A series of programmes made by All Out Productions are going out on BBC Radio 4 over the next few weeks:
Doon The Watta - The first installment is this Sunday at 14:45
Nicholas Parsons has gone 'doon the watta' to the Clyde where he worked as an apprentice in the 1940's to rekindle memories of his life in Glasgow and journey down the river he loves for a Radio 4 series by All Out Productions.
Nicholas Parsons was just 16 when his parents sent him from his relatively privileged home in London to the industrially hardened city of Glasgow. It was January 1940 and with the country still at war, the Parsons felt the best place for their teenage son was serving his country north of the border. So with the help of an uncle Nicholas secured an engineering apprenticeship on the busy River Clyde. For 5 years he combined his studies at Glasgow university with work for the Drysdales firm, making and fitting pumps and turbines for the steamships that would ply the estuary from Broomielaw Quay in the centre of Glasgow to as far down the coast as Largs and Ardrossan in Ayrshire. The names of these steamers were as well known to the Glaswegians and to Nicholas, as the streets of their city.
60 years on Nicholas Parsons goes back to the place where he was sent as a boy but grew into a man. By day he had a tough education from the uncompromisingly tough men of the Clyde but where by night he had the freedom to discover his talents on stage and perform to packed out theatres and concert halls full of the men whom he was clocking on and off with.
In this series Nicholas returns back to Glasgow and retraces the life he once had with All Out Senior Producer Lyndon Saunders.
Lady Plays the Blues - Radio 4 Music Documentary broadcast on Tuesday 22nd June at 1330 (and repeated Sat 26th June at 15.30)
Ex Catatonia vocalist, Cerys Matthews, travels to the USA to find the reason why so few women are known for singing and playing the blues.
When it comes to the blues and those who have mastered it, the list usually runs along the lines of: T-Bone Walker, B.B. King, Stevie Ray Vaughan, Robert Johnson, Albert King, Eric Clapton, Buddy Guy, Muddy Waters…the list goes on. But it’s striking that in many a top 10, 20 or even 100 of all time blues greats, there appear no women.
In “Lady Plays The Blues” Matthews tries to find out the story of the women who have mastered the art but have rarely been recognised for their talent. Along the way she reveals the stories of female guitarists of the early blues era such as Rosetta Tharpe, Memphis Minnie, Etta Baker, Algia Mae Hinton, and Precious Bryant. These women all lived extreme lives which led to them playing the blues in a way perhaps no man can dream of. Yet most remain unknown and some have died with no recognition whatsoever. Cerys will also reveal how guitarists from Bob Dylan and Kenny Wayne Shepard to Muddy Waters were themselves taught by some of these ladies who played the blues.
Cerys also travels to the Blues Awards in Memphis and speaks to contemporary guitarist Bonnie Raitt about the influence of pioneering blues guitarist Memphis Minnie and the 'guitar playing miracle' Sister Rosetta Tharpe.