Speechification

It's a little quiet here at Speechification towers isn't it? Sorry about that. We all appear to be on holiday and /or watching the Olympics. Anyway. Here's something splendid to keep you going - a documentary about B-sides, one of those documentaries that makes you realise there's far more to a topic than meets the eye. I especially liked the bit about Phil Spector making awful jazz B-sides for records so DJs wouldn't play the 'wrong' song. And here's a lovely little bit by the programme maker about the tribulations of voice-overing. MP3 here.

I don't think I'd had the nerve to post another Archive Hour, it seems we do it every week, but this one was a listener request so I couldn't resist. And it is a complete audio joy. The words, the voices, the music are all great, a welcome departure from the Radio 4 norm in the use of music. But the sheer sound of it is delicious. Lots of crackly phones, under-powered tape recorders, badly tuned radios. It's incredibly evocative. Hats off to Brook Lapping who made it, and in an absolutely unheard departure for a radio production company, mention it on their website! Genius. MP3 here.

Fifteen splendid minutes about the people who turn pages for musicians during live concerts - the ultimate job where the greatest achievement is not to be noticed. Googling the programme reveals this page from the production company, but yields no more information than the BBC programme page. Googling the producer, Simon Hollis, reveals that he's also made a previous speechification favourite - A Nasty Case Of The Vapours. Before doing this it would never have occurred to me to follow the work of a particular producer, but I wish there was a way I could. The MP3 is here. (Steve - we should add Mr Hollis to the tags for the 'vapours' programme)

Here's another quickie. I heard this one in the car and it had me sort of chortling (gurgling?) with pleasure. Not because it's funny (although it is) but because it's almost perfect radio. Presenter Vivienne Parry's a proper grown-up broadcaster with a personality, opinions and loads of wit. She oozes confidence and pleasure in what she does (and she used to present Tomorrow's World!).

In this half-hour feature (obviously my favourite kind of show, looking back through Speechification's lengthening archive), she asks "what did the doomed heroines of all those Victorian novels actually die of?" and she rounds up a bunch of fascinating doctors and literary types to provide some answers. This is precisely what I pay my licence fee for (MP3, Real).