Christopher Stone

Presenter0:00

This download is the only extract the BBC has of this edition of Desert Island Discs. The presenter was Roy Plumley.

Presenter0:08

How do you do, ladies and gentlemen?

Presenter0:10

On our desert island this week is the first gentleman of the gramophone, the man to whom everyone who presents a programme of grammophone records and every listener who enjoys such programmes owes a great deal. It's the man who started it all thirty years ago, Christopher Stone.

Presenter0:24

Well, Christopher, what is all this about a seventy fifth birthday? I I just don't believe it.

Christopher Stone0:28

Well I seventy fifths is quite a different thing. It's nothing to do with grammar phones at all. It it's something that happens to people uh when their time comes.

Presenter0:33

Kind of

Speaker 30:33

Apes

Christopher Stone0:36

Yeah. Uh

Speaker 30:36

Yeah. Apparently, he caught me. Well, you you certainly don't look like it, and I'm I'm sure you don't feel it. I don't

Presenter0:43

They don't feed it today.

Speaker 30:44

Uh

Presenter0:44

Now, you're going to be quite alone on this desert island, Christopher. How do you like the idea?

Christopher Stone0:48

I like the idea very much. I've always been attracted by islands, especially when they're lived on by my brother-in-law.

Christopher Stone0:55

Come, Mackenzie, wherever he is, I have always gone to see him, and I've generally had to go a good long way to see him. Yes, he's a great lantern island. Well, now, I'll tell you the thing, I'm I'm rather worried as to whether there are roses growing on that island.

Presenter1:08

Can't guarantee raising.

Christopher Stone1:09

But I'm terribly proud of the rose that was called after me by my friend Mr. Herbert Robinson.

Presenter1:13

And I

Christopher Stone1:15

Uh

Presenter1:15

Yes, in

Christopher Stone1:16

The Yes, the question was.

Presenter1:16

Yes, the Christmas stone rose. Well now, what are you going to choose to take with you in the way of rec

Christopher Stone1:20

And I'm going to choose, just in as a sort of compliment, a rose, rose, I love you. A a quite absurd thing to uh play in its honour, this rose. And that is the record that

Christopher Stone1:34

Wilfred Thomas. Wilfred Thomas. That is a course of Re Wilfred Thomas, one of his discoveries.

Presenter1:36

Dip.

Christopher Stone1:39

And he brought it over here and I broadcasted during that time and I think it's most delightful. Who's singing? Her name is Huey Huey Lee or some such name of that sort. Lee is the song.

Speaker 31:45

Who singy

Speaker 31:50

Ah, yes. And you would like it sung in the original Chinese? I think so.

Christopher Stone1:54

Oh yes, not that I know much Chinese.

Christopher Stone1:57

Well, I hope you liked that that accompaniment. It's very good.

Presenter2:00

I enjoyed

Christopher Stone2:00

It would be a very good accompaniment for me on my island.

Presenter2:00

Then we can be a very corresponding.

Christopher Stone2:04

if there weren't neuroses. But now uh I had a thought this morning in bed whether I wouldn't like to be reminded of everything else.

Christopher Stone2:14

in my life, which is

Christopher Stone2:16

round me now. And the thing that strikes me most is that picture of Carnival that I've got opposite my bed, done by T. Deddick.

Christopher Stone2:25

And he did it in about nineteen nineteen when the Coliseum was having a season of Diagilev Ballet and he had a pass to go and look at it whenever carnival was being played.

Christopher Stone2:37

And he made this delightful picture, which is all full of colour. I've shown it to you, haven't I?

Presenter2:41

Yes, I I I see an interest. It is beautiful, that deep blue backdrop and the little figures along the footlights.

Christopher Stone2:44

Yeah.

Christopher Stone2:45

Oh, it's a fascinating business.

Speaker 32:46

Yeah.

Christopher Stone2:47

But anyhow, there it is, and I think we ought to have a little of Schumann's music, just to sort of give an idea of the crowds, the lovely people moving about, which I dare say most of us have seen on ballet productions.

Presenter3:01

Just prior to the last movement of Schumann's music Carnival. Now what, Christopher?

Christopher Stone3:07

Well, I'd had a great uh ballet phase in my life. I had a great friend at one time called Charlotte, who always used to make me go to all sorts of ballets and things.

Presenter3:16

Willingly I try.

Christopher Stone3:17

Willingly I try.

Presenter3:18

Willingly, I trust.

Christopher Stone3:19

Oh, very, very much. I think I learnt all I know about uh Belle from her. I remember the um special uh thing she used to love best of all, the r one of the records, used to write to me and say, I hope you're going to broadcast it soon, I used to, and that was La Calinda by Delius out of Coanga, which is a rather a popular thing with most of us, I think.

Presenter3:36

Yeah.

Christopher Stone3:41

Here it is.

Presenter3:43

La Colinda. Now we come to number four. What's that?

Christopher Stone3:46

Well, i I think it's uh another of my morning favorites, the ones ones that put me in the right mood.

Christopher Stone3:52

And this one is lovely. It's Mozart's Divertimento number fifteen in B-flat, and it's played by the members of the Vienna Octet, and of course it is all delightful, but uh we'll just have a little sample of a little minuet from it, I think which we shall find just the mood we want.

Presenter4:12

Christopher, you were the very first to present gramophone records on the air in an individual way. How did all that start? What were you doing before that?

Christopher Stone4:20

Yeah, I don't know. I used to write books and

Christopher Stone4:23

That sort of thing. And I I gradually got mixed up in this.

Speaker 34:24

Mano.

Christopher Stone4:27

uh a magazine that my brother-in-law was starting, the Grammophone, and uh of course it meant tremendous lot of work bu building that up into the size it's got to. And so uh there it was. I was working, working very hard and I suddenly came to the conclusion that the BBC were not having really the best new records that were coming out into my office.

Christopher Stone4:48

So I wrote to them about it, and uh Rex Palmer asked me to go along. He put me under Craig Miller.

Christopher Stone4:54

who uh looked after me tremendously well. And I started regular.

Presenter4:57

And

Presenter4:59

And that led to you you did at one time top the bill at the palladium playing the gramophone. I'm sure that's a unique achievement.

Christopher Stone5:04

See

Christopher Stone5:05

I think that's a unique, unique thing for almost anybody to do. I I remember once saying that I was the only person I knew who'd who'd ever been top of the bill in the palladium for one week, who'd never been asked to play or perform on any stage again. I'm sure that was the f.

Presenter5:19

I'm sure that was the fault of the grammar phone, not you.

Christopher Stone5:22

I enjoyed it all. I knew nothing about it.

Christopher Stone5:26

But it was uh great fun. And I had very luckily two old friends of mine came along, the two Leslies, Leslie Holmes and Leslie Sironi. They looked after me like fathers. It was marvellous. Saw what I was wearing, whether I was properly dressed and when I got onto the stage, what I got to do and all that sort of thing.

Christopher Stone5:43

And uh so they have always been almost my prime uh amusing people'cause they've got a laugh in their voices about everything. And if I'd like to have a record of theirs, hundreds of records they must have made. Which one would you like? This one.

Presenter6:00

Why must we keep on working? Oh, Christopher, you'll have to do a certain amount of work, I'm afraid, on this desert island. How do you think you're going to manage? Will be able to look after yourself?

Christopher Stone6:08

Oh, I don't know. I've always looked after myself somehow, but I like

Christopher Stone6:12

Very much to have someone to look after me, I must say.

Presenter6:15

That's not allowed. I'm sure it's not.

Christopher Stone6:16

Could you build somewhere to live?

Christopher Stone6:20

Oh, I don't know about living. I can I can live on the ground like anybody else. It might be a bit damp. What are you going to eat?

Christopher Stone6:27

Anything I need, practice anything, and drink all my canoe fish?

Christopher Stone6:32

Oh, I've been looking forward to that all my life, and I've never had time to learn fishing properly. Now I'm really going to learn quite a lot about that.

Presenter6:39

You'll have plenty of time. Well, Christopher, you've always struck me as as a man who's contented with the simple pleasures in life, so I don't think you'll get on too badly on this island. Let's have your next record.

Christopher Stone6:49

For my next record I want the bronze horse overture Aubert to be played, just to remind me of all the horsey things I've got mixed up in my life. Some of them very pleasant, some of them uh rather dangerous. Do you like horses? I like them very much, yes, and I like looking at them.

Presenter7:03

You like

Christopher Stone7:07

But um

Christopher Stone7:08

At the same time, uh I don't regard you know, I've got the old traditional feeling about them, that they're dangerous at both ends and rather uncomfortable in the middle. And I think anybody who's ever known me, especially in the war, would say uh yes, the less you get on a horse the better for you.

Christopher Stone7:25

There we are. Now we'll just have this for my beautiful bronze horse, which is made by PJ Main Maine. I don't know which is Maine, I think.

Christopher Stone7:34

who re made it in eighteen hundred and forty six.

Presenter7:37

This is that lovely bronze horse on your mantelpiece.

Christopher Stone7:39

Yes, yes, rather. And it's standing in a position which I'm told by the experts is not a very good position for a horse to be standing in.

Presenter7:47

That's a very cheery horse indeed. What next?

Christopher Stone7:50

Well, I don't know. I think about the bronzes on my mantelpiece, as usual. And here are there well, I don't know, there are all sorts of little bits about. But really it's Paris, those pictures of Paris. Those are oh, permanently for me because I've known Paris since I was a boy and in war and in peace and so on I

Presenter8:11

We first met in Paris, Christfa, do you remember?

Christopher Stone8:14

Yes, we did, didn't we?

Presenter8:15

Yeah.

Christopher Stone8:15

Yes. Oh, but it was fun. And these Paris pictures, I think we oh, we must have April in Paris, which is a record always asked for every spring by quite a number of people in this country.

Presenter8:15

But

Presenter8:28

Well now we've come to your last one, Christopher. What number eight?

Christopher Stone8:31

Well, I think I think rather an odd one. It's it's an old record by Scurwell and Weldon, which has always been very, very uh much in my mind. And in that island, now my goodness me, I think I shall be very glad to think that there's someone coming along to pick me up and take me home again. Uh

Presenter8:48

What's it called?

Christopher Stone8:49

It's called When Everyone Else Has Passed You By and They Probably Will Have by Then, I think.

Presenter8:55

Well, there you are, Christopher, there are your eight records. You've taken several records to remind you of the treasures you have around you in your flat, but every castaway is allowed to take one treasure with him, one luxury article. What have you chosen?

Christopher Stone9:08

Well, I've I've chosen something which is very seldom to be found in my flat, and that is a fountain pen I can write with easily. I don't write at all well. I want lots of ink with it.

Presenter9:17

Mhm. And some paper and and what are you going to write?

Christopher Stone9:18

What you've been doing? I just want to write things to put'em in a bottle and send'em off. See who gets them.

Presenter9:29

Well, thank you, Christopher Stern, for letting us hear your choice of Desert Island Discs. And from all of us, we wish you many more years of broadcasting and writing.

Christopher Stone9:37

No, that's what I was doing in that island.

Presenter9:39

Bye everyone.