Tuning in…
Tuning in…
Desert Island Discs
Presented by Roy Plomley
A cricketer who led the English Test team to victory over the Australians.
Eight records
String Quartet No. 14 in C♯ minor, Op. 131Favourite
Favourite disc: Yes
The keepsakes
The book
a large anthology of English poetry
Am I allowed a large anthology of poetry, of English poetry? Well, that's what I'd like, because I think that's the most dense and the most varied to be chosen.
The luxury
Unlimited supply of golf balls and a set of clubs
I've played a lot of sport in my life and the one sport I'd like to improve on and really play and I could play by myself is golf. So I'd like an unlimited supply of golf balls and a set of clubs.
In conversation
Presenter asks
How did you set about choosing these eight records?
Well, I wanted some records that were old friends, but I also wanted some that um I reckoned I'd like I'd get to like and that I would really need to learn. And so there's a mixture of those things. One or two of them are records that remind me of things, but mainly they're music that I very much like.
Presenter asks
What inspired you to change from classics to philosophy?
Two things. Uh one was that I used to play for Cambridge at cricket and the first slip I used to keep wicket was Eddie Eddie Craig, who's now lecturing in philosophy at at Cambridge, and he and I used to talk about philosophical questions, or he would talk about them and I would ask. And um also the the philosophy that I came across in the classics tripods and I found that it really made me start to think for myself much more than I had done.
Presenter asks
How confident were you at the beginning of the Ashes series?
The recording
Timestamps play the recording from that turn
Mike Brearley
Hello, I'm Kirsty 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 seven, and the presenter was Roy Plumley.
Presenter
Our castaway this week is a cricketer, the man who has led the English Test team to victory over the Australians, Mike Brearley.
Presenter
Mike, could you adapt yourself to solitude on this island?
Presenter
It would be hard. I've been described by some people as a loner, but I don't think that's true. I like to get away by myself from time to time, very much, but I need to. But as for being alone all the time
Presenter
Pretty tough proposition, I think.
Presenter
I know that that music is is a hobby of yours. You play the clarinet, don't you?
Presenter
I did. I haven't played it for a long time. Um
Presenter
Two things stopped me playing. One was
Presenter
A small concert I was involved in at St John's College, Cambridge, when the elastic band came off a crucial place for the clarinet and ruined the whole thing. And the other thing that happened not long after that was that the clarinet was stolen. I haven't replaced it. Never replaced it. Well, there's an idea for anyone who wants to make a presentation to the English captain.
Presenter
How did you set about choosing these eight records?
Presenter
Well, I wanted some records that were old friends, but I also wanted some that um I reckoned I'd like I'd get to like and that I would really
Presenter
Need to learn. And so there's a mixture of those things. One or two of them are records that remind me of things, but mainly they're.
Mike Brearley
Mm-hmm.
Presenter
Music that I very much like.
Presenter
What's the first one you've chosen?
Presenter
The first is a clarinet piece, it's um Brahms clarinet sonata, the second of the two.
Presenter
The opening of the Brahms Clarinet Sonata, Opus 120, No. 2, in E-flat, played by Gervaise Dupoy and Daniel Barrenboim. Was that one of the pieces you used to play, Mike? I used to try, yeah.
Presenter
Are you a Londoner?
Presenter
I am. I've lived most of my life in London. My parents still live here. Yes. You were brought to cricket at a very early age.
Mike Brearley
Are you
Presenter
Put to it. Um, my father played, if that's what you mean, and I and I can't remember a time when I didn't love it and want to get someone to bowl at me, or even bowl at someone else. Yes, I Your father played county cricket.
Mike Brearley
Yes, I
Presenter
He played two or three games for Middlesex and Yorkshire, and he played club cricket by the time I was around.
Presenter
He was a a maths master at the City of London School, which is where you went. That's right, yes. A good cricket school?
Presenter
Um not specially. The playing fields were about ten miles away from the school, so that there weren't those advantages that some schools have.
Presenter
Uh but it was the place where I first played cricket matches, or proper matches as opposed to matches with uh stumps on a wall, you know.
Mike Brearley
Uh
Presenter
And then you took a scholarship to Cambridge to St. John's. What did you read?
Presenter
I read classics for two years and then I changed to philosophy. What inspired that change?
Presenter
Two things. Uh one was that I used to
Presenter
play for Cambridge at cricket and the first slip I used to keep wicket was Eddie Eddie Craig, who's now lecturing in philosophy at at Cambridge, and he and I used to talk about philosophical questions, or he would talk about them and I would ask.
Presenter
And um also the the philosophy that I came across in the classics tripods and
Presenter
I found that it really made me start to think for myself much more than I had done. Yes. Yes, you you took a first in your tripos, didn't you? I did actually in in the part one, yes.
Presenter
Now other activities. You played the clarinet, we talked about that, you did a bit of acting.
Presenter
Yes, I was I played lacrosse, I played various games, hockey and squash and rugby. Tell us about the acting.
Speaker 4
Yeah, it's a very good idea.
Mike Brearley
Yeah.
Mike Brearley
Uh
Presenter
Um well there wasn't that much of it, but there were school plays um Horatio in Hamlet.
Presenter
Um we put on a play the six formers ourselves put on a play, The Frogs of Aristophanes, uh which was great fun. We got a theatre to put it on in. Uh
Presenter
And I nearly appeared in
Presenter
In the Cambridge Greek play, that it coincided with the Universita Crossmatch.
Presenter
Which brought forth some cynical remarks.
Presenter
And as a cricket blue, you scored more runs for the University than anyone before or since, I think. Yes, I probably played at more matches than anyone else as well. Yes. Well, no wonder Middlesex got after you.
Presenter
Yes, I'd I'd already played for the young cricketers of Middlesex and the second eleven before I went to Cambridge, although I didn't play very much for the first two or three years that I was at Cambridge. I got into the side in my last year and
Presenter
Played regularly.
Presenter
Let's have your second record. What's that to be?
Presenter
The second record is some Shakespearean songs sung by Alfred Della, a counter tenor, and I'd Like to Hear Where the Bee Sucks.
Speaker 4
Well the bee sucks, yeah, sock in a coast which we
Speaker 4
And a country does to fly, and a battle glide to fly after side.
Speaker 4
Merrily, merrily shall I live now, When the little loss that hangs on the bough.
Speaker 4
The currently shown I look down on the love lost of the eyes of my body.
Speaker 4
Then I'll be also not
Presenter
The voice of Alfred Deller. Mike, there was a certain amount of indecision about your future career. For instance, you took the civil service exam.
Presenter
Yes, there was indecision. I went and visited one of the civil service departments for a week, and I found it very interesting and took the exam. Came on top, in fact. Yes, I did. Partly because I was utterly relaxed about it, as I didn't know whether I'd take it up.
Presenter
Well, in fact, when you came down you went on an MCC tour of South Africa and then played a full season for Middlesex.
Presenter
Yes, and I struggled a bit at the cricket at that stage and I was still very interested in philosophy and very concerned to take it further. So I went back to Cambridge and started doing research in philosophy. And after a year the opportunity came to go to America, to California, and do a year's research there. And they're very vigorous, the same tradition of philosophy and a great vigour over there as far as the subject goes. And at that time, quite a bit of money to spend on it as well, which was a help. You broke that year to take the Young England team, the MCC under 25 team, to Pakistan.
Presenter
Yes, I wasn't expecting to be playing professional cricket at all any more, really. And that came out of the blue. And the professor of philosophy at the University of California was extremely understanding about it. Not that he knew what cricket was, but he was very understanding about letting me go. You certainly sorted out the Pakistani opposition. You scored.
Mike Brearley
But he was very uncomfortable.
Presenter
Seven hundred and thirty nine runs in nine innings. I've got the figures here. And you scored three hundred and twelve in one day. That was a good day's work. It was a very enjoyable and unusual day's work. They say the scorer um left at T and no one ever saw him again.
Presenter
tired out and discouraged.
Presenter
And then what, back to California? Yes, back to California for the rest of that year, and then um another year at Cambridge continuing what I was doing and then finally finally as far as philosophy was concerned really um a job at the University of Newcastle teaching in the Department of Philosophy there, which I held for nearly three years. Yes. And enjoyed it.
Mike Brearley
Which I have
Presenter
And then that finished the philosophical period of your
Presenter
career for some time. You you became captain of Middlesex in nineteen seventy one and took up serious cricket, and it's been serious cricket ever since. That's right, though I've also had other things to do in the winter, but certainly that's been the main thing for the last seven years.
Mike Brearley
Basel
Presenter
Let's break off for your third record. What's that to be? The third record is The Art of Feud by Bach.
Presenter
And um this is something I don't know at all really, but I'm assured that it would be really worth getting to know.
Presenter
Contrabunctus number twelve from Bach's The Art of Fugue
Presenter
Played by Lionel Rogg at the organ of St Peter's Cathedral, Geneva. Well, now, captain of Middlesex. And in the first season, you lifted the county from 16th to 6th in the championship. They must have been very pleased with you that season. That was a honeymoon year. Next season wasn't so good. I think we were about eleventh or twelfth. Now, a number of tours to the West Indies with a team from Kent, of all places.
Presenter
Yes, short tours they were two or three weeks. You captained an MCC side to East Africa. Yes. Now when was your first test appearance?
Presenter
Well, that was only last year, nineteen seventy six, against the West Indies, and certainly by that time I didn't expect.
Presenter
to play in any Test matches for England and my ambition was
Presenter
confined to county cricket and to doing as well as I could in that area and for Middlesex as well.
Presenter
And this season you were announced as Captain of England for the first two Test matches against Australia. The selectors being very cautious, just the first two to start with. I think rightly so. Tony Gregg, who did a very good job as Captain of England and only lost the job because of his involvement with Kerry Packer. He was at the point of a five test the year before, and I think he found that quite hard to adjust to. The fact that
Presenter
It was then that much harder to concentrate fully on his own particular job as opposed to the the job of organizing the side, and he found it harder to do well himself.
Presenter
We'll talk about this triumphant test series in a minute. Let's have another record first.
Presenter
Yes, Beethoven's Quartet, opus one hundred and thirty one.
Presenter
The earlier Beethoven quartets were amongst the first.
Presenter
Pieces of music that I really got to know and love for myself, and this is probably even more complex and more worth knowing.
Presenter
Part of the Beethoven Quartet in C sharp minor, opus one hundred and thirty one, played by the Amadeus Quartet.
Presenter
Now, winning the ashes, Mike, a nice contribution to the celebrations of Jubilee Year. At the beginning, how confident were you, or or weren't you?
Presenter
We had played the Centenary Test match in Melbourne in March.
Presenter
And it had been an absolutely tremendous game, which we lost in the end by 45 runs, though in the second we scored 400 and still lost. And I think that at that point we knew that Dennis Lilly wasn't coming on the tour, and I think we were pretty confident that we could win.
Presenter
But obviously
Presenter
You still have to do it, and the margin of the win has surprised us all, I think.
Presenter
How much say does the captain have in the selection of the team?
Presenter
He's one amongst five selectors, and then I think from then on it's a matter of his
Presenter
personality and his ideas, how much he can persuade the others.
Presenter
Uh but it's a very straightforward affair. We meet before each test match, five of us. We sit down and we talk and we
Presenter
Flesh it out until we get aside for the next match. It must have been a tremendous moment, the end of the fourth Test when it was all in the bag, when you saw Dedic Randall.
Presenter
Take that final catch.
Presenter
It it was. It was amazing. It was it was an odd
Presenter
sort of detachment from it because that moment seems such a historic moment when you see it on
Presenter
A film, old the old film of the Ashes Being Won by Compton Edrich, and it just seemed very odd that we were a part of that. But it was a tremendous moment, a tremendous match, a tremendous day.
Mike Brearley
Uh
Presenter
Yes. As and and talking of the history, I mean
Presenter
It's quite extraordinary that England has won the ashes in this country in the year of the Queen's birth and the year of the Queen's coronation and in the year of the Queen's Jubilee. That it seemed a kind of pattern to that, doesn't it? I hope it isn't another twenty five years.
Presenter
You've been reported uh saying that looking after a cricket team is not much different to looking after disturbed adolescents. Now I know that was light hearted, but uh
Speaker 4
Uh
Mike Brearley
Meanwhile.
Presenter
They do need a bit of mothering as well as leadership. I wasn't thinking so much of mothering. I mean the disturbed adolescents, they need a bit of mothering, but they also need a bit of uh common sense and they need to be listened to. The sort of thing that can happen is that people try and captain cricket sides without giving credit to the ideas of the people who are playing or without noticing what's going on amongst the members of the side. And I think those two years that I spent in a in a clinic for disturbed adolescents two winters.
Presenter
It didn't do any harm in the matter of management.
Presenter
You spent those two winters in in psychiatric work in the clinic. That's going to be the pattern from now on, is it, Mike? Serious cricket in the summer and back to your
Presenter
Medical work in winter.
Presenter
Well, at the moment I'm hoping to be on tour this winter in Pakistan and New Zealand. Oh, of course, yes.
Mike Brearley
Okay, cool.
Presenter
Um, when I stop playing cricket I certainly want to carry on in therapy in some way, uh both for myself and for other people.
Presenter
So you've got your future pretty well set in your mind.
Presenter
Yes, though uh how long I'll play cricket I don't know. But after that, yes, I've got some clear ideas on what I want to do.
Presenter
Let's have your fifth record.
Presenter
I'd like some Haydn um the Nelson Mass.
Presenter
Why do you choose this?
Presenter
I am very fond of Haydn indeed, and I and I also want some more church music. I uh I don't know the Nelson Mess very well yet, but uh
Presenter
Looking forward to getting a note over the next twenty or thirty years on the island.
Presenter
An excerpt from Haydn's Mass in D minor, the Nelson, recorded in the chapel of King's College, Cambridge. A cricket is one of the gentler sports, but these aren't very gentle times. Commercialization's coming on apace. And how do you feel about it?
Presenter
Sponsorship of cricket by various companies has saved it as far as professional cricket is concerned in this country over the last ten or fifteen years.
Presenter
So that there's no question that that's absolutely crucial. There's no alternative really to working for commercial firms, I mean for cigarette companies or insurance companies or whatever. Yes, the the big difference between that and what's happened in the last year with Kerry Packer
Presenter
Is that the
Presenter
Her other sponsorships have all been through the
Presenter
Or under the aegis of the authorities, the Testing County Cricket Board in this country, or the Australian Board of Control. So it isn't a matter of working for a cigarette company, say. It's a matter of a cigarette company putting money into the game, which it then comes through, filters through to the players at some stage via the establishment. Yes. Apart from the test matches this year and the other games we've mentioned in this programme, what's been the best game of cricket you've ever taken part in? That's a corny question, I know, but there must be one in your mind. Well, there's one very recent one, which is it's a little bit of a boast, but it was very we played, Middlesex played Surrey, and it rained for almost all the first two days. And at the end of the second day, they were about eight for one or something. And we won the game on the last day without any declarations. We bowled them out twice and declared our first innings with no run after one ball and then knocked the runs off to win by nine wickets. I think that was as good as any. Very satisfying. Very satisfying. Record number six.
Presenter
Don Giovanni, please. Some opera Mozart. I haven't got any Mozart. And it will remind me of.
Presenter
Visits to Covent Garden.
Speaker 4
Second.
Speaker 4
Semiconductor and the best of Pebble Es
Speaker 4
I'm gonna be doing early time.
Presenter
Part of the sextet from the second act of Mozart's Don Giovanni, conducted by Colin Davies. Now what about your capability as a lone castaway?
Presenter
Would you be all right at looking after yourself? Could you rig up a shelter? I yes, I think so. I think if I had to do it I'd make do. Would you try to escape? If I was really desperate I might, or if I thought there was a very good chance of success.
Presenter
But I try to live a good life there and enjoy myself there.
Presenter
might not succeed.
Presenter
Break on number seven.
Presenter
Record number seven is a bit different. Ray Charles. Um just
Presenter
Sheer life and exuberance I went to a Ray Charles concert at Newcastle and I've never enjoyed myself more.
Speaker 2
Georgia
Speaker 2
Georgia
Speaker 2
The whole day through.
Speaker 2
Just an old sweet song.
Speaker 2
Keeps Georgia on my mind Georgia
Presenter
Ray Charles and Georgia on my mind. And now your last record.
Presenter
I'd like Bach again, Cantata No. 106, The Actus Tragicus.
Speaker 4
This means this boy.
Speaker 4
Fen Spirit!
Speaker 4
Right, and who scared?
Speaker 4
Richmond Square and Swordsman
Presenter
The Bach Cantata No. one hundred and six act as tragicus.
Presenter
A Bach Guild performance conducted by Felix Prohaske.
Presenter
If you could take just one disc out of the eight you've played us, if we took seven away from you, which one would you hang on to? I'd keep the Beethoven quartet.
Presenter
And you are allowed to take one luxury with you.
Presenter
I've played a lot of sport in my life and the one sport I'd like to improve on and really play and I could play by myself is golf. So I'd like an unlimited supply of golf balls and a set of clubs. That's easy. And one book, putting aside Bible, Shakespeare, big encyclopedias. Yes, no. Am I allowed a large anthology of poetry, of English poetry? Well, that's what I'd like, because I think that's
Mike Brearley
Uh
Speaker 4
Man's page
Presenter
The most dense and the most varied to be chosen.
Presenter
And thank you, Mike Brearley, for letting us hear your Desert Island discs. Thanks very much. Goodbye, everyone.
Mike Brearley
You've been listening to a podcast from the Desert Island Discs Archive. For more podcasts, please visit bbc.co.uk slash radio four.
We had played the Centenary Test match in Melbourne in March. And it had been an absolutely tremendous game, which we lost in the end by 45 runs, though in the second we scored 400 and still lost. And I think that at that point we knew that Dennis Lilly wasn't coming on the tour, and I think we were pretty confident that we could win. But obviously you still have to do it, and the margin of the win has surprised us all, I think.
Presenter asks
You've been reported saying that looking after a cricket team is not much different to looking after disturbed adolescents. What did you mean by that?
They do need a bit of mothering as well as leadership. I wasn't thinking so much of mothering. I mean the disturbed adolescents, they need a bit of mothering, but they also need a bit of uh common sense and they need to be listened to. The sort of thing that can happen is that people try and captain cricket sides without giving credit to the ideas of the people who are playing or without noticing what's going on amongst the members of the side. And I think those two years that I spent in a in a clinic for disturbed adolescents two winters. It didn't do any harm in the matter of management.
Presenter asks
How do you feel about the commercialization of cricket?
Sponsorship of cricket by various companies has saved it as far as professional cricket is concerned in this country over the last ten or fifteen years. So that there's no question that that's absolutely crucial. There's no alternative really to working for commercial firms, I mean for cigarette companies or insurance companies or whatever. Yes, the the big difference between that and what's happened in the last year with Kerry Packer is that the other sponsorships have all been through the or under the aegis of the authorities, the Testing County Cricket Board in this country, or the Australian Board of Control. So it isn't a matter of working for a cigarette company, say. It's a matter of a cigarette company putting money into the game, which it then comes through, filters through to the players at some stage via the establishment.
Presenter asks
Would you be able to look after yourself as a lone castaway? Could you rig up a shelter?
I yes, I think so. I think if I had to do it I'd make do. Would you try to escape? If I was really desperate I might, or if I thought there was a very good chance of success. But I try to live a good life there and enjoy myself there. might not succeed.
“It would be hard. I've been described by some people as a loner, but I don't think that's true. I like to get away by myself from time to time, very much, but I need to. But as for being alone all the time, pretty tough proposition, I think.”
“The earlier Beethoven quartets were amongst the first pieces of music that I really got to know and love for myself, and this is probably even more complex and more worth knowing.”
“They do need a bit of mothering as well as leadership. I wasn't thinking so much of mothering. I mean the disturbed adolescents, they need a bit of mothering, but they also need a bit of uh common sense and they need to be listened to.”
“I am very fond of Haydn indeed, and I and I also want some more church music. I uh I don't know the Nelson Mess very well yet, but uh looking forward to getting a note over the next twenty or thirty years on the island.”
“Sheer life and exuberance I went to a Ray Charles concert at Newcastle and I've never enjoyed myself more.”