Speechification

Another jewel from the archive. Patrick Wright, author of countless articles and six books (including the excellent Tank: The Progress of a Monstrous War Machine) made this documentary about the uncomfortable collision of art and war in the early twentieth century. In particular, it's about a British society portrait painter called Solomon J Solomon and his innovations in camouflage. It was produced in August 2002 by John Goudie, who now, among other things, produces Radio 4's Front Row.

Wright has a brilliant web site with enough clever words on it to keep you going for weeks - including these about our hero Solomon.

The picture shows HMS Furious in about 1918, painted in what is still called 'dazzle camouflage,' another innovation of the period. It's from the Wikimedia Commons (MP3).

Billy Childish is the permanent outsider, but a few more people are starting to hear his name and - if very lucky - his music, too. The ICA is about to launch a large exhibition of his work, so his reputation will only be growing. John Wilson explores his work and his world. [MP3]

Something from Radio 3 in mid-2007: Mark Kermode in the Charlie Chaplin archives, uncovering the filmmaker's connections to celebrity (he invented the whole thing) and modernism (he inspired pretty much everybody, especially the Dadaists). MP3.

Lovely, slow-paced, contemplative Radio 3 Sunday Feature about Byzantium and its continued influence. Pretty much the exact opposite of the Russell Brand Show in so many ways... What a rich and varied thing the BBC is. Here's the MP3 and here's the programme page.

While everyone's wibbling on about the world crashing around our ears it's worth listening to this programme - about a time when it nearly was; when unflappable gents were parked in Vulcan bombers, only half a minute away from taking off with their nuclear payloads and various people had to make serious plans about how and where they wanted to die. MP3 here. (And thanks to Curtis for alerting us to this one.)

Here's an orgy of high-end medical sound for you: gurgles and pings, clicks and whirrs. A mesmerising programme recorded at Harefield heart hospital by sound artist John Wynne. The quiet voices of patients offset the clinical cacophany with their stories. The show went out in Radio 3's Between the Ears slot in June and was accompanied by photographs taken by Tim Wainwright, including the one on the left (MP3).

On Radio 3 they're having a sort of Summer season of short essays from 100 clever and/or important people. It's all part of a real festival called Free Thinking that takes place in Liverpool at the end of October. In her contribution Marina Warner talks about the commodification of art and concludes (in two minutes flat) that the visual arts are less commodified than writing. Clever and persuasive. The other essays are all here. Contributors include: Phil Redmond, Stuart Maconie, Frank Cottrell Boyce, Germaine Greer and quite a lot of very interesting people I've never heard of (MP3).

Worth noting too that Radio 3 will most likely chuck the whole lot away once the festival is finished since that seems to be standard practice with the station's speech output: especially scandalous behaviour when you consider that this cerebral stuff must have a residual value of close to zero. Write to your MP or something.

Radio National recently dusted off a few archive programmes to mark the work of producer Tony Barrell. I'll post a few of the shows here, for sure. This one's a beauty - on the life and work of photographer Edward Muybridge, and thus the nature of time. Some charming moments, not least a few shards of Philip Glass cross-fading into the sound of a train. But also some mind-boggling insights into time itself, from scientists and skateboarders. An absolutely lovely piece of work.

Radio Eye: The Space Between Time [mp3]

The Ken Nordine is worth the price of admission alone. Actually so is the Patrick Gibson/Laurie Anderson piece at the end.

The Night Air: Museums [mp3]

This is just lovely. I could listen to old men remembering interesting lives forever anyway, but one of these old men invented Minnie The Minx for The Beano. And the others drew or edited or wrote storylines for The Dandy at DC Thompson in Dundee. Morris Heggie and Dave Torrie both edited The Dandy (in 71 years the comic has had four editors), Bill Ritchie and Jim Petrie were artists and Walter Fearne worked his way up from storylines to Managing Editor. What a life to look back on... (MP3)