Lord Rix

Presenter0:00

Hello, I'm Kirsty Young, and this is a podcast from the Desert Island Discs archive. For rights reasons we've had to shorten the music. The program was originally broadcast in two thousand nine.

Presenter0:28

My castaway this week is Brian Rix. His transformation from the man who dropped his trousers for laughs to a ground breaking campaigner for disability rights is surely unique.

Presenter0:39

He was driven to call a halt to his first career as one of the most successful actor managers of all time.

Presenter0:45

In pursuit of altering legislation and attitudes towards disability.

Presenter0:49

The sharp change of direction, driven by deeply personal experience. His first child, Shelley, was born with Down syndrome. It has, of course, been Lord Rick's for

Presenter0:59

Seventeen years now?

Lord Rix0:59

Seventeen years.

Presenter1:01

It is a very long time since you made your living as an actor. Does that seem like somebody else's life now?

Lord Rix1:04

Yeah.

Lord Rix1:08

I suppose it does to a certain extent, although I still do one-night stands occasionally, A for myself and B for Mencalf. The first half of the show is theatre, television, all the rest of it, and the second half uh is Mencalp and the House of Lords, and I try and get laughs in both halves, which I do succeed in doing, and it's called A Pier Round Whitehall.

Presenter1:28

And something of the farce still in there.

Lord Rix1:30

Oh, yes, indeed. I mean, I still enjoy getting laughs.

Presenter1:33

Very interestingly that you said there in that answer, I do it partly for charity but also for myself. You you still feel the need and you enjoy the warmth of people enjoying your talent?

Lord Rix1:39

Yeah.

Lord Rix1:43

To hear laughter is is still incredible from my my point of view. But the extraordinary thing is, I'm still as nervous as I used to be on the first night of a of a play or or the beginning of a a television, because remember, my original televisions were all live.

Presenter2:01

Of course. That was back at the beginning of the fifties.

Lord Rix2:03

The only thing I can claim

Lord Rix2:06

Is I still known for the guy who dropped his trousers to get laughs?

Presenter2:10

Many thousands of times, and I will ask you about that a little later. For now, though, Chairman of Mencap, you did that for 22 years, and it is a support organization for people with learning disabilities. I'm still the president.

Lord Rix2:21

God shall

Presenter2:22

Indeed, you're now the President, and I was wondering if you are ever planning on slowing down.

Lord Rix2:24

But

Lord Rix2:28

No, I hope not. Um I mean, uh I w will continue uh until they either get sick of me or um

Lord Rix2:36

I'm incapable of carrying on, or I'm taken out in my coffin.

Presenter2:40

Well, just to be clear and in order that people are are aware, I I hope you don't think me rude in in reminding uh people that you are now eighty-five years old.

Lord Rix2:47

Cato

Presenter2:47

Yeah. Yes. You're incredibly dapper and apparently bursting with energy.

Presenter2:55

I thought it was for me, Ryan. I'm disappointed in the-

Lord Rix2:56

Ryan, I'm disappointed in not recording.

Presenter2:58

Uh

Presenter2:59

But you've got a wonderful scarlet kerchief and scarlet socks and a stripy shirt and your hair is immaculate. That's all important to you.

Lord Rix3:06

Absolutely.

Presenter3:07

Tell me about your first piece of music then. What's number one on the list?

Lord Rix3:10

Um well, this goes back to um my love of jazz. Elspeth and I went to see Ella Fitzgerald and uh Duke Ellington in uh what used to be the Gaumont in Hammersmith. In Hammersmith, that's right. Imagine my frustration was the number I've chosen.

Presenter3:20

In Hammers?

Lord Rix3:26

Because it absolutely brought the audience to their feet when it was actually played at the Go Mont.

Speaker 33:35

Went down to the dance

Speaker 33:38

Sat down by the wall.

Presenter3:43

Ha ha!

Speaker 33:43

Invited to dance.

Presenter3:45

Liner Today

Speaker 33:50

But no one at all

Speaker 33:55

The copper bag

Speaker 34:00

So jumping and gay.

Presenter4:01

I'm in a

Presenter4:03

Ella Fitzgerald and imagine my frustration. I read, Brian Ricks, that you can't bear rejection and you're hopeless at dealing with it. It seems, then, something of a rash decision you made to become an actor.

Lord Rix4:15

Yes, I suppose so. I couldn't bear bad notices. I remember my bad notices all all actors do, of course. But I also remember my good ones. Of course the tellies used to get good notices too.

Presenter4:26

And great and great appreciation from the audience as they love.

Lord Rix4:26

And grey and

Lord Rix4:28

Huge appreciation figures and huge audiences.

Presenter4:32

Because you had live audiences.

Lord Rix4:33

The live audience. And of course, the audience reaction was absolutely 100% genuine.

Presenter4:37

And it goes very far back, your your connection with with live theatre. You you used to watch and and indeed on occasion help your mum. She was teen Am Dram performer.

Lord Rix4:45

The same

Lord Rix4:47

Yeah, my mum was very keen on amateur theatricals and and she put on concert parties, she put on plays, she put on the amateur operatic society and so on. And uh of course when I was young she wrote me in as a stage manager and then uh later I became an actor with her.

Presenter5:04

You say when you were young, how young would you have been?

Lord Rix5:06

Oh, about seven.

Presenter5:07

And what what were your jobs?

Lord Rix5:09

Well, stage management in those days was sort of making tea, I suppose but then I graduated to putting the records on, and prompting as well.

Presenter5:18

And your mother, what sort of a woman was she?

Lord Rix5:21

Well, she she had a lovely soprano voice. She was um just a housewife, as it were. My father couldn't act for Toffee, but he built all the the scenery. But my sister s and my brother Malcolm, who was twelve years older than me, and my sister Nora, who's seven years older than me, and my sister Sheila, who's five years older than me, all were performing with my mother. And of course my sister Sheila went on the stage first of all. And of course she's best known as Annie Sugden in Emmerdale Farm. She played the lead in that for twenty-five years.

Presenter5:52

And

Presenter5:56

Um and it was brought up in Yorkshire. It it was a very comfortably off your father was a shipbuilder, ship owner. Um upper middle class background. Tell me what your home was like. What did it what sort of house did you live in?

Lord Rix6:02

Ship owner.

Lord Rix6:05

Done what you

Lord Rix6:08

We lived very comfortably, and we had three very, very large

Lord Rix6:12

uh, drawing rooms and so on, and my mother used to rehearse all the plays in one of the drawing rooms. All the furniture was stripped back, and we had a grand piano there and all the rest of it.

Lord Rix6:21

That's how it all began. It was really all home grown.

Presenter6:22

Yeah.

Presenter6:24

As a little boy that must have seemed intensely exciting, I imagine.

Lord Rix6:27

Oh, it was hugely exciting. I should love it. I've always been a person who's fond of company, as it were. But of course it was bad for me in a certain extent, because

Lord Rix6:38

It made me used to the company of adults. So when I was at school I wasn't too happy with people of my own age. You know, I was much happier with older people.

Presenter6:45

Uh

Presenter6:47

Let's take a little break for your second piece of music. Tell me what it is and why you've chosen it.

Lord Rix6:51

Well, I was the the stage manager for my mother in the

Lord Rix6:55

passion plays, well all the plays at that time. She or every year she was to put on a passion play for the church and in nineteen thirty nine, before the war, she put on um Caesar's Friend, which was by Dorothy Sayers, and I put on all the music. This particular piece of music has remained with me all my life. It still makes me weep when I hear it, because it's so evocative of my youth and it's so evocative of

Lord Rix7:23

everything in those days, and it's a sad piece of music as well. It's um Tchaikovsky's Antanticantable, and uh I remember fading this in and fading this out and uh blubbing at the same time.

Speaker 37:23

Boom.

Presenter8:32

Itzhak Perlman and Janet Goodman Guggenheim playing the opening of Tchaikovsky's Andante Cantabile. So you described this very interesting activity that went on as the sort of almost the centre of home life, which was your mother's Andram productions and she was uh rehearsing them in the largest drawing room and some of the actors would come along and your father was making props and you were putting on the records.

Presenter8:53

It seems possible that that sort of almost iron grip that your mother had on the production, of overseeing everything, might have made something of an impression on you, this idea that being in control of a production is is the thing to be. Do you think it made an impression?

Lord Rix9:07

Yes, I think so. And I think also my first job with Donald Wolford, being a with an actor manager, had a great influence on me. And of course in the Air Force, at the end of my career in the Air Force, I was putting on plays as well. I never liked the idea of, you said earlier on, rejection. I couldn't bear the idea of auditioning, auditioning, auditioning and never getting the part.

Lord Rix9:32

I'm afraid so. I'm afraid so, yes.

Presenter9:36

Why do why do you say afraid so? Is it?

Lord Rix9:38

Well, I mean, I suppose it would be more generous to be otherwise.

Presenter9:43

Have you ever been directed, produced by anybody else?

Lord Rix9:46

Uh w well, I did a B B C series for two years here, uh so I had obviously a B B C director.

Presenter9:53

How did that go?

Lord Rix9:54

Oh, it was very good if Sunday mornings.

Presenter9:56

Did you allow them to be in charge?

Lord Rix9:59

Yes, but I was always glad when he went on holiday'cause I could always slip in some more jazz records.

Presenter10:04

I get the picture, yes.

Lord Rix10:06

Yeah.

Presenter10:06

Um, you were sent to a was it a Quaker boarding school when you were about thirteen?

Lord Rix10:09

Yeah.

Presenter10:11

And and how did that go? Was that an enriching experience?

Lord Rix10:13

No, I hated school. Why? Well, I was bullied. Uh well, uh they were silly inasmuch as they sent me to school in a summer term in other words, at the end of the school year.

Presenter10:23

Yeah.

Lord Rix10:24

Everyone knew each other and everyone being together, and I was pitchforked into this particular situation.

Presenter10:29

And what sort of what sort of form did the b bullying take? I mean, was it physical?

Lord Rix10:32

Oh physical and uh

Presenter10:34

Because

Lord Rix10:36

I I don't know. I mean, it was just bullying.

Presenter10:38

Did did you tell your parents?

Lord Rix10:38

Did you tell your parents? No.

Presenter10:39

Yeah.

Lord Rix10:40

No, it's the sort of thing you didn't.

Presenter10:44

Tell me about your next piece of music, then.

Lord Rix10:46

When I was called up to Air Crew Reception Centre, sitting in front of me was a bloke with slightly longer hair than even mine, and we recognised each other from show business, and he had actually been playing piano with Carl Barito, who was the big, big, big jazz band in this country at that time swing band.

Lord Rix11:05

and Tommy played the piano. And he was then called up and he was there in front of me and we got to know each other. I was acting, I'd already become a professional actor. He was a professional musician.

Lord Rix11:16

And we remained very great friends, and when the war was all over, I said I'd always wanted a Basiban.

Lord Rix11:23

So I put up the money and he did the arrangements and we recorded uh an acetate and Parlophone gave us a a a recording contract with George Martin as our A and R man, which is whatever happened.

Presenter11:35

Whatever happened to him

Lord Rix11:36

Well, he became Sir George, didn't he? Win the Beatles. Anyway, Tommy did.

Lord Rix11:41

uh lots of recordings for f films for me and televisions. So all was going well and until the big bands, Te Ted Heath and Ambrose and Giraldo complained bitterly to the BBC that we were nicking all their musicians of course for the Tommy Watts Orchestra.

Presenter12:32

Tommy Watt and his orchestra and Louise. So, Brian Rick's dropping your trousers then. It went on to be, I suppose we could call it your sort of catchphrase almost, your comedy signature twelve thousand times. That's right, yes. The first time it happened though, and and it got a laugh, well it wasn't really your trousers. Tell me what happened.

Lord Rix12:40

Signature.

Speaker 212:42

But

Lord Rix12:42

That's right, she is.

Lord Rix12:49

Well, it was um w I was playing Snout in Midsummer Night Stream.

Presenter12:52

Yeah.

Lord Rix12:52

And I was wearing a pair of green ties, which were far too big for me.

Presenter12:57

Right.

Lord Rix12:57

And uh my tights fell down.

Lord Rix13:00

And of course he got a huge laugh.

Presenter13:01

Fuck. Of course.

Lord Rix13:02

But

Presenter13:02

You knew your audience even then, I'm thinking.

Lord Rix13:02

You knew your

Lord Rix13:03

Yeah, and I I did assist them down a little bit, and they fell down to my ankles, and from then on it stayed in.

Presenter13:11

Uh young actors uh of course dre dream of playing the big romantic leads. Your dream was always to get the laugh, was it? Was that what mattered most?

Lord Rix13:18

Oh no, I fancy myself as a Hamlet. Of course. I thought I'd make a marvellous Hamlet. I still know what a rogan peasant slave am I and uh to be and not to be, I still know them because I I learnt them in case I ne ever needed for auditions. But having got laughs once and realized there was uh a career and money to be made out of being a funny actor, that's what I chose.

Presenter13:41

I mean, you went on to have a a unique and remarkable career, thirty years of being very successful at the top of your profession.

Presenter13:49

Let's talk for a moment about Fart. Why do you think that British audiences loved it so much?

Lord Rix13:56

Well, it comes from the Middle Ages, very broad farce, as it were. All sorts of people have been farce writers. I mean

Lord Rix14:06

The importance of being earnest is is really a farce.

Lord Rix14:11

Chekhov started writing fast. I'll tell you.

Lord Rix14:15

Our audience was from age of five to ninety.

Lord Rix14:18

We were a family audience. We were clean as a whistle.

Lord Rix14:22

You allowed one god

Lord Rix14:24

And one bloody. That's all you're allowed in the script.

Presenter14:27

And your productions ran and ran and ran. Wh which meant, of course, that for you as an actor, you were constantly playing the same part again and uh again and again. I mean, w were you bored at any point?

Lord Rix14:29

And then we

Lord Rix14:34

Yeah.

Lord Rix14:36

Yeah.

Lord Rix14:37

Yes, it was. It was very, very boring. I mean, I would do fifteen hundred, sixteen hundred performances of a play.

Lord Rix14:46

And um

Lord Rix14:47

You you do think of other things. You think uh the supper you're going to have, or you think of the fact you've got to go and see the doctor the next morning, or whatever it is, and then suddenly you come to and realise you're in the middle of a scene, and wonder, Oh, God, what have I done? It can actually throw you quite a lot.

Presenter15:06

Let's take a break for some music. What's next? We're on track four now.

Lord Rix15:09

Well, my first jazz record before the war was um Swinging the Blues with Count Basie. During the war and after the war I became a Sinatra fan, as you can imagine, and he did a magnificent version of Blues in the Night.

Lord Rix15:26

So I really wanted to put Basie from the thirties to uh Sinatra in the forties together. As I started with uh Swinging the Blues and then Blues in the Night, I thought it'd be a good idea to put the two together in Learning the Blues.

Speaker 315:40

The tables are empty.

Speaker 315:44

Dance floor is deserted.

Speaker 315:48

You play the same love song.

Speaker 315:52

Like a hundred times you've heard it.

Speaker 315:57

That's the beginning.

Speaker 316:01

Just one of the clues.

Speaker 316:05

You had your first lesson?

Speaker 316:08

In learning the blue

Presenter16:11

Uh

Speaker 316:11

Yeah.

Presenter16:11

Frank Sinatra and Count Basie and Learn in the Blues. So for very nearly what would it be, about sixty years now, you've been married to Elspeth. How how did you meet?

Lord Rix16:20

Six years this coming August. Well, I gave her a job.

Lord Rix16:24

I was auditioning at New Year 1949 and Elspeth walked in and I fell for her straight away and I chased her that evening. She had another boyfriend at the time and I interrupted the occasion and was with her in her mother's flat and I managed to persuade her.

Presenter16:46

What do you mean you interrupted the occasion?

Lord Rix16:48

Well, no, no, she was meeting her boyfriend in her mother's flat.

Presenter16:52

And you just went along.

Lord Rix16:53

I went along. So it was as cold-blooded as that.

Presenter16:56

You said you fell for her right away. Wh what did you fall for right away?

Lord Rix17:00

She was she was marvellous as she walked in the room and I just felt for her.

Presenter17:04

How does he look? What was he wearing when he was a little bit more?

Lord Rix17:05

She was wearing a green costume.

Lord Rix17:08

Sort of tweed costume.

Lord Rix17:10

And she had this lovely red hair and blue eyes, and she was gorgeous.

Lord Rix17:15

We we got married in uh August of uh nineteen forty nine.

Presenter17:19

You've described yourself as two self opinionated, determined people. So I'm I'm wondering two big characters in a marriage a very successful and and long marriage how you manage to accommodate each other's big personalities.

Lord Rix17:24

Um

Lord Rix17:29

Children

Lord Rix17:33

I I don't know. I suppose we've rowed the same as everyone else rows and I've but we've always

Lord Rix17:39

Come together.

Presenter17:40

It's going to be your diamond wedding anniversary this year, isn't it?

Lord Rix17:43

Yes, it is.

Presenter17:43

Are you planning a a celebration?

Lord Rix17:45

Well, I don't know yet. I I think a lot will depend on what the family want to do, etcetera. But we're going to do something, obviously. After all, s w to be eighty five, to be uh eighty and to have a w a a sixtieth wedding anniversary all the same year makes it quite a year, doesn't it?

Presenter18:03

Quite a year. Tell me about your next piece of music, then.

Lord Rix18:06

Um well, again, this is um going back to the middle years. We had built a house uh in Spain.

Presenter18:12

Yeah.

Lord Rix18:14

Her holiday home.

Lord Rix18:15

In nineteen sixty four sixty five.

Lord Rix18:18

And uh

Lord Rix18:20

We were going to have a holiday for together for the first time for a month, and then Jonathan, our youngest, threw a temperature, so Elspeth said, I can't come, I've got to stay behind.

Lord Rix18:30

She stayed behind and I went off on my own to Spain.

Lord Rix18:35

And I'd brought with me, because I'd bought it the night before, the latest record by Nat Kinkole, which was Love.

Lord Rix18:41

And I played this all day, this record, because it's the only one I had available at the time. And then Johnson's temperature went down, and Elspeth joined me very quickly.

Presenter18:44

See everyone.

Lord Rix18:51

So when I was eighty, we had a big do in the Chumley Room in the House of Lords, and Jamie, our elder son.

Lord Rix18:59

put together a record of our years together, and the music he played was love, of course. So this brings back memories of our house in Spain, the first time we went there on holiday, it brings back memories of my eightieth birthday, and it's a great record.

Presenter19:04

Love

Speaker 319:16

L.

Speaker 319:18

It's for the way you look.

Speaker 319:21

At me

Speaker 319:23

Boom.

Speaker 319:24

Is for the only one I see.

Speaker 319:29

V

Speaker 319:30

is very very

Speaker 319:33

Extraordinary.

Speaker 319:36

Is even more than any one that you adore can love.

Presenter19:38

Uh

Speaker 319:42

Is all Nat King

Presenter19:43

Natkin Cole and Love. So, Brian Ricks, you and Elspeth went on to have four children together. Tell me about the births of your first, your daughter, Shelley.

Lord Rix19:52

Well, she had Down syndrome. Of course, it wasn't known as Down syndrome in those days, it was known as Mongolism. The fact that Elspeth was twenty one, twenty two, and I was twenty five, twenty six, something like that.

Lord Rix20:03

The chances were one in seventeen.

Lord Rix20:06

Hundred tha then. But of course the older you get, the chances g get greater.

Presenter20:12

At the time, of course, it it it wasn't known that this was a genetic disorder. There was much less known about diagnosis.

Lord Rix20:17

Nobody knew anything about it. I was asked if I had venereal disease or if I'd was drunk at the time of conception. All these sort of things were asked quite seriously.

Presenter20:25

And this was nineteen fifty one. Uh what was the attitude of of the doctors as the best course of action?

Lord Rix20:32

Oh, put her away, forget her and start again. That was the sort of general um advice which we were given in those days. You could ask any parent at that time, and this is what they were told.

Speaker 320:40

Why isn't it?

Speaker 320:43

Time.

Lord Rix20:45

Um put'em away, forget'em and start again. Well.

Lord Rix20:48

We looked at some of the long distance hos longstay hospitals, which were horrendous, as many as 4,000 people.

Lord Rix20:56

shambling round the grounds, you know, with a learning disability, it was it was disgraceful.

Presenter21:02

Uh given that the attitude of the doctors was that this was potentially something that either you or your wife ha had done, I mean I'm imagining there must have been a considerable feeling of guilt.

Lord Rix21:11

Shame, guilt, isolation, it was terrible.

Lord Rix21:15

It was a very grim time, make no bones about it, but

Lord Rix21:19

It started us then, I suppose, thinking about what one could do. So it was really the beginning of our um activities in regard to learning disability for for nearly sixty years.

Presenter21:35

And uh your other children

Lord Rix21:36

Uh

Lord Rix21:37

Well, they they came Louisa came first, and then uh Jamie, then Johnty. They're all they're lovely kids, and they're lovely grown up adults now, well and truly into adulthood. They were marvellous with her, and and our grandchildren were marvellous with her.

Lord Rix21:54

And I don't think they got name called at school. I don't think so. I think the only name calling they got at school was the fact that their father dropped his trousers for a living. That's what it was.

Presenter22:04

I read um that there was an occasion I think it was a fundraising occasion when uh uh Shelley was there with the family and she decided she got up on stage and made the most of it.

Lord Rix22:04

Yeah.

Lord Rix22:10

Yeah.

Lord Rix22:13

Yeah, this was a this was the Commonwealth Institute in Kensington High Street.

Presenter22:17

Then

Lord Rix22:19

And there was a concert for learning disabled people that day, and I was comparing the concert and Shelley was in the audience, and I think it was her birthday.

Speaker 322:25

Yeah.

Presenter22:27

And if

Lord Rix22:28

So I

Lord Rix22:30

Announced this from the stage, and the the saxophonist I had playing on stage there played happy birthday to you and Shelley.

Lord Rix22:39

was very lame, got up and stumped down the aisle and came on stage and bowed and clapped her hands over her head and took the reception. And then there were six of the biggest black guys you've ever seen playing a a steel band, and she got hold of one of them and started to dance. Immediately the stage was flooded with people with learning disability, all dancing. It was a fantastic birthday reception for her, and she definitely had a theatrical bent, exactly like the rest of the family.

Presenter23:09

Let's take a break for some music, what's next?

Lord Rix23:12

Well, um uh Elspeth and I go to quite a lot of the proms, and both of us are very fond of Marla.

Lord Rix23:21

And I'm particularly fond of Mahler's Third Symphony because it's brassy. It's just like listening to bassist Swing Section or Duke Ellington or any of those. So I've chosen this as a memory of the proms which we love, and of course the fact we love them together.

Presenter24:38

The opening of Mahler's third symphony performed by the Chicago Symphony Orchestra conducted by Sir George Schulte. Sir Brian Ricks, you have spent, as we've said, many years now, twenty-two of them heading up Mencap, and now you are President of Mencap. It is a long time to be immersed in a world in which you are so personally, emotionally connected. Has that been a difficult thing for you?

Lord Rix25:04

No, no, not at all. It was a conscious uh decision.

Lord Rix25:09

And one, as I frankly

Lord Rix25:11

I've enjoyed

Lord Rix25:13

Occasionally, of course, it's been disappointing. But we've come so far. Being so well known as I was was also incredibly useful in terms of fundraising, and making waves, as it were. Remember I I made a speech in Central Hall.

Presenter25:25

Hmm.

Lord Rix25:33

To about two thousand people there on a Sunday, and I told the audience there that we had a learning disabled daughter.

Lord Rix25:40

And the next day the papers have got Brian Ricks confesses, Brian Ricks admits.

Lord Rix25:46

Um,'cause that's what it still was, even then.

Lord Rix25:51

To some extent it still is.

Lord Rix25:54

But we have come a long way and we've successive governments are um supportive. I I mean of course I found that who I was was very useful in terms of getting to be ministers. I could ring up various departments and give lunches to various people. But of course that then transferred to the House of Lords where of course I have direct access then. But in the old days I still had access entirely because of dropping my trousers for a living.

Speaker 226:05

Yeah.

Speaker 326:05

Yeah.

Presenter26:06

Uh

Speaker 326:06

Uh

Presenter26:06

Yeah.

Presenter26:22

Tell me about your next piece of music.

Lord Rix26:23

Um well, when I was eighty

Lord Rix26:26

Mencap decided to put on a do with all the jazz legends. George Melly, Kenny Ball, Terry Lightfoot, Don Lusher, John Danquorth. And at the end of the evening, I introduced somebody called J. C. Jammer. And he's a jazz pianist with a learning disability. And it was really most moving because he was jamming away and he was playing Bassett Street Blues and St James' Infirmary and all the rest of it. And all these old boys

Lord Rix26:59

because, let's face it, they are all old, came on stage and jam there was a huge jam session. It went on for about three quarters of an hour, and it was enormously exciting and fun, but it was also incredibly moving. So I I managed to get a recording of J C Jammer, as he likes to be known.

Lord Rix27:17

playing something which he wrote himself, uh which is called um

Lord Rix27:21

A dump truck baby.

Speaker 327:23

Well I'm a dumb truth, baby

Speaker 327:27

I'm gonna drop you down

Speaker 327:34

Oh, well I'm a don't you, baby.

Speaker 327:38

I'm gonna talk it down.

Speaker 327:45

Where the bird is

Speaker 327:48

Cause I'm fooling around.

Presenter27:51

Uh Yeah.

Presenter27:53

JC Jammer and Dump Truck Baby and Happy Memories Brian Ricks of that eightieth birthday concert that was put on for you five years ago by Mencap. You've been tremendously successful at raising funds and raising awareness. Indeed, you've been described as having done more for people with learning disabilities than possibly anyone else in the country. But I'm wondering, i is there part of you that

Presenter28:15

Somewhere a little thread of regret at stepping away from the stage and not having the the glory and uh the riches that it brought.

Lord Rix28:22

None, none whatsoever. Not at all.

Presenter28:24

Not at all.

Lord Rix28:27

um doubt in my mind that I made the right decision. Um ever. I I I never have any regrets. I've never had any regrets. I've always been a person who looks forward to the future. And I b I believed what I could do for Mencap in my mind, you know, and hopefully a lot of it's taken place.

Presenter28:44

Um you seem like a people person and and when you've been introducing your music you talk about the people. You're going to be alone on on this island. I'm I'm casting you away to

Lord Rix28:47

The music

Lord Rix28:51

How do you think? Would you? Oh, God, yes. I'd hate it.

Presenter28:55

Would you?

Lord Rix28:57

I'd be hopeless, really. I wouldn't be able to make myself a raft. I I don't think I'd be able to even light a fire by rubbing two sticks together. I'm not not sure what I could do. I I think I would be a mess.

Presenter29:10

Would you be emotionally down in the dumps?

Lord Rix29:13

Oh yes, yes. I'm a gregarious person and I

Presenter29:16

Yeah.

Lord Rix29:16

I I'm I love company, always love company.

Presenter29:19

Oh.

Lord Rix29:20

And I would miss it desperately. I'd miss Elspeth desperately, I'd miss my kids desperately, and I'd miss all my friends desperately.

Presenter29:31

Tell me about your final piece of music.

Lord Rix29:32

Um yeah, well, this goes right back to my childhood.

Lord Rix29:36

The first thing I remember my mother playing it was the the Amateur Offeratic Society putting on Ruddygore. All the ancestors are painted on the walls.

Lord Rix29:46

And halfway through the screens turn round and out come the ancestors, the ghosts.

Lord Rix29:52

and sing.

Lord Rix29:53

And, um, of course, as a young

Lord Rix29:56

Kid of our separate

Lord Rix29:58

It was had a huge impact on me.

Lord Rix30:00

It's all there in this particular piece.

Speaker 230:20

As the somber breeze sweeps over the trees and the mists lie low on the pen, From their tombstones are gathered the bones That once were women and men And away they go With a muff and the goat To the rhythm that ends too soon

Speaker 230:42

Holy Beethoven, Holy Bell.

Speaker 230:46

Dead on the night's hide

Speaker 330:53

I know.

Presenter31:03

PAINTED EMBLEMS FROM GILBERT AND SULLIVEN'S RODIGOR PERFORMED BY THE DOILY CART OPERA COMPANY. Sir BRIN RICKS, it comes to that point where I'm going to give you the Bible and the complete works of Shakespeare, and you can choose a book to take with you to the island. What will your book be?

Lord Rix31:18

In Cyprus Britannica.

Presenter31:22

All how many volumes there are of that.

Lord Rix31:24

Well, as many as possible, although I don't quite know. I presume there's a.

Presenter31:26

Prize

Lord Rix31:29

Available some form of condensed version, but it would be A reading material, B history. I'm mad on history.

Presenter31:32

Yeah.

Lord Rix31:36

And see, it would teach me a few things. It might even teach me how to get off the island, because I'd hate it.

Presenter31:41

Yeah.

Presenter31:43

We've established that, yes. We'll get you some sort of condensed version if we can get our hands on it. And you're allowed a luxury, of course. What would you like to take?

Lord Rix31:50

Well, uh whether you allow me or not, I'm not sure, but I'd like a tr a s solar powered transceiver.

Presenter31:56

I really hate saying this, but you can't have it. It's far too useful to communicate with the outside world. Something more.

Lord Rix32:03

Well that's disastrous, isn't it? Because I think without being able to communicate people, I

Lord Rix32:08

I think I'd be very depressed. However, I also have very bad sciatica.

Presenter32:13

Yeah.

Lord Rix32:13

Um so I think I ought to have a a proper orthopaedic cushion.

Presenter32:17

Yes, I can certainly give you that. Something nice and comfy. Uh and if you had to take just one of the eight discs, which one would it be of of the uh eight records?

Lord Rix32:20

Uh

Lord Rix32:28

Oh I think it would have to be love.

Presenter32:33

It's yours by Nat King Cole. Brian Ricks, Lord Ricks, thank you very much for letting us hear your Desert Island discs.

Lord Rix32:38

Thank you.

Presenter32:46

You've been listening to a podcast from the Desert Island Discs archive. For more podcasts, please visit bbc.co.uk slash radio four.