Tim Rice

Speaker 20:00

Hello, I'm Kirstie Young, and this is a podcast from the Desert Island Disc's Archive. For rights' reasons we've had to shorten the music. The programme was originally broadcast in nineteen seventy six, and the presenter was Roy Plumley.

Presenter0:31

Our castaway this week is a broadcaster and a writer of lyrics and libretti who's doing exceedingly well. It's Tim Rice. Tim, have you ever daydreamed about being a Robinson Crusoe? Yes, quite a lot.

Presenter0:43

Could you endure the prospect?

Presenter0:45

I'm not too sure about it. I think I'd quite enjoy the novelty for a while, but probably it would wear off. Can you think of anything you'd be particularly happy to do without?

Presenter0:53

Well the telephone, not so much the telephone ringing but the inefficiency of the telephone system. Now you write the words to Andrew Lloyd Webber's music. Have you any musical skill yourself? Do you play the piano? I do play it badly, but I can play well enough so if Andrew gives me a tune to put words to, I can bash out the chords at home, but I don't get the family rushing in to hear me play. The families don't do that. How did you set about choosing your eight record? Well, I decided to choose eight records that I thought I could live with, um, for a very

Presenter1:22

Fairly long period of time, and I also tried to choose them from different fields of music that I liked. Where do we start?

Tim Rice1:26

Yeah.

Presenter1:28

Well, I think the first one ought to be Billie Holiday, who's uh greatest female jazz singer ever, and a song called Nice Work If You Can Get It.

Speaker 31:36

Just imagine someone waiting at the cottage door.

Speaker 31:42

Where two hearts become one Who could ask for anything more?

Speaker 31:47

Loving one who loves you and then taking that far. Now I square if you can get it and if you get it, won't you tell me how?

Presenter2:05

Billy Holiday, what's your next record? Next record is a record which is I think my favourite pot record of all time. It doesn't have a great social significance, but I can remember the day I first heard it. I was painting my bedroom in April 1961. I knew it was a number one hit record when I heard it, and it was. It was a thing called Runaway by Del Shannon.

Tim Rice2:31

Oh my gosh so strong

Tim Rice2:36

Uh

Presenter2:36

Uh As I still hold on, I think of things we've done together while our hearts were young.

Tim Rice2:45

Uh

Presenter2:45

Uh

Tim Rice2:49

I'm a walking in the rain Just a pause

Presenter2:54

Bell Shannon. Tim, in what part of the country were you born? I was born in Amisham, Buckinghamshire. You were educated at Lansing. A musical school? It is a musical school actually, although I I wasn't really one of its most distinguished musical sons. I had a bad pop group, but that was about it.

Tim Rice3:07

I had a

Presenter3:10

What happened when you left school?

Presenter3:12

Well, I let me think, golly. Um, straight away I was a petrol pump man for a while and then I went to Paris to the Sorbonne University. Yes. Studying what? Well, I was on a thing called the Course de Civilisation Française, which was vaguely a thing for foreign students to try and brush up their French. Um I had the A level just and um the idea was to get me more or less fluent in French, mhm, which more or less worked. And I lived in Paris for

Tim Rice3:19

I'm telling you what

Presenter3:36

six months at Sorbonne on this fairly short course. Following that I then went into the law, which was possibly a mistake as I didn't do very well at it. When your day's legal work was over, did you still have your group?

Presenter3:48

No, the group had more or less packed up after we'd all left school. But um I was trying to make it as a pop singer in my spare time. I was taking tapes around to people and getting endless rejection slips. Did you get any any engagement? Not really. Um I honestly wasn't and still am not a very good singer. But uh funnily enough one publisher liked one of my songs that I'd written and I I w in fact wasn't trying to sell the songs. I was trying to sell myself because I was keen to be

Tim Rice3:54

Minimize.

Presenter4:14

McJagger or someone like that. When and where did you meet Andrew Lloyd Webber?

Presenter4:19

I met Andrew in March 1965 in his flat. I'd heard about him through hawking my songs around. I'd heard that this other young fellow was also hawking his songs around. And he, I'd heard, was very good at tunes and I wasn't very good at tunes. And I thought, well, perhaps I could do some lyrics. And so I got hold of his number and rang him up. And he said, come around to my flat and we'll have a chat. And we got on very well. What was the first thing you wrote together? I think the first thing we wrote was a pop song, which I believe I remember right. It was called Patterns of Love. but it didn't actually get anywhere. It wasn't even recorded by anybody. But we didn't write an awful lot to begin with. The first six months or so of knowing Andrew, we just sort of did things together, like go to football matches or go to Ricky Nelson concerts. We didn't actually think about doing a huge epic or anything. You did start a musical about Dr. Bernardo. After about six months of knowing Andrew, Andrew said, look, I've had this idea knocking around for ages.

Tim Rice5:00

Um

Tim Rice5:06

You can start.

Presenter5:14

Let's do musical on Doctor Bernardo.

Presenter5:16

And uh I thought well it seemed like it you know could be a good idea. We had a go at this and and and it really worked out rather well. It it it wasn't produced or anything, but it did show us that we could write together. Yes. And it showed us that we we had some ability to do something that was more than just a two-minute pop song. What were you doing in the daytime? I was still doing law at this point, but about a year after I met Andrew I decided that as I'd failed all my exams I ought to do something a bit more that uh had a vague hope of uh financial reward so I joined EMI Records. Doing what? I I think technically I was a management trainee which means chap they don't quite know what to do with but could be useful in 1983. So I went around every department, classical department, packaging, marketing, promotion, covers and wound up with a chap called Norrie Parramour who of course is one of the most distinguished men of pop music and uh it was through him that uh in fact my first tentative breaks came because I was able to go to endless sessions and see how pop records are made and see how indeed

Tim Rice5:51

Could be useful in 1983.

Presenter6:15

Serious records were made as well and uh meet people who actually were very successful in the music business which I hadn't done before and one was able to work with people like Cliff Richard. What was your first success with Andrew?

Presenter6:26

Our first financial success, of course, was Superstar, but our first success critically was Joseph.

Presenter6:31

Joseph and the Amazing Technique on a Dreamcoat. That started as a as a very short piece, didn't it? Yes, it it it began in 1968 for um a school end of term concert.

Tim Rice6:32

That's

Presenter6:41

It was to be a one-off performance and after we'd had all these dreams about Dr. Bernardo being a West End Smash, it was a bit of a come-down for us to write something just for one ten-minute spot in a in a prep school end of term concert. But it was such a success on this very small level that it grew from there and it was published by Novellos as a school textbook and gradually things grew and and all this time I was in fact still working with Norrie Paramore.

Tim Rice7:04

Uh

Presenter7:10

And then Norrie decided to record it, which of course boosted the work considerably, so we expanded it a bit.

Presenter7:16

You were both offered a steady salary so that you could get down to writing. Yes, this was in fact by David Land, who is now our agent, stroke manager, stroke, whatever. And David's been with us now for five or six years and we owe absolutely everything to him really because Andrew was unemployed. I was in fact working for Norrie. I was very happy working for Norrie, but I had this sneaking feeling that I ought to really have a go at trying to write full-time. And I couldn't obviously work for Norrie and write and do both well. And David Land came up with this offer. He said, well, I think you two lads, on the strength of Joseph, have got some sort of potential. I will pay you, I think it was £25 a week each at that time, which was a fortune for us, just to write. And I'll be your manager and give you an office if you need one and promote anything you turn out. Well, that was a decisive point in your career. Let's break off there for record number three. Record number three is, in fact, a record by Cliff Richard, who I think is one of the underrated men of British music. I mean, he's hugely successful, but I think his contribution to British pop music, and indeed that of the Shadows, is very underrated. And one of my favourite of his early hits is Travelling Light.

Speaker 28:26

Got no bags and baggage to slow me down

Speaker 28:33

I'm traveling so fast my feet ain't touching the ground

Speaker 28:40

Travel in line, travel in line.

Speaker 28:48

Well I just can't wait to be with my baby tonight.

Presenter8:56

Cliff Richard.

Presenter8:57

Right, Tim, your financial worries were over. You both had £25 a week. What did you do with that time that was being bought for you? What was the work you settled down to? Was it Jesus Christ Superstar? Not instantly, no. We had had this small success with Joseph, and we felt, well, let's try and do a second Joseph. And we virtually completed a thing based on Richard the Lionheart called Come Back Richard, Your Country Needs You, which was all right, but it wasn't really as good as Joseph, and the storyline wasn't quite as good. And it quite clearly wasn't perfect and hadn't got much potential. And we were a bit worried because here we were getting £25 a week each, and we were absolutely terrified this would be cut off. So we instantly abandoned Richard and then had a go at Superstar. An opera on the last seven days on the ministry of Jesus Christ.

Presenter9:45

Chosen, I gather, for its story value rather than as a religious work. Yes, we weren't trying to make any point, either pro-religion or anti-religion, um or indeed any point at all. We were trying to tell a story, um of this clash between the ultimate practical man, Judas, and the ultimate spiritual man, Jesus. But you didn't take the story on to the resurrection. No, but we certainly didn't deny the resurrection. My own beliefs on the resurrection are are extremely

Presenter10:11

Well, bewildered. I mean, I'm

Presenter10:14

I'm a don't know, and I didn't want to sort of force a viewpoint down anybody else's throat which I didn't actually know about myself. Did you try to sell it first for the stage, or as a disc? Well, we would have liked to have sold it for stage, but we had very few contacts in the stage world and a certain amount in the record world. And of course, it's much cheaper to mount a record. Well, the record was pretty expensive. You made the same sort of demands that Belios did. You wanted a symphony orchestra and a jazz group and a couple of choirs and. Well, this was Andrew, in fact.

Tim Rice10:40

Come here.

Presenter10:43

Took the thing to one company prior to MCA who who in the end took it. We took it to a nameless record company who said we could do it if we kept it down to three musicians. And Andrew said, you know, out of the question. I didn't quite know what Andrew had in mind all the time. I mean the tunes were written, but I didn't realize that it was going to be quite such a huge work at times 87 piece orchestra. The record was a success and in the theatre it was done first in the United States. Yes, well the record took off like a bullet in America. It was a complete flop in Britain. It came out with a certain amount of publicity, got quite nice reviews but died the death.

Presenter11:18

But um in America it it took off overnight. What was the first reaction from religious groups?

Presenter11:24

Well mixed. Um on the whole uh any intelligent religious group saw that it didn't actually say anything particularly original or controversial, so they thought, well, it's quite a nice record or it isn't a nice record, but we had a few of the rather strange religious groups in America um issue

Presenter11:41

disclaimers and strange protests and things, but um on the whole very good reaction. When it first came to London you had nuns picketing the palace theatre. Yes, I couldn't quite understand um what that was all about. I mean the only effect of course was in fact to help the show because we made the front page of all the papers when it opened rather than just the arts page. So s s so in fact picketing it was the was the worst thing Enemies of Superstar could have done.

Tim Rice11:57

Yeah.

Presenter12:02

And it's been in that theater for over a thousand performances now. And how many countries has it played in? I would think about fifteen to twenty. I'm honestly not sure. And there's been a film, of course. Yes, the movie followed on fairly quickly after the show. Um came about two years after the show opened.

Presenter12:17

In fact, only about one year after the British show opened that it didn't seem to affect the show too much.

Presenter12:21

Let's have record number four. Where do we go now? Well, uh record number four is Mendelssohn and uh partly because it's a great piece of music but mainly because it reminds me of my wife who is Scottish, I have the Scottish Symphony.

Presenter13:32

Mendelssohn's Scottish Symphony, the opening.

Presenter13:35

The Berlin Philharmonic Orchestra conducted by Carrion.

Presenter13:39

Now we were talking about Jesus Christ Superstar. In the meantime, things had happened to that 10-minute Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat.

Presenter13:46

Yes, well, um it had got to the stage where it had been recorded by Norrie Parramore, um w and it was then about twenty-five minutes, thirty minutes long. And uh

Presenter13:57

Frank Dunlop, almost unbeknownst to us, in fact we did vaguely know about it, but we didn't think it was anything important, put it on at the Edinburgh Festival in 1972, just in the half-hour version. And it was a fantastic success. It got much better reviews than Superstar ever got. And everybody said, of course, these lads are talented, and it was just that Superstar wasn't any good. Joseph is brilliant, and it got fantastic notices up in Edinburgh, so we hammered up there to have a look at it. And it was great, it was fantastic. And everybody said, you must take it to the West End. So we expanded it, and it came to the West End, but we expanded it too quickly. And it didn't really do very well. It ran for about six, seven months, propped up by generous producers and backers and things. But by the time the show ended, we'd got it right. We'd got rid of all the padding. And in fact, the last week of Joseph was great. And it's been a huge success in an hour and a half version in the provinces ever since, and indeed abroad. Yes. Mighty Oaks from Little Acorns Grove.

Tim Rice14:39

Wait.

Presenter14:52

Now there's a new musical you're working on. What's that? Well we're working on a musical based on the life of Eva Perron, the Argentine lady who died in 1952. Yes. A rather unusual subject for a musical.

Tim Rice15:02

A real

Presenter15:04

Yes, I suppose it is. Um they said that about J C What are your plans for it? How far have you got? Well, we've just about written it. Um there's a few gaps, the old verse here and there. Um the next stage really is to record it. Um having by accident discovered the best way to do it with Superstar, i.e. go to record first, we thought we'd follow the same formula and

Tim Rice15:08

Yeah.

Speaker 215:08

Yeah.

Speaker 215:10

How are you?

Tim Rice15:10

Yeah.

Presenter15:24

Make a record of it. How do you work with Andrew? Who writes what first? Well, in the case of anything musical, we have a joint discussion on the plot, really. I might say, well, this is the very rough outline, and Andrew will say, well, let's bring in A, B, C plot features. And then Andrew will write a tune to each scene, already knowing what the feel of it is, what the words are in fact going to say, even though we haven't even got a title perhaps. And then I will put words to the music.

Presenter15:55

Um so it's really mood or plot, tune, words. And then of course we might make the odd alteration if if something doesn't work. Have you given up all idea of performing yourself? Oh, no, no, no. Um I make a bad record about once a year. In fact I've I've got one coming out round about now, coincidentally. Um

Presenter16:14

I've made about eight or nine records over the last ten years. Yeah, I was thinking in terms of the theatre.

Speaker 216:16

Yeah

Presenter16:18

Oh, in terms of theatre, um well I have performed um in Joseph. The only thing I can do really, acting-wise, is do fairly good impression of Elvis Presley. So as there is a part in Joseph which features Elvis um I've I've done that in the provinces. Good. Record number five. What's that? Well it it actually is Elvis Presley. Um I really could have taken any one of his tracks as he's my

Presenter16:40

Favourite singer, but I've chosen the King Creole soundtrack and uh this particular song is called New Orleans.

Presenter16:51

You'll never know, you'll never know what happened.

Tim Rice16:55

Whatever means I'm playing you play and die to New Orleans. New Orleans

Presenter17:01

New Laude Uh

Tim Rice17:03

You ain't been living there, you gotta let O with the black-eyed baby body over you

Speaker 317:14

Uh I've been saved you never

Presenter17:16

Elvis Presley from the soundtrack of King Creole. Let's go straight on to the next one.

Presenter17:20

The next one is My Fair Lady, it's called You Did It.

Speaker 317:25

That blackguard who uses the science of speech More to blackmail and swindle than teach

Speaker 317:31

He made it the devilish business of his.

Speaker 317:34

To find out who this Miss Doolittle is

Speaker 317:39

Every time he looked around, there he was, that hairy hound from Budapest.

Speaker 317:43

Never leaving us alone, never have I ever known a rue de Pess.

Speaker 317:51

Finally I decided it was foolish not to let him have his chance with her.

Speaker 317:56

So I stepped aside and let him dance with her.

Presenter18:02

Rex Harrison in My Fair Lady.

Presenter18:05

How do you think you'd make out as a castaway? Were you ever a Boy Scout? I was actually, yes, I was uh head of the Peewit Patrol, I remember. Well done. You could build some kind of shelter, you could build some fire. I doubt it, no, I wasn't um I'm I'm not very hot on that sort of thing. I mean I'm I'm sh absolutely certain that if one actually was there one would have to do these things and and perhaps would knock up a reasonable fire, but I'm I'm not a dab hand round the home.

Tim Rice18:14

Build a campfire.

Tim Rice18:18

Uh

Presenter18:27

Do you know anything about sailing? Small boats.

Tim Rice18:28

All notes

Presenter18:29

I'm a good swimmer, but I I've known nothing about sailing.

Tim Rice18:33

I don't think

Presenter18:35

I think you're wise. Another record.

Presenter18:38

Um I would like to take uh something from the world of uh classical opera and uh from Puccini's Laboem Musetta's Waltz.

Presenter19:47

Elizabeth Harwood as Musetta in Puccini's La Boheme, a recording conducted by, once again, Herbert von Carrian.

Presenter19:55

Which brings us to your last record.

Presenter19:57

My last record is a country record. I'm a great fan these days of country music, which in fact is not far removed from the rock and roll I grew up with. And this particular record, in fact, isn't at all rock and roll. It's a very corny record in a way, but I think on the Desert Island I would love to be soothed by this every night as I go to bed on my own. Tammy Wynnette, Stand By Your Man.

Tim Rice20:17

Even though he's hard to understand.

Speaker 220:26

Handy Fear of Hound.

Speaker 220:31

Uh

Tim Rice20:31

I'll be proud of him Cause after all

Tim Rice20:39

Uh

Speaker 220:39

It is just a man.

Presenter20:47

Tammy Winnette. If you could take just one disc out of the eight, which would it be? I think I would take the Tammy Winnette. I think it would be very relaxing.

Presenter20:55

And one luxury to take to the island with you? I would take a cricket bag full of cricket kit.

Presenter21:01

Play cricket all on your own. Well, you could certainly bowl on your own, and if you had a slip catcher, you could practice fielding. And it could have a practical use. I mean, pads would be useful for wearing when ploughing through the jungle. Tim, I was talking about a luxury.

Presenter21:13

Incidentally, you do run your own cricket team, don't you? Yes, yes I do. It's um Heartaches Cricket Club.

Presenter21:20

A flourishing concern.

Presenter21:23

Well, roughly in the Oxfordshire area where I now live, but we don't actually have a home pitch. We're at Wandering Side. Mhm. Well, good wandering to you. And one book apart from the Bible, Shakespeare, and big encyclopedias.

Presenter21:35

I think I take uh the collected works of Lewis Carroll, which wouldn't just be Alice in Wonderland and Alice Through the Looking Glass, but would have a lot of mathematical puzzles and strange inventions and

Presenter21:45

An awful lot to keep me amused. Right. And thank you, Tim Rice, for letting us hear your Desert Island disc. Thank you very much. Goodbye, everyone.

Speaker 222:00

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