Memorable encounters on the air and small screen

When, recently, the BBC recorded an interview with me on a chilly platform at Ribblehead railway station I had a feeling that my contribution of a few minutes duration would not be used. I had been asked to talk briefly about the celebrated viaduct.

The radio programme into which the interview would be slotted was about gardening. My absence “on air” a few days later therefore did not disappoint me.

I chatted with Eric Robson, producer, whom I had met several times. On the last occasion, he was compiling a DVD about Wainwright and the film unit crowded my kitchen.

I have had some happy – at times amusing – times on radio and television. When I was interviewed for a programme that emanated in London, a green van belonging to the BBC arrived outside my Giggleswick home.

The engineer who had brought it sat me down in a favourite lounge seat, wired me up, then left. I was the only person in the house. A voice in my ear gave me instructions. I was put in touch with the man in the van, which was parked just a few yards away, then with the studio in London. It was all done via satellite!

In pre-television days, a BBC radio unit turned up at the Dalesman office in Clapham. The broadcasters had an ordinary saloon car, the springs of which had been strengthened to allow for the massive weight of radio equipment which occupied the back seat.

Another time, photographs from the Dalesman archives were selected for television. They were copied on to film and re-shown in a corner of our book store – a corner in which I had lagged with parcels of books to muffle outside sounds.

I commented into a microphone about the photos as they were projected before me by a person or persons unknown. My favourite sound recording took place for the BBC at their studio in Leeds. The studio was in part of a large building that had been associated with the Quakers.

I was interviewed about a book I had just written. It dealt with my experiences on the High Pennines and especially my favourite walking area, between the head of Teesdale and Cross Fell, the Pennine highspot.

A copy of the BBC recording found its way into the WRM Archive, organised by Sita Brand, and another copy came to me.

I play it now and again. It was a relatively short interview, recorded in a busy studio, reflecting rural life that was lived at a gentler, slower pace than it is today. The valleys had flower fields. Some amusing tales lightened the broadcast I quoted a remark made by an old-style dalesman. It was that “milk tastes o’ nowt till a cow’s had its foot in t’bucket”.

Towards the end, I spoke about the centuries-long association of humans with a bleak, windswept, rain-drenched environment. Up there, on the Pennines, were forces of nature that man had been battling against for many thousands of years. At the end of the interview I did not say “cheerio”. My words were merged with the rendering of some favourite music – Maurice Ravel’s Lever du jour (Daybreak). It brought tears to my eyes. Yorkshire TV was kind to me, especially when I had a half hour conversation with Richard Whiteley in a capacious Leeds studio. We sat, face to face, a table between us, in a pool of light, and our talk was conversational. Richard was affable and clearly pleased to be chatting with me for we had often met down the years.

I described a notable musical discovery when I was allowed to open up the case of an old grandfather clock at a farmhouse in a little-known part of Lakeland. Among the music that tippled on to the floor were original scores that Young Mr Elgar had written while staying at Giggleswick with his friend Dr Buck. Alas, Richard died at a relatively early age.

It was in the Yorkshire TV studio in Leeds, during a teatime programme, that I produced one of the songs composed at Giggleswick by Elgar I found in that grandfather clock in South Lakeland.

I gave background details – and then the song was sung by a notable contralto with piano accompaniment.

Happy days!