Kirsty Young

Speaker 10:01

BBC Sounds, Music, Radio, Podcast.

Presenter0:04

Hello, I'm Lauren Laverne and this is the Desert Island Discs podcast. Every week I ask my guests to choose the eight tracks, book and luxury they'd want to take with them if they were cast away to a desert island. This is an extended version of the original Radio 4 broadcast and, for rights reasons, the music is shorter than the original broadcast. I hope you enjoy listening.

Presenter0:47

My castaway this week is Kirstie Young. She's a multi-award winning broadcaster who might at first glance require little introduction to Desert Island Disc's listeners, but is that true? After all, her phenomenal professional skill lies in making her subject rather than herself the entire focus of her work. Her ability to reveal the truth of a story, a moment, a person to her audience is nothing short of remarkable.

Presenter1:14

It's a feat she's accomplished again and again throughout her thirty years on air, from the newsroom where she chronicled the horror of 9-11 as it unfolded, to her BAFTA-winning coverage of the centenary of the Battle of Passchendaele, and more recently that moment when she found exactly the right words to express the sombre gratitude of a nation after the state funeral of Her Majesty the Queen.

Presenter1:37

Of course, there were also the twelve unforgettable years she spent as host of this programme. On a personal note, they made her my broadcasting hero and the toughest imaginable act to follow. She sent castaways, including Tom Hanks, Dame Judy Dench and David Beckham to the island. Today, it's her turn. In a Desert Island Discs tradition that goes back to the days of Roy Plumley, who cast himself away twice, she'll make the journey herself and look back on her own story. She says, I never had the nerve to plan, but I've found that if you work hard, you get the breaks. I've always been gung-ho, and that has been my friend. Kirsty Young, welcome back to Desert Island Discs.

Kirsty Young2:16

You are very generous. That was such a lovely introduction. It is such a treat to be here. I honestly, you probably can hear it in my voice. I'm a little bit nervous. It was very strange to sit on the other side of the the table. I mean it's a privilege and also slightly disorientating. I'll do my best to be lucid.

Presenter2:31

I'll do my

Presenter2:32

I can imagine. There's only one letter, isn't there, between interviewee and interviewee for the whole world of difference. Exactly. So Desert Island Discs turned eighty this year. Kirstie, what do you think it is about the programme that people love so much all these decades on?

Kirsty Young2:36

But a whole world of difference.

Kirsty Young2:45

I once described it as a sort of hammock-like quality, just to fit itself around the person who is there. So, therefore, if it is a sort of Premier League footballer or if it is an astrophysicist, their music and the amount of time you spend talking to them, and then also the ways in and the ways out of the music, are sort of beautifully kind of soft and comfy. So, people come into the studio and they're kind of surrounded by their own bits of furniture and the music. So, they've got the comfort of that familiarity, and also whatever they choose gives each programme a unique flavour. They're only meant to be.

Presenter2:51

So

Kirsty Young3:21

Was it six or twelve? You know, I've seen the original letter that Roy Plumley wrote in front of his three-bar sort of electric fire because he was trying to get a commission. You know, he was a freelancer. So it had very modest beginnings, and I also think that's great. I think something that has sort of, you know, this tiny little seed that was planted that's grown into this great oak tree that we all revere. It's a tribute to him. It's a great idea.

Speaker 13:22

Yeah.

Speaker 13:30

Two.

Speaker 13:31

Mm-hmm.

Presenter3:43

Yeah.

Presenter3:44

And your contribution to it, enormous. You met 496 castaways while presenting the programme. Yeah, 496.

Kirsty Young3:48

Did I?

Kirsty Young3:49

Yeah.

Presenter3:51

And obviously many of them said that taking part in the programme had a hugely profound effect on them, but I know from experience that it will have been the same for you. These conversations where people open up, that they change your perspective every single week. I'm sure that's an experience you had many times.

Kirsty Young4:06

It absolutely is. And it's a funny thing to think that about something that is in essence just a little 43-minute radio programme.

Kirsty Young4:15

It did. Made me a more knowledgeable person. That was good. The research took me to lots of places I wouldn't naturally ever have gone. you know, reading about sort of mural plasticity or trying to understand what Carlo Rovelli actually does for a living. You know, those it takes you to places uh that that are unfamiliar, and that's great because that kind of was my education for all of those hundreds of guests.

Speaker 14:22

Yeah.

Speaker 24:22

Don't

Speaker 14:22

We have

Presenter4:27

And

Presenter4:36

Well, I think we'd better get started with your first disc with that in mind, Kirstie. What's it going to be and why are you taking it with you?

Kirsty Young4:41

So this is the opening from Bach's Cello's Suite, number one in G major. It's played here by Stephen Isserlis, who was one of my early guests. I had not heard this piece of music before, I wasn't at all familiar with it. I can still remember sitting at my desk and doing the research for the programme, and I put it on. It was one of those moments where I just stopped in my tracks. The other reason I've chosen it is when I was interviewing Stephen Isserlis, who is a remarkable cerebral extraordinary musician, obviously.

Kirsty Young5:14

I asked him the question: When you recorded it, because it's the pinnacle for a cellist to record this piece of music. And I said to him, So when you listen back to it.

Kirsty Young5:22

He said it and I've never listened back to it.

Kirsty Young5:25

And I said, why is that? And she said, well, a dog doesn't go back and inspect its own mess.

Kirsty Young5:29

And I thought, for somebody as accomplished as him, and this happened a lot actually for actors and people that I interviewed.

Kirsty Young5:37

People who, for us, are serving us up the most profound sort of cultural gems.

Kirsty Young5:42

They're of course human too, and they hear the mistakes and they see the mistakes. And I learned something from that from him, which is, you know, we are all usually our own worst critics, and it's not a bad thing to be, because you end up with good work. I think it's utterly beautiful. Stephen's never heard it, but I've heard it so many times, and this is something I listen to a lot.

Speaker 16:21

Yeah.

Speaker 26:26

Yeah.

Speaker 26:41

Yeah.

Presenter7:01

Prelude from Bach's Cello Suite number one in G major, played by Stephen Isselis. So Kirsty, you were born in 1968 in Glasgow, the younger sister to Laura. For a little while it was just your mum Catherine and you and your sister. I know that you've marvelled at your your mother's tenacity during that time. Tell me a little bit about it.

Speaker 17:08

In class

Kirsty Young7:15

Yeah.

Kirsty Young7:20

There are lots of single parents in the world, aren't they? And they all deserve us to toast them for the work they do. I was really tiny, a baby when she was on her own. My sister was three, and she is the very definition of a self-starter. I can't imagine how difficult that would be. I mean, I remember when my first daughter was a few weeks old, lying in the bath.

Kirsty Young7:42

And it really hit me forcefully. It was the first time actually I'd ever got upset about it. And I thought, imagine, you know, you feel as vulnerable as a person can feel. You feel raw as a mother when your your baby is in those first sort of few weeks and months.

Speaker 17:51

Your b

Kirsty Young7:54

And my mum was in uh an unhappy marriage and decided up with it she would not put, and uh there was a lot of of pain and unreasonable behaviour, and she decided she wanted out of it, and good for her. And yet she did that having a, you know, a very, very uh young baby, and my sister, as I say, was only three and a half.

Kirsty Young8:14

So m my mum always made us feel that we were the best things that had ever happened to her, and still does, and thinks of that pain only in a glass half full way, which is, well, look what I got.

Speaker 28:25

Yeah.

Kirsty Young8:26

Yeah.

Kirsty Young8:26

So that inevitably transmits itself to your children. So w there was never this sense in which I'm on my own, this is impossible, no, I don't remember any of that in my childhood.

Presenter8:35

I can see the emotion in the middle of the middle of the house.

Kirsty Young8:36

I know, I know, well I do feel emotional when I talk about it actually.

Kirsty Young8:40

You know, she got herself a full-time job, and I went to a childminder and she made sure it was a job with a car. You know, she completely.

Kirsty Young8:48

looked at what she'd got and made the very, very best of it. And she didn't have she had very loving parents, but she had no financial security from her family background. And so she did that by herself. And my admiration for that is unending.

Presenter8:59

And it sounds like she insulated you from the emotional impact of what she was experiencing until you were much later.

Kirsty Young9:04

She really did. I mean, I think obviously, you know, as as I've become older and I understand more about myself and I I think more about those things when you have your own family inevitably you do. You understand

Kirsty Young9:17

That those things

Kirsty Young9:19

necessarily have an impact on who you are.

Speaker 19:21

Door.

Kirsty Young9:22

My mum

Kirsty Young9:24

Gave us enough love for everybody. She definitely did that. And that, you know, that is, that's no small feat, I think.

Presenter9:31

Time for some more music, Kirsty. Your second disc today. What are we going to hear?

Kirsty Young9:34

We are going to hear something by Nina Simone. I mean, all eight tracks virtually could have been by Nina Simone. I love her so much. I love her voice. I love the breadth of her catalogue. I love the pain that is writ across much of the stuff that she portrays. This is a very light one, and it's really glorious. And I do listen to it regularly, and I love it. And I'm a real words person, so I love the lyrics of this. I'm very fortunate in that my sister Laura and my brother Ian really properly make me laugh, probably like no other people. And Laura was in a charity fashion show when she was a teenager, and I was three years younger, and always in awe of her, still sort of am. She is my best friend, and sometimes I still persuade her to do the funny dance. It was a kind of parody of the fashion show dance that she originally did to this track when I was a teenager. It's My Baby Just Cares for Me.

Speaker 210:29

My baby don't care for sure

Speaker 210:33

Ma B

Speaker 210:35

Hello?

Speaker 210:38

Bamboo images cares for me

Speaker 210:45

My baby we don't care for

Speaker 210:50

Cars and races

Speaker 210:53

But we will care for

Speaker 210:59

Hi, don't please.

Presenter11:01

Nina Simone and My Baby Just Cares for Me. So Kirsty Young. Your mum married John Young, who you call Dad. He brought you up. He was your dad. When you were three. Your brother Ian came along too, so there were three kids and I think John ran a news agent and sweet shop. I did, that's right. Did you have free reign of the Sweetly Jaws?

Kirsty Young11:14

Yeah.

Kirsty Young11:17

I did, that's right.

Kirsty Young11:20

Did we hell?

Kirsty Young11:22

My mum ruled with a rod of iron. I was sometimes allowed to spend my five P pocket money on the penny tray occasionally, but we weren't no, we were not allowed sweets. We did my mum was one of those mums, I mean, good honour, you know, we didn't have fizzy drinks in the house. That was what she was like, and he's always been a very hard grafter, my dad, John. And it was, you know, up to get the papers at 6am and all all that sort of stuff.

Presenter11:29

Occasionally.

Speaker 111:29

People

Presenter11:46

So you saw that drive and that work effort.

Kirsty Young11:48

My dad has got an incredible work ethic and even now in his you know, he's he's in his early eighties. Even now, you know, if if you wanted him to build you a staircase or a kitchen, he'd be the first one to go in. He's a he's a trained joiner and he's very, very skilled and and later on in his life he he worked restoring old buildings in Scotland and you know he's a real craftsman. He and my mum had Ian.

Speaker 111:59

Okay.

Kirsty Young12:10

And so then we had this little brother. I can still remember him being brought back from the hospital. And we were very much brought up as a family unit. I didn't have any contact with my biological father, and John has always been

Presenter12:21

And join.

Kirsty Young12:23

My dad and a and a and a brilliant dad.

Presenter12:26

You relocated to to Sterling in from East Kilbride when you were eight. I did. Did that feel like a very big change to you?

Kirsty Young12:30

Like a very big change. It felt like a really big change. And it felt like a very positive change because we'd Sterling is a beautiful place and it's very, very different from East Cool Bright. So it was it was a great move and I went to a much, much nicer school and with a great headmaster and it was a very positive thing for me.

Presenter12:44

So tell me about school. What would we have read on your report?

Kirsty Young12:48

I didn't particularly enjoy high school, apart from the things that I was reasonable at. So I I enjoyed art. Mr Carberry was my art teacher and he was brilliant. We had a really strong English department there. I loved English. I liked writing essays. I was asked to write for the school newspaper and I was in the debating team. But apart from the things that I liked, I was really average, average to medium crap as everything else. And also I kept encountering teachers who'd say,

Kirsty Young13:15

So you're Laura Laura Young's sister? Because Laura was effortlessly academic, which was sickening if you were meant to be. And puzzling if you were a teacher. I did. I fell in her shadow. So I had to find my own things.

Speaker 213:21

And puzzle.

Speaker 113:23

Uh

Speaker 213:26

Yeah.

Kirsty Young13:26

Yeah, I did I did feel in her shadow and I felt, yeah, I'm well, no, I'm not I'm not as not as academic as her, but I'm something else. You know, in a way it's you know, in in families it's it's good. I think that's why it's good to have siblings, because you define yourself not just in relation to your inner thoughts, but externally to them too, and and to a degree I think I proluded that.

Presenter13:44

Absolutely. It's interesting though, that there do seem to have been clues there that you had a a voice that you wanted to use. I mean, Debating Society, the school newspaper.

Kirsty Young13:53

If only somebody, including me, had put two and two together. If I can call them those sorts of jobs.

Kirsty Young14:00

weren't even something in my consideration. You know, I had I had uncles who worked in the newspapers in Glasgow.

Kirsty Young14:05

They worked in the print rooms and they didn't we didn't know people who were journalists, we didn't know certainly didn't know people in broadcasting. So it was very other. I didn't perceive myself as that sort of person, but of course, absolutely the clues were there as to what I got. And I remember being asked to do some public speaking at primary school. They asked me to do a vote of thanks, and I just got up and did it. And everybody kind of looked and went, Oh shoot.

Kirsty Young14:26

She can actually do that. And it didn't bother me to do it, to stand up and speak in front of people. And I was probably only about nine, I think.

Presenter14:32

Not to be flippant, Kirsty, but even in those days did people say her voice has a real gravity has a certain because when did that kick in? When did the voice happen?

Kirsty Young14:37

Yeah.

Kirsty Young14:42

I got chucked out of the the school choir when I was at high school. I remember the music teacher. It was sort of self-selecting, you just went along. It was like a club, an after-school club.

Speaker 214:49

Discover.

Kirsty Young14:50

And he said, Hey, hey, Old Man River, out out

Kirsty Young14:55

I know. I've always and even now, if I'm staying in a hotel and I order room service, they say it'll be with you, sir, in 40 minutes. Yeah, I know I've got a slightly, it is, it's a deep voice, but it was it's good later. It was good later.

Presenter15:05

Good luck.

Kirsty Young15:07

Yeah.

Presenter15:08

Let's go to the music. It's time for your third selection today. What are we going to hear and why?

Kirsty Young15:12

Well, why wouldn't we hear Joni Mitchell? I worshipped at the shrine of Joni Mitchell for decades.

Presenter15:12

Well

Kirsty Young15:19

I sometimes feel on her behalf a sense of resentment that I know people revere her, but Bob Dylan, Joni Mitchell, I'm thinking they're exactly the same. She is an absolute poet. The fact that she wrote this when she was, I think, twenty five bamboozles me, because really

Kirsty Young15:38

It's the song of a maybe a fifty five year old woman. It is extraordinary, it's beautiful. And my brother used to shout as I played it on my cassette recorder, Get that screaming witch off. He did not like Joni Mitchell so much, so this is for Ian, actually.

Speaker 215:55

Rows and flows of angel hair, And ice cream castles in the air, And feather canyons everywhere And I've looked at clouds that weave

Speaker 216:15

But now they only block the sun They rain and snow on everyone

Presenter16:24

Joni Mitchell and Both Sides Now. So Kirstie Young, tell me a little bit more about this potential that you had, this latent urge to use your voice at school. You mentioned that you wrote for the school paper, you're in the Debating Society. I think you also attended summer drama schools at the the Scottish Youth Theatre.

Kirsty Young16:42

Yeah, I do.

Presenter16:42

Th those were residential courses, weren't they?

Kirsty Young16:44

They were and I did get very, very homesick. I don't want to overstate the fact that I I was unhappy at school, but I didn't really love it. And when I was in those environments I really loved it and I thought, Yeah, these are my people and it was a bit more exotic and more varied and it was m more fun. I feel sorry for my parents, you know, that they had to traipse to see

Presenter16:51

Yeah.

Speaker 216:51

The ma

Kirsty Young17:07

Ibsen's Peer Gynt, when you see that sort of performed by a little bit of

Kirsty Young17:11

fourteen year olds, I can't imagine that was the best night of their life, you know, but they they supported me and they encouraged me and it it made me, I I suppose, just aware that the world's a big place and there are all sorts of choices and it's not just about passing exams and sitting in French class.

Speaker 117:21

There are also

Kirsty Young17:26

I think words, actually. I think that was the thing that I fell in love with. I think when I was a teenager.

Speaker 217:27

I think

Kirsty Young17:31

Yeah, I've never thought of it.

Kirsty Young17:34

Here we go. Desert Island the magic of Desert Island discs. Who knew? I would say, you know, whether it was the words of Joni Mitchell or whether it was Shakespeare, I was kind of falling in love with words, actually. Conversation or lyrics or books are really my my thing.

Speaker 217:34

Desert Island the magic of desert.

Presenter17:43

Actually.

Presenter17:49

He didn't go see universes

Kirsty Young17:49

You didn't

Presenter17:50

You didn't do you think it was because you thought you I'm not the academic one so I'm not not going to or?

Kirsty Young17:56

I wanted to get an A, B, and a C, I think, in my A-level equivalents. In Scotland, they're called hires. So that was okay. I mean, my results were fine.

Kirsty Young18:04

I think I had a slightly restless quality and and I you know, as long as I was earning after I finished my exams, my parents were fine with that. And so I I I left school and took up a a job working, sort of washing glasses and working in a restaurant and saved up to go abroad. I'd never been on a plane, so I thought I'd quite like to do that.

Presenter18:21

So you're seventeen and you went to the window being OPEF?

Kirsty Young18:22

I was seventeen and I went

Kirsty Young18:24

I went to be a nau peer.

Presenter18:25

That's very adventurous.

Kirsty Young18:27

A bit adventurous.

Presenter18:27

'Cause you were quite far away. Barcelona, Switzerland?

Kirsty Young18:29

Barcelona and Switzerland, yeah. Um always listen to to radio in my teens in my bedroom.

Kirsty Young18:37

But I developed an abiding love of radio when I was in OPER because I listened to the World Service for at least three hours a day when I did the ironing.

Presenter18:45

So you came home after that adventure and and you took a job in a pub I think.

Kirsty Young18:48

Yeah, I was going to get ready. I wanted to do English literature A-level and the only way you could do that, I wanted to just be more specific. And so I was going to go to college and I was working over the summer in a bar and I was serving a pint to a very nice guy one evening and he was a freelance camera operator and his runner had gone sick and he did sports. And I thought, well, next weekend, rather than working here, maybe I can lift those camera cases. And so that was, I worked as they used to call it a runner. And so that was my summer job. I started to work on motorsport shoots and football shoots, neither of which I'm interested in. But it didn't matter. Didn't you? Because really. I can see on your face that you were doing.

Presenter18:54

Be more s

Presenter18:55

Mm-hmm.

Presenter19:22

Did you really

Kirsty Young19:24

I loved it because it was this whole hidden world and well hidden to me and yeah, and I thought, oh, look at all these people doing jobs that they really love, which is the that's the great gift of our sorts of jobs and broadcasting, is there are an awful lot of people doing jobs they really love and that is a great privilege. And I saw all these people doing jobs they loved and I thought maybe and and so I said to my parents.

Speaker 119:38

Yeah.

Kirsty Young19:49

I might not go to college to do the A levels and upgrade.

Kirsty Young19:54

My exam results, I might do this. And they said, Well, and I said, Because I'm working with runners who've got degrees, who've done four years, and they're four years older than me, and now they've got a job as a runner. And they said, and again, to their great credit, they said, Right, well, that's fine then. As long as you keep working and you do that, then you carry on. It's such a

Kirsty Young20:11

Brilliant attitude, I think, as a parent to think, Well, find your thing.

Presenter20:14

Mm-hmm.

Kirsty Young20:15

Your sister's thing's not your thing. What's your thing? And they completely allowed me to do that as long as I was, you know, earning money and paying my way.

Presenter20:22

Well, we'll find out what happened next in a minute. First, though, I think we'd better hear your fourth choice today, Kirsty. What have you gone for?

Kirsty Young20:27

Mr. Day Cross

Kirsty Young20:28

Oh crikey, get the tissues out.

Kirsty Young20:32

This is for my mum and dad, and it's also a love letter to Scotland by Doogie Maclean. It is really for all the people who've ever gone away. As I said to you, I'm a words person, and the lyrics of this, of course, I know we can't listen to all of it, but if people like, I would urge them to listen to all of it, because it is a beautiful love letter to Scotland by somebody who has left. And yet, their Scottishness is at the very core of who they are and kind of defines everything they do. But that need to leave, to propel yourself away, and then later to understand why you're sad that you've gone. This is exquisite. This is Doogie MacLean and Caledonia.

Speaker 221:08

I have kissed the ladies and left them crying Stolen dreams, yes, there's no denying I have travelled hard, sometimes with conscience flying Somewhere with the wind

Speaker 221:25

Let me tell you that I love you.

Speaker 221:29

But I think about you all the time

Speaker 221:33

Caledonia, you called me, now I'm going.

Presenter21:39

Douglas McLean and Caledonia. So you were loving working as a runner in T V, you'd done that for a couple of years, then a researcher and you beat 700 applicants to a job that you applied for. It was as trainees, news and continuity announcer for BBC Radio Scotland. You were just 21 and you got it out of all of those people. What do you think they saw in you?

Speaker 221:44

And T

Speaker 121:44

Feed and

Kirsty Young22:02

I think they were trying to lower the mean age of the department.

Kirsty Young22:06

I don't know that I mean, timing in a career is everything.

Speaker 122:08

Yeah.

Kirsty Young22:09

And I think obviously they thought they could train me up and I'd be reasonable at the job and that's great, but I think also the timing of

Kirsty Young22:16

Maybe a younger voice in their department, maybe a young female. I mean, there were wonderful females in the department, and I worked with a brilliant team, and it was the best training.

Kirsty Young22:26

Ever have had. What did they see in me? I you know, I don't know. A little bit of potential, probably, I guess.

Presenter22:32

You almost didn't apply though, why not?

Kirsty Young22:34

Well, I didn't have the nerve. It was the BBC, Lauren. I was working as a researcher at a small independent. It was at the time when 25% of all TV production had been decreed that it should be independent production, and therefore there was a great sort of miniature explosion in Glasgow with these little independent production companies. So I was researching documentaries and pitching ideas. It was a really interesting job. And somebody who worked with me said, you should apply for this. What I didn't know was that the company was close to going down the Swanney at the time. And I was like, I love my job. Plus, I'd never get that one. And on the final day before it was closing, my work colleague said, no, you really should apply for this. So I feel that he literally drove me to the reception and watched me hand it in. So that was a very kind thing for them to do. I lacked a wee bit of nerve, I think. Even at that point, by the time I was researching, I'd worked up enough nerve at the interview for that job.

Speaker 123:15

Yeah.

Kirsty Young23:24

the researcher's job to say, you know, maybe one day I could be a reporter. But even saying it, I felt like a fraud. I felt like the person's going to start laughing. They didn't start laughing, and that probably gave me the confidence came quite incrementally, I think.

Presenter23:36

Gradually. Well, with with that in mind, since you s you were a bit more nervous, I mean, how was it going on air for the first time?

Kirsty Young23:43

I had that sort of tension where I definitely want this was a proper job. I was getting incredible training by brilliant professionals that I was surrounded with.

Kirsty Young23:53

And it also terrified me. And I think it's how quickly you lose the terror. I lost the terror very quickly. And I love being in a radio studio. And I love being in a T V studio. Now, but in the beginning, I mean, I

Presenter23:54

Hmm.

Speaker 123:59

Bye.

Kirsty Young24:06

Before I did my first live news bullet, and I did go and throw up in the talk I mean I did, really. Yeah, I did. The nerves were churning.

Presenter24:10

Didn't I?

Presenter24:13

Kirstie, it's time for some more music. Your fifth choice. What have you gone for and why?

Kirsty Young24:16

Well, this is all about New York. I think it's actually probably the best song written about New York, and it's maybe not the one people think it is, written by Cole Porter. I have a never-ending, like so many people, a never-ending love affair with New York. I've been going there for 30 years, and it just absolutely never, ever disappoints. And whenever I step into the middle of Manhattan, I always somehow feel like I'm a background actor in a movie, and I love that. And I remember the first time I was with my sister when I went to New York and worked up the nerve to order a martini. I didn't even know what was in a martini, but I remember sitting at a bar in New York drinking a martini. There's a particular hotel in New York that I've been lucky enough to sometimes stay in, and this was recorded live at that hotel. They have this beautiful little lounge, sort of jazz lounge, with lamps on the table and delicious food. And it's wonderful. And now I have a great reason to visit New York because two of our kids are currently based there. One's working there and the other one's studying there. So this is a Cole Porter song and it was recorded live at Cafe Carlisle. And it's Bobby Short singing I Happen to Like New York.

Speaker 225:29

I happen to like this bird, I happen to like this towel.

Speaker 225:36

And when I have to give the world my last farewell And the undertaker starts to ring my funeral bell I don't wanna go to heaven, don't wanna go to hell, I happen to like New York

Speaker 225:50

I happen to lie.

Speaker 225:53

Here we are.

Presenter26:02

Bobby Short and I happen to like New York. You can taste the martini, can you? I wish I could taste the martini. Absolutely. Kirsty, in 1997 you joined Channel 5. You were there at its launch hosting the news and you won many awards for your work there. Your style was also hugely influential on the way the news was presented. Obviously there was the famous perch on the desk rather than being sat behind it, but also this kind of a certain directness and informality to the

Speaker 226:07

What's up?

Kirsty Young26:07

It's the Martin.

Speaker 226:07

Yeah.

Speaker 126:15

Hello.

Speaker 226:15

Uh

Kirsty Young26:29

The way you covered the news, the way you handle the stories. It's lovely being at the start of something because everybody's kind of.

Kirsty Young26:35

You know, you're all in the mess together and it's very sort of binding and bonding in that way. And I think people were kind of ready to find it hilarious. You know, people were ready to look at the mess and actually it wasn't. And within two or three weeks of being on air, we got a wonderful front page in a section of a broadsheet. What it said is why this woman is changing the face of television news. I wasn't. The editors and the producers and the people who'd formatted the programme were, to be clear. I just happened to be the person at the front doing that. But I'm the one they got the picture of, so that's what they say. You know, people did start to loosen up a bit. We came out from behind the desk. It was during the 1997 election campaign, and there was this massive interest as to whether Tony Blair was going to cut through. And the first programme we did, I had him on and interviewed him. And I remember saying we were talking to Alastair Campbell, and he said, where does he sit? Yeah, yeah, yeah. And where does he sit? And it's like, well, we don't have chairs, so we'll perch. And he's like, sorry, he'll do what? And then we had this big discussion about will Tony Blair perch? And Tony Blair was happy to perch. Alastair wasn't so happy to have him perch and sort of stood l glaring at me through the.

Speaker 126:39

Singing that

Presenter27:23

To view the

Presenter27:26

Then

Speaker 127:28

Yeah.

Presenter27:39

Alistair

Kirsty Young27:44

to the whole interview by the side of the camera just out of shot.

Presenter27:47

Did you get more flack because you were a a woman in those days? This is, you know, twenty-five years ago, I guess.

Kirsty Young27:53

and they met on occasion.

Kirsty Young27:55

With a nice little dash of snobbery and misogyny, but that's not unique to me. But I definitely did. I remember being at a launch.

Kirsty Young28:02

The launch party actually for the whole channel and I was chatting away to an English female film producer who'd produced something for the channel. We had a nice conversation and then towards the the end of the conversation I said, It was so nice to talk to you and and she said J just one just one thing, the the the news and I said yeah She said, Are you going to do it in that voice?

Kirsty Young28:20

Well, it's the only one I've got. I was absolutely astonished by that. You know, but that was clearly she meant a I think she meant accent. I think she was talking about my accent. And I remembered Michael Heseltine saying at Tory party conference before we'd gone on air and we went to the party conferences to sort of tell them about what we were doing and try to schmooze the politicians. And you know, Michael Heseltine turns to me and saying, I'm not having some little smart allegonous skirt to try to get the better of me.

Speaker 128:26

I think it's just talking.

Kirsty Young28:42

I thought, right, well it's trouser suits from here on in there. You meet little things like that. They're not even bumps in the road, but they are indicative.

Presenter28:48

Hmm.

Kirsty Young28:49

of certain attitudes and certain perspectives.

Presenter28:51

You were moved to ITV for a while to present the news over there. I did. And you were on air on september the eleventh, two thousand one. It was supposed to be just an ordinary day, but obviously it it wasn't. You ended up being on air for over five hours. I did.

Kirsty Young28:54

That is

Kirsty Young28:58

Two cents.

Kirsty Young29:05

Stit.

Presenter29:06

What were your memories of it?

Kirsty Young29:07

I'd gone back to work after having one of my daughters, so I'd only been back at work for maybe about six weeks, I think. And my husband called me on the way into work and said he was in New York and he said there's been a plane crash and it wasn't long after John Kennedy Jr. had crashed his small plane on his way out to I think Martha's Vineyard and I am he said it went into the World Trade Towers obviously I knew what the buildings were and I thought maybe it was a little biplane or

Speaker 229:27

Mm-hmm.

Kirsty Young29:36

I had no sense of it. And I said, God, that's extraordinary. He said, Yeah, it really is extraordinary. And I rang off and I went into the newsroom.

Kirsty Young29:43

That day I was doing the evening news, and it was kind of vibrating. I'd never felt anything like it. It was extraordinary atmosphere.

Kirsty Young29:50

And I went to the news editor, the input editor, and he said, we're going to do a flash on this. And I said, really? He said, yeah, it was a passenger plane. And I said, my husband's in New York. And I said, he's with a guy who saw it, because he'd gone out into the street, because he'd heard the noise. And it was a road sweeper who'd said to him, a plane just went in. And he was only like five or six blocks from the Twin Towers site.

Kirsty Young30:12

By the time I went downstairs, I didn't even have time to go into makeup, and I thought I was just going to do a news flash. I literally had not even 20 seconds worth of script. But by the time I got into the studio and I was getting rigged up with a mic, they said it's happened again, a second one's gone in. So it was very clear there was some moving story, and from the back of the gallery, I heard in my earpiece, we're going open-ended, which basically means we're going on air, we don't know when we're coming off, and we came off.

Kirsty Young30:36

Yeah, five just over it was over five hours later. It was a very, very intense experience, a terrifying time for the world, and not least for those extraordinary New Yorkers. Yeah, it was extraordinary.

Presenter30:46

Did you surprise yourself that you stayed so calm in in that kind of moment? Because you you can't have been through anything comparable to that before.

Kirsty Young30:53

But before

Presenter30:53

But that

Kirsty Young30:53

That was a unique event. I used to used to say, well, I've got a lot of, you know, rather than air miles on air miles, you know, I've got a lot of live, and I think that really comes into its own when you, when I, I mean, I was relatively.

Kirsty Young31:06

Relatively young. I was in my early thirties, but old enough to be good at my job. That's the point. The point is you hold it together. Yes.

Presenter31:13

Let's have some more music, Kirstie. It's your sixth choice today. What are we going to hear?

Kirsty Young31:18

I was very lucky to uh to interview Christine McVeigh on Desert Island Discs back in twenty seventeen and I think she wrote the perfect love song, Christine McVie, and I think this is the perfect love song, and it's so exquisite.

Kirsty Young31:36

And simple and yet profound. And this is from my husband, Nick.

Speaker 231:44

Cause I feel that when I'm with

Speaker 231:50

It's all right.

Speaker 231:54

I know it's right.

Speaker 232:00

And the songbirds are singing.

Speaker 232:05

We know the score of it.

Speaker 232:10

And I love you, I love you.

Speaker 232:15

Like never before.

Presenter32:22

Christine McVie from Fleetwood Mac with Songbird.

Presenter32:27

Kirstie, in two thousand six, you became the fourth presenter of Desert Island Discs, and you cast away nearly five hundred people over twelve years. Looking back, what do you take away from that experience?

Kirsty Young32:39

Very, very early on in my career I was given great advice by somebody which is

Kirsty Young32:44

You know?

Kirsty Young32:45

Listen to the answer. It's all very well to think of your kind of smarty Knickers' questions. Listen to the answer. And so I got to listen. I got to listen to brilliant, high achieving, contradictory, infuriating, marvellous, funny, talented people.

Speaker 133:00

Uh

Speaker 233:00

Mm-hmm.

Kirsty Young33:02

I really love the long-form nature of it. I love that there was room for people to breathe and talk, and there was room to give the f to ask the follow-up question. And you know, that that's the great thing.

Kirsty Young33:14

There's so many great things about the job, but you know, all all of those things.

Presenter33:17

Kirsty, you did have to step away from broadcasting. You took a four-year break in august twenty eighteen. You'd become ill with fibromyalgia and rheumatoid arthritis. You also had to step down from your role as President of UNICEF UK. Now you had always worked ever since leaving school at seventeen.

Presenter33:34

It must have been a a huge change. What was it like being told that you had

Kirsty Young33:38

I had been around the houses with my health for about a year, seeing different specialists trying to work out what was going on and it was a little bit of a complex picture and the pain was increasing and I was feeling really, really ropey, really ropey. And I eventually was fortunate enough to get in front of a brilliant man, a brilliant professor of rheumatology, who took time. and not every physician does, but really took time to understand what was going on and presented me with the facts. And along with giving me a diagnosis, which made complete sense to me, he said, you know, this is how I believe you can get better. And if you want to get better, you've got to take this seriously because it's going nowhere if you don't.

Speaker 134:02

Good.

Speaker 134:21

Mm-hmm.

Kirsty Young34:24

And one of the things he said was, Is there a way of doing your work where you sort of reduce it or you do it? And I said, Well, you either do it or you don't. That's the kind of job I've I've got. You know, I can't do that part time and I can't do those things. They're not those sort of commitments. And he said, Well,

Speaker 234:35

Mm.

Kirsty Young34:40

Part of getting better is we can introduce all sorts of drugs, we can monitor you, we can do this and we can do but you have to reduce the stress in your life and you have to take this seriously and you can't just keep shoveling painkillers down your neck which don't work anyway and feel shocking. If you want to get better, this is how to do it. So it was it was very real. It was said i with extreme kindness, much better than I've just preceded it. But it was just a moment of absolute reality and clarity. And I remember I pulled my car.

Kirsty Young35:10

Over and just had a good old, well, to use a good Scottish short, good old greet about it. And I thought, right, well.

Speaker 135:14

And I thought

Kirsty Young35:17

Them's the facts, and you're really going to have to think about this. And I'm very aware in talking about this. People sit opposite physicians and get diagnoses that are much more serious than the one I got. But it's a very painful thing, and I was in pain, and a chronic long-term pain condition is an absolute pain, literally, and metaphorically to deal with. It grinds you away, you lose your personality, you lose your sense of humour, you lose your sense of self. There's all sorts of things that go with it. It's awful.

Speaker 235:36

Yeah.

Presenter35:48

Yeah.

Kirsty Young35:48

Yeah. And so I had to take it seriously if I was going to get better. So I did.

Presenter35:51

Can I pick up on that idea of a sense of self? Because that's one of the key things, isn't it? Particularly when you.

Kirsty Young35:54

Because

Speaker 135:56

Nepplin.

Presenter35:58

Change your daily routine, you change your job, you're changing your identity really to step away. How did you handle that?

Kirsty Young36:01

Really?

Kirsty Young36:06

I felt very shaky about it because as you say, I'd I'd worked and I had a job that I absolutely loved and intended to do until they sort of chucked me out the door really. And I

Kirsty Young36:22

Yeah, I thought if I'm not that.

Kirsty Young36:24

What am I now? What's what am I for? What's a Kirstie for? I did, I f I did feel that, and that was ridiculous, obviously, because given that

Speaker 136:29

Kill the

Kirsty Young36:35

To use that well-worn phrase, the cracks are where the light gets in. All sorts of other things happened that were good things. But at that moment, you kind of do lose yourself.

Presenter36:39

Yeah.

Kirsty Young36:43

in when you're in chronic daily pain, you sort of lose yourself anyway. So it's a ki you know, there's a lot going on. There's a lot going on. And actually the the mo the the thing I wanted most was to try to figure out how to get on top of this thing.

Speaker 136:47

Yeah.

Presenter36:48

You know that

Speaker 136:48

Yeah.

Speaker 136:49

Uh

Presenter36:49

There's a lot going on.

Presenter36:55

And happily you are so much better now. So much better. Able to come back to front the BBC's coverage of this year's Platinum Jubilee earlier this summer. And then of course, just a few months later, you presented coverage of Queen Elizabeth II's funeral from Windsor.

Kirsty Young36:57

So much better.

Presenter37:10

Now your closing tribute, Kirsty, as I'm sure you know, went viral, and many thought that you summed up her life magnificently, while

Presenter37:19

Just about managing to to hold it together, could see and and hear the the emotion in in your voice. What do you think the twenty one year old Kirsty, starting out as that nervous announcer, would have made of that?

Kirsty Young37:31

Oh, goodness knows.

Presenter37:33

articulate in a moment in in history, in our collective history.

Kirsty Young37:33

Particularly in a moment in

Kirsty Young37:37

Well, it's communication, isn't it? In the end, that sort of

Kirsty Young37:43

the job that I'm supposed to be able to do. That's it in a nutshell, is communicating with people. And I'm not I don't work in news anymore. I don't need to have the clinical eye of on this hand that and on that hand the other. It was really in those final moments, it was really

Kirsty Young37:59

what just happened? What have we all collectively and I absolutely appreciate that people may not be interested in the royals and may have no feelings on the Queen, but for the people who were watching and for the people who'd bothered to watch and the people who had watched those you know, that period, that remarkable eleven days of mourning.

Kirsty Young38:19

What was it that we were thinking? And in the end, the day that I worked was just the funeral day.

Kirsty Young38:25

And so I think it was helpful for me that I'd been one of those people also watching.

Speaker 238:29

Mm.

Kirsty Young38:30

As I was writing it,

Kirsty Young38:32

And because I'd had the four days of doing the platinum coverage, you know, I'd read a lot and I'd been thinking a lot about the Queen because that was my first thing back at work this year. And so I was just really trying as honestly as possible without any, what would I say, without any sort of cynicism or attempting to be beyond, I thought we are all in this moment, and I am and you are and we've all been in it. And what's it been about? Why has this moment happened the way it's happened? That's what I was trying to sum up. I haven't watched that either actually because I've yeah. You should, it's very good. I'm definitely not going to do that, but thank you for being kind as I can.

Presenter39:07

And under pressure, the kind of pressure that you must have been under on a day like that.

Kirsty Young39:11

I did nearly have a bit of a moment. It was it was emotional. I mean, I felt emotional. It was uh and we were sitting right at the heart of it in Windsor and the pipes, that didn't help, the mast pipes coming down in front.

Presenter39:13

Was it

Kirsty Young39:22

We were absolutely in this kind of surround sound and visual situation, and that's the point of the job, isn't it? The point is to try to have some clarity at the centre of something. I think that's the point, is to try to see.

Speaker 139:36

I think

Kirsty Young39:40

What is this? And if you can get hold of something that sometimes even feels a bit intangible, and of course, the queen.

Kirsty Young39:46

Meant very different things to different people, but it was actually the experience of what we'd gone through.

Presenter39:49

I think it's the collective nature of that moment and the historic nature of that moment and that we were all in it together.

Kirsty Young39:51

Nature of that

Kirsty Young39:55

Together. And also to humanise it, you know. And I thought, well, how do you find a way of talking about the Paddington moment?

Kirsty Young40:01

Using the words Paddington Bear, because they sound a little bit flippant in the middle of the so there was a way of kind of working it that that made it appropriate to the situation, I hope, and I'm I'm glad that some people felt it was.

Presenter40:12

Absolutely, it was. Kirstie, we've got to make some time for the music. Disc number seven. What are we going to hear next?

Kirsty Young40:15

Disc ma

Presenter40:19

Yeah.

Kirsty Young40:19

I am not not particularly a devotee of organised religion, but organised choral singing moves me to my very core, and I absolutely love the sound of the unaccompanied human voice.

Kirsty Young40:33

On my island, I will need the company. So, one of the reasons that I've chosen this particular track is the company of voices that I feel would almost sort of surround me like a comfort blanket. I also am, I'm not proud of this, I'm a Christmas nut, and I'm not even ironic about it. I mean, I literally just love it. Start thinking about Christmas when I put away my swimming cosie at the end of August. I'm like, Christmas is coming. So, I also love that time of year, and so this is a beautiful, well, I'm to me anyway, a very, very beautiful piece of choral music that just encapsulates the beauty of the human voice, what it's capable of, and also just that beautiful festive time of year that is my favourite. So, this is O Magnum Mysterium.

Speaker 241:32

So come in.

Speaker 241:53

His side of her own.

Speaker 242:08

Let the Rabbi Satan.

Presenter42:23

O Magna Mysterium by Thomas Louis de Victoria and The Voices of Ascension Choir directed by Dennis Keane.

Presenter42:31

So, Kirsty Young, let me ask you a bit about Christmas, since you're a Christmas nut. How do you spend the big day? Is there a fixed routine?

Kirsty Young42:37

Yes, there very much is. There's almost a time sheet of there's an absolute schedule, a time schedule.

Presenter42:40

Okay.

Kirsty Young42:44

There isn't really, but notionally in our heads there is. It's got to be at home. We're not allowed to be anywhere else but at home, as decreed by our four kids. So it's at home.

Speaker 142:48

We're not

Kirsty Young42:55

Is it a shameful thing? I think it might be. This year I have actually bought Christmas pajamas for everyone.

Presenter43:01

Everyone is matching.

Kirsty Young43:03

Apparently, that's a thing now. Yes, it's a thing. It is a thing. We've never done it for you. You're not on social media, Christian. Is that why? Yeah.

Presenter43:04

Yes.

Presenter43:06

And you not on

Presenter43:10

It's a thing that people do. They post the selfies. I mean, I haven't done it, but I see.

Kirsty Young43:12

Uh

Kirsty Young43:14

Okay, quite wrong.

Presenter43:15

Can't lie, I too have the pajamas.

Kirsty Young43:17

There. Yes. Right, okay. So this is a new thing, this Christmas. So it starts with as many people as we can fit in the house. We'll be there always. A couple of days before, I own one of our kids who is a first rate baker. We bake a Christmas Bunt Village.

Kirsty Young43:34

You heard me right. So if you do five or six of them at different things, then you put them together and you put the icing sugar on top, you've got Christmas Village. That's very satisfying.

Speaker 143:42

That's

Kirsty Young43:44

We obviously do all the food thing completely over the top. You know, my husband is never happier than when he's catering for four times the amount of people that he needs to be catering for, and he's really, he is the king of the Sunday roast. I'm on.

Kirsty Young43:55

Stuffing, bread sauce, sprouts, and sausages. Okay. And he's on everything else.

Presenter43:58

Okay.

Presenter43:59

Okay, so you're kind of accoutrement.

Kirsty Young44:01

I am. I am. That's exactly what I'm doing. And he's doing the hard stuff.

Kirsty Young44:05

And um well, we did watch the Queen's speech before we ate, and this year we'll watch the King's speech, which will be remarkable and interesting.

Presenter44:14

Kirst, do you know what happens next? We're preparing to cast you away. Now you've heard so many different versions of islands described to you. Yes. I wonder what island you imagine for yourself in this moment?

Kirsty Young44:24

Yeah.

Kirsty Young44:28

Uh

Kirsty Young44:29

I if I was suitably attired, I'd like a tiny, beautiful Scottish island, actually. I used to go walking with my dearest group of girlfriends, Scottish girlfriends, and I had to give it up for a few years and that made me quite miserable. But I'm back walking again, and uh we went this year to uh Kerraraild, a tiny little exquisite in fact I shouldn't have said it now, because other people, too many people, go walking there, but it's very, very beautiful.

Kirsty Young44:58

uh little island which is um near open off the coast there. I wouldn't mind being stuck on Kerra. Let me choose that one, but I'd need to have a nice big puffer and some proper walking boots on.

Presenter45:07

I wonder about talking about the the building, the the practicalities of surviving on your desert island. Would you be able to start a fire, build a shelter? You said your dad was very handy.

Kirsty Young45:18

Yeah, I can't take him, can I?

Presenter45:20

The Clean

Kirsty Young45:20

No, no, so uh no, I mean I'm not obviously useless at all.

Presenter45:24

All of that. He didn't pass on his skills when you were looking at it.

Kirsty Young45:26

No, not really. I can do a fire as long as I've got fire lighters.

Kirsty Young45:30

It would be a tragic weeping mess by hour four, I imagine.

Presenter45:33

And what about the solitude? How would you handle that? Not too bad, I think.

Kirsty Young45:37

Because I've got a vibrant inner dialogue, sometimes too vibrant. I don't mind my own company. I mean, it's easy to say that, isn't it?

Kirsty Young45:45

How long would I last? I'd probably go kind of crackers after three days, but I'm not bad with my own company. I quite like it.

Presenter45:52

And before you go, you know you're allowed one more disc. So I think we've better hear it. This is number eight. Kirsty, what's it going to be?

Kirsty Young46:00

This is for our four fabulous children. It's a great privilege, isn't it? Parenthood. It's a great privilege.

Kirsty Young46:11

In the same way that children help you think about things in different ways and examine yourself in ways and maybe question some of your attitudes as they grow up, they also introduce you to stuff that is brilliant and you would never have found it. And I would definitely never have listened to Kendrick Lamar unless my children had said, why do you not listen to Kendrick Lamar? You'd love it. You don't want a Pulitzer for nothing, do you? I mean the guy's got chops and I thought on the island I could learn the words to this. At least two of my children know all the words to this and that kind of impresses me. He's sort of their Joni Mitchell in the same way that I can sing every word of her songs. They seem to know his and it seems a lot more difficult to learn than Joni Mitchell. So maybe I could occupy some of my time on the island managing to learn this incredibly impressive and rather wonderful piece of music.

Speaker 147:01

One of these lives, I'ma make these right with the wrongs I done. That's when I unite with the father-son till then I fight. Rain on me, put the blame on me. Got guilt, got hurt, got shame on me. Got six magazines that's aimed at me. Done every magazine was fame to me. It's a game to me with a bedroom at. Sleep, I ain't never had a fairs with that. What's fair when the hearts and the words don't reach? What's fair when the money don't take things back? It's rare when somebody take your dreams back. I care too much, wanna share too much. In my head too much, I shut down too. I ain't there too much. I'm a complex soul. They layer me up, then broke me down. The morality's dust. I lacking trust. This time I'm

Presenter47:32

Kendrick Lamar and Count Me Out. So, Kirsty Young, you know the deal. It's time for me to send you away to the island. I'll give you the Bible. True. The complete works of Shakespeare. You can also take one other book. What will it be?

Speaker 147:39

Yeah.

Kirsty Young47:39

Bible

Kirsty Young47:41

There you can also

Kirsty Young47:44

Well, I was thinking a lot about what would I really, really want and what would I really, really miss. And I think, given that I've got the complete works of Shakespeare and the Bible, and I would read the Bible, I've never read the Bible, so I'm definitely going to do that. And what I would miss, I think, is the friendship of girlfriends, especially. And so I'm going to take with me the collected works of Nora Efron. It's called The Most of Nora Efron. And it's pretty substantial, it's over 500 pages. I haven't read all of her journalism.

Speaker 248:09

Uh

Kirsty Young48:14

I recently reread for about the third or fourth time Heartburn and I had tears running down my face. Now I think that is really, really smart to be able to do that from the written word. So that's what I take because it is the voices of all the wonderful, smart, funny women I have been lucky enough to know and do know, sort of encapsulated into the works of Nora Efron. So that's what I'm going to take.

Presenter48:39

Fabulous. You can have a luxury item too. What would you like?

Kirsty Young48:43

I don't know how tough you are going to be on the table. I'm not going to be tough on you, Kirsty, it's you. Okay. So some flimsy idiot let Dustin Hoffman take the bar at the writs.

Presenter48:44

No no.

Kirsty Young48:52

Who was that? Oh, God only knows. Anyway, she did that. And so I sort of think, well, if Dustin Hoffman can take the bar at the rit I don't want the bar at the ritz. I I thought, right, I I'm gonna take m my bathroom from home and'cause I'd love the feeling of fresh water, but I'm not gonna take that.

Presenter49:00

Okay.

Kirsty Young49:07

I recently went to see Sam Mendez's brilliant new movie and it is set in an old cinema. I would like to take.

Kirsty Young49:16

A cinema which has all of the films I've ever watched.

Presenter49:20

Oh.

Kirsty Young49:20

Can I take that?

Presenter49:20

Uh

Kirsty Young49:22

Can I I probably can't see that?

Presenter49:23

I think you can take that, yes. I don't see why not.

Kirsty Young49:24

I don't see why not. It only needs a single seat. I don't even need a popcorn machine.

Presenter49:28

I can't not give you a popcorn machine, Kirsty. It's you, it's Kirsty.

Kirsty Young49:31

See it's you, it's Kirsty. So that's what I would like. I would like an old cinema with all the movies I've ever watched available for me to view. And that way I'll have company and I'll have memories and I'll have stories and I'll have escapism.

Presenter49:44

And we'll make sure the chair is incredibly comfy. Thank you for that. It is yours. And finally, if you could only save one of the tracks.

Kirsty Young49:46

Thank you for that.

Kirsty Young49:51

Yeah.

Presenter49:51

Uh Which would it be?

Kirsty Young49:52

Uh

Kirsty Young49:54

Of course, this is impossibly difficult, and I really resent you for even asking me. But it's going to I think it's going to be the Bach, the cello suite, because everything is in there. To me, it is it's

Kirsty Young50:05

It's what it is to be human in music there, and because I'm a words person, I've got.

Kirsty Young50:12

I've forgotten all the Russian and French I ever learned, but I've got the lyrics to every song I ever enjoyed in my head, so actually I think it would be uh the Bach.

Presenter50:20

Kirsty Jung, thank you very much for sharing your Desert Island discs with us. Yeah. True.

Kirsty Young50:23

Such a pleasure. Thank you so much.

Presenter50:39

Hello, it was lovely to chat to Kirsty and I hope she's very happy on her island watching her favourite films in her cinema.

Presenter50:46

There are more than 2,000 programmes in our archive which you can listen to, including the programmes of former presenters of Desert Island Discs, Roy Plumley, Michael Parkinson and Sue Lawley. And you can also find the Desert Island Discs of the musicians who Kirstie chose to take to her own island, cellist Stephen Isilis and Fleetwood Mac member Christine McVie. You can find their programmes if you search through BBC Sounds or on our own Desert Island Discs website. The studio manager for today's programme was Jackie Marjoram, the assistant producer was Christine Pavlovsky and the producer was Sarah Taylor.

Presenter51:44

Hello, this is Marion Keys. And this is Tara Flynn. We host a podcast you might like for BBC Radio 4 and BBC Sounds called Now You're Asking. Each week we take real listeners' questions about life, love, lingerie, cats, dogs, dentists, pockets, or the lack of, anything really, and apply our worldly wisdom in a way which we hope will help, but also hopefully entertain. Join us, why don't you? Search up Now You're Asking on BBC Sounds Tanking You.