ambassador
to Broadcasting House the next morning demanding an apology.
As a result, Harding was exiled to the North Region and promoted to a position
where he would neither write nor produce scripts. He settled down there to the
task of cultivating a circle of young writers and. no, not actors but readers.
He despised actors and was never able to convince himself that they possessed
even the most rudimentary intelligence.
(.)
Harding was someone I admired; he had a passionate belief in radio and had
actually created a new art form, the radio feature. He loved words and
understood their power and he had a vision of a radio art form which could
assist the forward march of mankind. He was a big man who occasionally made
himself small by making cruel remarks. I learned a great deal from Archie
Harding, and through my work with him I built up a gallery of rough voices and
mastered several dialects and accents. Later, I graduated to becoming a
narrator and poetry reader.
It was John Pudney who gaye me my first real chance as a scriptwriter. Pudney,
a producer on loan from the London headquarters of the BBC, arrived in
Manchester with a considerable reputation as a feature producer. It was a
reputation well-earned, for he was far and away the most talented producer I
ever worked with in radio. He was a poet of some standing and was able to
attract artists of the calibre of Auden and Britten to work with him. He had a
nice sense of irony and an engaging schoolboyish sense of humour.
(.)here was this upstart from the south, this effete poet who looked like a
prosperous farmer up for a day in town, intent on riding roughshod over the
well-kept pastures of the featureocracy. No lengthy passages of beautifully
crafted narration for Pudney, no dessicated prose that could be bent and angled
by cunning inflections. No soloists and no choir. Instead there were the
Caption Voices reading adverts about forgotten cures for warts, bunions,
consumptions and the falling sickness; brisk statements culled from newspapers,
official documents, government reports and royal circulars. In place of the
undesignated voices, the rough, smooth, less smooth, official, angry and fluent
voices of the classic feature programme, he introduced the characterised voice,
almost always accented or in dialect. Not the italicised dialect of a Bridson
script, where it was used as an interesting exhibit; now it was a counter of
the harsh officialese of the Caption Voices.
Pudney's approach to radio documentary was not aimed at subverting the classic
feature but at humanising it. Harding's early programmes were not only
stylistically brilliant and innovative, they were also passionate, political
statements, vibrant with anger and impatience. Form and content existed in
perfect balance. In his Manchester period the scripts which he inspired others
to write lacked the earlier political conviction and, consequently, the passion
too was absent; the form had become all-important, and while this may have
interested those who put the scripts together, it more of ten than not resulted
in pomposity and a sententiousness which must have repelled many listeners.
Pudney, on the other hand, was able to invest the dullest subject with humour
and irony and one was never allowed to lose sight of the fact that a human
intelligence was at work in even the most grandiose project.
In the same way that I had drifted into radio acting, so I drifted into
scriptwriting and occasionally into working as a temporary producer of
features. On two or three occasions I was even brought in to assist the junior
programme engineer operating the 'grams' on which pre-recorded field material
and effects were played. All these varied activities would, no doubt, have
stood me in good stead had I been interested in pursuing a career in radio; but
as far as I was concerned they were merely a means to an end, a necessary, and
at times tiresome, detour on the journey to a revolutionary theatre. This is
not to say that I found the work itself tiresome or uninteresting. On the
contrary, I was frequently fascinated by it, particularly during the first year.
Radio Work
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1933
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May Day in England
by D.G. Bridson: He had the part of an actor in this programme.
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1934
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He wrote and took part in a programme celebrating the songs of Robert Burns.
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1936
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The Lancashire Witches
: first radio script written for the North Regional Service. Produced by Olive
Shapley.
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1937 - 38
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Politics
: third in a series of one-hour programmes entitled
News of a Hundred Years Ago
. Produced by John Pudney.
The Seafarers
: second in a series entitled
Lines on the Map
, dealing with communications. Broadcast on the Empire Service of the BBC.
Produced by John Pudney.
Westwards from Liverpool
: a feature on emigration, produced by John Pudney.
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1938 - 39
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The Chartists' March
: a feature in which actors in the BBC studios of Aberdeen, Glasgow, Newcastle,
Manchester, Birmingham and London told the story of the march of the Chartists
in 1838. Produced by John Pudney.
Northern Nationalities
: six half-hour features dealing with the music and songs of
Scots, Irish, Sephardic Jews, Ukrainians and Arabs living in the North of
England.
Compiled and produced by Jimmie Miller.
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1947
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Pleasant Journey
: six documentary features written in collaboration with Joan
Littlewood as vehicles for the comedian Wilfred Pickles. Produced by Olive
Shapley.
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1948
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The Song Collector
. the record of a folk song collecting trip in Teesdale,
Yorkshire. Produced by Olive Shapley.
Scouse
: a radio portrait of Liverpool, depicted in songs and music. Produced by
Denis Mitchell.
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1952
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St. Cecilia and the Shovel
. a feature dealing with industrial folk songs, written for
the BBC Third Programme. Produced by Reggie Smith.
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1953
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Ballads and Blues
, six feature programmes dealing with various themes: the sea,
war and peace, the brutal city, love, railways, crime and criminals. The object
of
the series was to show how the British and the North Americans dealt with these
subjects in their indigenous songs. Produced by Denis Mitchell for the Home
Service and repeated on the Light Programme years later.
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The Radio Ballads
In 1957 at the invitation of producer Charles Parker, Ewan and Peggy became
involved in a project which was to bring them much reknown.
Produced for the BBC, each one-hour Radio-Ballad consisted of recorded
actuality from members of the public, a script and songs made by Ewan MacColl,
direction and musical arrangements by Peggy Seeger, production and editing by
Charles Parker, musical participation by singers and instrumentalists and
ingenious procedures innovated by BBC technicians. The final programs were
seamless tapestries of speech, sound and song and were considered revolutionary
for their time. They opened up new vistas and techniques and changed
irrevocably the course of radio documentary in Britain. There were eight
broadcast between 1958 and 1964. They are all now available on Topic Records.
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1957
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The Ballad of John Axon
: a true Casey Jones Story about a Stockport railwayman. BBC's entry for the
1958 Italia Prize.
songs:
Song of the Iron Road
Fireman's Calypso
The Fireman's Not For Me
(from the play 'You're Only Young Once')
The Ballad of Leisure Time
Train Journey
Runaway Train 1,2 & 3
The Ballad of John Axon
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1958
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Song of a Road
: about the building of Britain's first motor highway, the
M-1.
songs:
Song of a Road
Cats and Back-Acters
The Driver's Song
The Fitter's Song
Come, Me Little Son
Exile Song
Hot Asphalt
The Road is Done
Dig and Scrape and Load
Finishing the Road
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1959
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Singing the Fishing
: dealing with the herring fishing industry. Winner of the
Italia Prize (documentary category) for 1959.
songs:
North Sea Holes
Cabin Boy
Shoals of Herring
Net-Hauling Song
Fishgutters' Song
Fisherman's Wife
We're Awa to Fish For the Herrin'-O
Storm Sequence
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1960
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The Big Hewer
: dealing with Britain's coal miners.
songs:
The Big Hewer
Down in the Dark
Schooldays End
Miner's Wife
There's Changes on the Way
Champion Miner
Danger
Doorboy Song
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1961
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The Body Blow
: dealing with five people paralysed by polio. The first of the
Radio-Ballads to deal with a non-industrial subject.
songs:
While There's Life There's Hope
The Body Blow
Dependence
I'm Leaving You This Morning
Why Should This Happen to Me?
Rehabilitation
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1962
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On the Edge
: about Britain's teenagers.
songs:
Alone
World Beyond the Wall
Parent and Child
I Think We Should Be Getting Married
We're Young But We're a-Growing
Children of the Troubled World
Time That I Was Going on My Way
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1963
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The Fight Game
: dealing with professional boxing.
songs:
Life is a Battle
Peter Keenan's Song
When You're a Fighter
Skipping Song
Punching Shanty
Speedball Song
The Boxing Business
Who Would Have a Boxer
The Day of the Fight
The Fight
Man in the Ring
The Battle is Done With
The Fight Game
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1964
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The Travelling People
: about Britain's nomadic peoples.
songs:
Moving On Song
There's No Place for Me
Gypsy Jack of All Trades
The Gypsy is a Gentleman
The Gypsy's Answer
Terror Time
Thirty-Foot Trailer
The Winds of Change
Freeborn Man
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1966
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Romeo and Juliet
- not a Radio-Ballad but related in terms of radio
technique, this was an hour-long modem version of Shakespeare's play,
improvised and performed by the
London Critics Group. Broadcast by the BBC and produced by Charles Parker.
songs:
Down the Lane
Friday Night
Juliet's Song
After the Weekend It's Monday
Sweet Thames, Flow Softly
Death of Tim and Wizz
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Other radio programs ...
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1964
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The Lallans Makars
: a programme of contemporary Scots poetry broadcast
on the Third Programme. Produced by D.G. Bridson.
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1968
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Popular Poetry of the Elizabethan Era
: two programs written for the Open
University. Produced by John Gilbert.
The Song Carriers
: twelve half-hour programmes of Scots, Irish and English
traditional song. Devised by Ewan MacColl and Peggy Seeger. produced by
Charles Parker.
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1980s
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Parsley, Sage and Politics
: three hours of talk and song, edited in the Radio-Ballad style by Mary Orr
and Michael O'Rourke. An unusually informative set of programmes about the
lives of Peggy Seeger and Ewan MacColl.
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Television
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1962
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Sing in the New
: singing out the old year and welcoming in the new. Script
written with Peggy Seeger for Granada Television.
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1964
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An Impression of Love
: an impressionistic portrait of lovers and their songs.
Script written with Peggy Seeger. Directed by Adrian Malone, Grampian
Television, Aberdeen.
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1966
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The Irishmen
:
about the Irish workers who participated in the building of the
Victoria Underground Line in London. Ewan wrote the songs, Peggy
arranged them for singers and instrumentalists and the program was
conceived and produced by Philip Donnellan for the BBC. Thought to be
too brutal for public viewing, it was never broadcast. It is now available on
video (see
Charles Parker Archive
).
songs:
The New Rocks of Bairn
Farewell to Ireland
The Rambler From Clare
Rambling Irishman
Dublin Jack of All Trades
Indeed I Would
Nipper's Song
The Tunnel Tigers
Van Diemen's Land 1965
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1983
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The Stewarts of Blairgowrie
: a portrait of a Scots travelling family.
Directed by Philip Donnellan.
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1985
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Daddy, What Did You Do in the Strike?
: an hour-long program on Ewan. Granada Television, produced and directed by
David Boulton.
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1990
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The Ballad of Ewan MacColl
: a posthumous program on Ewan, produced by
Tim May, BBC.
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NOTE Between 1954 and 1972, MacColl wrote music and songs for a number of TV
programs. including
Before the Mast, Singing the Fishing, The Fight Game, Coventry Kids
. All of these were produced by the BBC.
The B.B.C. Written Archives at Chatham House contains papers and correspondence
with Ewan from 1936 until the 1960's. For access to these write to B.B.C.
Written Archive Centre, Caversham Park, Reading, Berkshire. RG4 8TZ : 0118 946
9282 (Internal; 061 282), Fax: 0118 9461145
Access to the Written Archives Centre is limited to academic researchers or
writers engaged on work accepted for publication.
Appointments to look at the material should be made well in advance, as
research places are limited to five per
day and tend to be booked for several weeks in advance.
Parsley, Sage and Politics: The Lives and Music of Peggy Seeger and Ewan MacColl
A nine part radio programme made by Mary Orr and Michael O'Rourke of Portland,
Oregon and
available from them.
Part 1. The Making of a Folksinger: Growing up in the Seeger family exposed
Peggy to the music and ideas of her father, Charles, and her mother,
avant-garde composer Ruth Crawford Seeger, her half-brother Pete, the family's
housekeeper, Elizabeth Cotten, folklorists John and Alan Lomax and others.
Part 2. The Singing Streets: Born in 1915 as Jimmy Miller, Ewan MacColl spent
his youth in the industrial slums of Northern England. This program examines
Maccoll's early influences: his working-class parents' trade unionism and love
of Scottish ballads, and his early experiences with street theatre.
Part 3. The Manchester Rambler: This segment focuses on MacColl's developing
theatre career, his membership of the Young Communist League, and his activism
during the 30's on behalf of causes such as ramblers' rights and the National
Unemployed Workers' Movement.
Part 4. Stage Left:
Formed by Ewan MacColl and director Joan Littlewood, the Theatre Workshop
revolutionised British theatre. George Bernard Shaw remarked in 1947: "Apart
from myself, MacColl is the only man of genius writing for the theatre in
England today." This episode concludes with Maccoll's departure from the
theatre and his emergence as one of Britain's leading singers.
Part 5. The First Time Ever:
This program's focus is the founding of the British folk revival and of a
lifelong partnership between Peggy Seeger and Ewan MacColl. Alan Lomax was the
catalyst for both events, he brought together MacColl and Bert Lloyd and others
who carried out the revival and he introduced Ewan MacColl and Peggy Seeger to
each other. "The First Time Ever I Saw Your Face" was written by Ewan MacColl
for Peggy Seeger during the course of a transatlantic telephone call in 1957.
Part 6. The Radio Ballads:
Between 1957-1964 Ewan MacColl, Peggy Seeger and BBC producer Charles Parker
created a series of eight radio documentaries, the Radio Ballads, that focused
on social issues and experiences of working people in different sectors.
MacColl and Seeger abandoned the traditional documentary style of using
narrators and actors. Instead, for the first time in radio history, extensive
use was made of actualities, and narration was replaced with original songs and
music written by MacColl and Seeger. The radio ballads were hailed as a major
breakthrough in radio technique and creativity. The ballad "Singing the
Fishing" won the 1960 Pria d'ltalia for radio documentary.
Part 7. Ballads and Blues:
Both Ewan MacColl and Peggy Seeger grew up with the ballads. Ewan's powerful
and expressive voice and extensive knowledge of Scottish, English and Irish
ballads make him one of Britain's foremost singers of traditional songs. When
Peggy was growing up, her family was collecting and singing traditional
American ballads. Many of these songs had roots in the British Isles. Together,
Seeger and MacColl are unsurpassed as a traditional folk song duo. The ballads
were the bedrock of the British folk revival which is the focus of this program.
Part 8. It's All Happening Now:
Initially founded by Ewan MacColl as a study group for folk artists, the
Critics Group went on to become a popular radical theater company. The annual
production of the Festival of Fools satirized current events and played to
packed houses for five years. This program features the music and songs of the
Critics Group and excerpts from a studio recording of the 1968 Festival of
Fools.
Part 9. Singing Out:
Original music is an integral part of Seeger and MacColl's political activism
and is used as an organizing tool in the labor, anti-nuclear and womens'
movements. This program is a rare opportunity to gain insights into modern-day
life through songs which are emotional, witty, tender and always
thought-provoking.
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