Irene Thomas

Speaker 10:00

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 nine, and the presenter was Roy Plumley.

Irene Thomas0:31

Our castaway this week is the popular Radio 4 broadcaster who performs in a variety of programmes. It's Irene Thomas.

Irene Thomas0:40

Irene, have you ever imagined yourself as a castaway?

Presenter0:43

Could you endure loneliness? Yes, I could. I'm quite good at being on my own, actually. But I must have an island that isn't too hot or too cold. One of the silly isles would do for me. Very, very nicely.

Irene Thomas0:53

Really nicely.

Presenter0:56

Cool enough for daffodils and cats. Yeah.

Irene Thomas0:58

Yeah.

Irene Thomas0:59

What would you be happiest to have got away from?

Presenter1:02

Jargon, I think, you know, the sort of ongoing situation.

Irene Thomas1:06

Mm.

Presenter1:07

And realising our full potential in the context of today's society, that sort of thing.

Irene Thomas1:12

Yes. Oh, wouldn't it be marvellous? Do you play records a lot?

Presenter1:17

Uh well, when I say I play records, my husband plays records a lot. Did you find it difficult to choose, just eight? Very difficult. Eighty eight would be more like it, n not eight.

Irene Thomas1:27

What's the first one you've got there?

Presenter1:29

Well, the first one is a sort of madrigal, I suppose. Fa una canzone, make a song, and it's sung by the Robert Shaw chorale. This reminds me of the sheer pleasure I've always felt in singing in a choir.

Speaker 31:35

Bye.

Speaker 31:43

Love that consoling sentence and not in Mary. Say my bad must be long and not super.

Irene Thomas2:10

Yeah.

Speaker 32:10

Uh

Irene Thomas2:10

Yeah.

Speaker 32:11

Watching the

Speaker 32:13

Her and the bomb is far gerrymander, head of mumblies bargains, they and the redeemed.

Speaker 32:39

Good morning, champion.

Irene Thomas2:42

Fa una canzone by Orazio Vecchi, sung by the Robert Shaw Corral.

Irene Thomas2:48

Irene, are you a lanterner?

Irene Thomas2:50

Yes, Bon

Presenter2:51

Yeah.

Irene Thomas2:51

Now and we know from the title of your new autobiography that you are a bandsman's daughter.

Presenter2:57

That's right, yes. My father was in the band of the King's Royal Rifles. And even when he left the army he left the army before I was born, but uh even when I was a tiny child I can remember him playing in uh the local military band, they had Woodwyn section as well, and he played in that. And he used to play in all the parts, the clarinet.

Speaker 13:13

Yeah.

Irene Thomas3:13

Yeah

Presenter3:15

And used to play in all the parks, Richmond Park, on a Sunday afternoon, and we used to go and watch and listen to it. Was it his an Influence that made you take up music as you did originally? Well, he discouraged me a little bit because it was a f and is a very precarious profession, but I think he taught me first to appreciate music anyway.

Irene Thomas3:35

Now you must have been very good at the piano, your chosen instrument, because while you were very young you started to earn extra pocket money, didn't you?

Presenter3:43

Yes, in a concert party called the May Fairs. We all wore white frilly dresses and we went around to whichever hall was big enough for us, you know. It was great fun and great experience, too. You got people who had been professionals and were

Presenter3:57

either retired or found they couldn't make much of a living and had taken up something else in the company. And they had a lot, even though they weren't stars, they had a lot to teach a young person. I was about fourteen or fifteen then.

Irene Thomas4:02

Yeah.

Presenter4:08

And that's

Irene Thomas4:08

And this was down in your corner of southwest London, Hammersmith and Richmond and Kingston and wherever.

Presenter4:11

Yes, that's right.

Presenter4:12

Yes.

Irene Thomas4:15

Were you especially bright at school?

Presenter4:18

Yes, I suppose I have to admit it sounds elitist, doesn't it? It's a dirty word these days. But I was, yes. And uh I suppose

Presenter4:27

If we had been a little richer, I would have got a state scholarship and gone on to university. But you could get scholarships in those days, but they didn't hand out as many grants. You know, it wasn't as easy to get a grant as it is nowadays. And it was a question of being somebody being able to keep me while I was learning, and that was impossible. So I had to go to work. What did you want to be?

Presenter4:48

I think I would have liked to have been a musician of some kind, either a singer or pianist, or even an actress. I rather fancied myself at school as an actress.

Presenter4:59

But I had to put it out of my mind, that was it. So what did you start at? Well, I went into an income tax office. Oh. People always shudder when you say that, but it the work may be a little tedious, but the people you meet are very nice.

Irene Thomas5:01

The w

Irene Thomas5:13

Right, well we've got you started, even if not in the direction which we altogether approve of. Let's have your second record.

Presenter5:20

I'd like to be reminded of the days when I used to watch my father playing in the band and listen to him, and uh Sunset, a mixture of a hymn tune and a trumpet call, and I suppose it's inevitably played by the band of the Royal Marines. You can almost see those whitewashed stones at the sides of the paths at the barracks, you know.

Irene Thomas6:33

Sunset by the band of Her Majesty's Royal Marines. Now, the war came along with all its horrors, but it did at any rate get you out of the income tax office, didn't it?

Presenter6:42

Yes, I went into the National Fire Service. We wore a a rather drabbed art blue uniform, and we used to do office work and telephoning and that sort of thing.

Irene Thomas6:52

He went right through the blit.

Presenter6:54

Yes, yes, I did, in various places in London. Not a happy experience for most people, you know, but if you were very young and hadn't lost anybody you loved in the war, of course, it was um not too bad.

Irene Thomas7:07

Now you envelate it out before the end of the war.

Presenter7:09

Yes, I was a bit, I suppose, bronchittic, if that's the word, and uh working in cellars and darkness and I suppose bad food as well. That didn't help. So I was really forced to leave, you know, and I only went into teaching for a while. Teaching where? In uh a primary school on the outskirts of London. I wasn't qualified, but it was a question of the men were all away at the war, and anybody who had two eyes, two feet, you know, stand up could teach, you know. Were you good as a teacher? No, Roy, I wasn't really. I haven't got that gift, that spark that a good teacher must have.

Irene Thomas7:36

We could

Presenter7:43

The gift that allows you to joke with children and make them laugh and

Presenter7:50

have fun and then in a second to bring them back to the matter in hand and get serious and really teach them something, you know, hold their interest for the rest of the lesson. My husband has it because uh he's had years and years of experience of teaching and he's quite used to handling classes of thirty or forty strapping lads, you know. In fact we can be going along Regent Street sometimes now and a boy'll come up behind him and say uh a line or two of Houseman that he

Presenter8:18

hammered into their heads, you know, they remember all these years later.

Irene Thomas8:21

Yeah.

Irene Thomas8:22

Now you were going to a teacher yourself. You had decided to take singing lessons. What prompted you to do that?

Presenter8:28

Uh

Presenter8:29

Well, I'd always wanted to be a singer. I have a a small voice, very straight, not terribly interesting. But

Presenter8:35

I went to and had lessons with a a lovely lady called Gladys Palmer, who had been with the BNO C in the old days.

Presenter8:43

And I enjoy my lessons from her.

Irene Thomas8:45

So how did your singing career start?

Presenter8:48

Well, oddly enough, right at the top they were auditioning after the war in 1946 for a new opera company in the Royal Opera House. There were going to be seventy in the chorus and the auditional people from all over the country. And I was lucky enough to be picked. And the idea was to do opera in English, you see.

Presenter9:08

and manufacture our own stars. But after a while we found that uh Continental stars were interested in coming, so we used to do the operas in all sorts of languages according to whoever was coming. But when I was there at first they were doing all the operas in English.

Irene Thomas9:24

Yes, this was the opening of of the post-war season. Covent Garden Opera House had been a dance hall, yes it had.

Presenter9:31

Yes, it had an uh floor put over where the uh the stall seats are, you know, and people doing uh the Susie Q and

Presenter9:40

The jitter bug and all that sort of thing. Very different.

Irene Thomas9:44

Let's have your third record. Watch all that one.

Presenter9:45

Well, uh that's from a a musical comedy operetta, I suppose you call it, by Heuberger called The Opera Ball. And it's a song about um sitting out the next dance in a little private room. And it's sung by a lady I had the privilege of working with. Well, she was a star and I was in the chorus, but Elizabeth Swatzkoff. And she has a voice, I think, like white lilac, you know, it's refined and elegant and smooth, like a string of pearls. And she sings this quite unremarkable little number beautifully. She lifts it right out of its clasp.

Speaker 310:24

Where is Sean Rossi Barley?

Speaker 310:31

Achuriv Zente.

Speaker 310:40

Our birth shall paint all the mass of thee on our saint

Speaker 310:58

The view is short for sea party.

Speaker 311:05

Achuriv Z and Torte.

Irene Thomas11:14

Elizabeth Schwarzkopp singing Im chambre s'apore from the Opera Beaux.

Irene Thomas11:19

Yeah.

Presenter11:19

Yeah.

Irene Thomas11:19

Uh

Presenter11:20

Fuck.

Irene Thomas11:20

A codister at the Royal Opera House. Was it hard work?

Presenter11:23

Oh, extremely, yes, very hard work.

Presenter11:26

But the compensations were that you worked for the very best producers and directors and conductors and with the very best singers, of course, like Madame Shvatzkov. And we worked for people like Tyrone Guthrie, who I suppose actors would walk miles over broken glass to work for that man.

Irene Thomas11:41

Yes. What were the most exciting productions you worked in?

Presenter11:44

Uh Peter Grimes, I think, was one. And the other exciting production was the uh

Presenter11:51

Really tremendous, Boris Godunov.

Presenter11:54

With Marianne Novikovsky as the the

Irene Thomas11:57

Which were the productions you liked least?

Presenter12:01

Well, uh the Wagner ones, I must admit, because I am no great Wagner fan. I know it's all very lovely, but it has some I think Debussy or Rossini, was it, said it has some mauve cardo for an awful, awful long time when nothing much seems to be going on and you see the audience dropping off to sleep.

Irene Thomas12:20

Um

Irene Thomas12:22

How long were you in the court?

Presenter12:25

Well, I was there for about three years altogether. I had a few small parts, but they were in very lightweight operas like Marriage of Figura. I was a bridesmaid in that, you know. And in The Magic Flute I had a little part as one of the boys. I loved that. But I could see that I was never going to really be an international opera star. I'm not big enough, not good enough, you know, not strong enough.

Speaker 312:48

Mm-hmm.

Presenter12:48

And not single minded enough either. You need a great determination. I went session singing, which is a very specialized job. Uh you don't need any great voice for it, but you need to be

Presenter13:02

A very, very good sight reader, which luckily by that time I was.

Speaker 313:05

Yeah.

Presenter13:05

Yeah.

Speaker 313:05

Yeah.

Presenter13:05

And you need to be absolutely obedient.

Presenter13:09

And if the conductor says it's a daggio, it's a daggio. Never mind if the score says andante. Do what you're told.

Presenter13:17

And also be able to sing in tune, of course, without hearing any accompaniment. Even if there is one, it may be a very quiet accompaniment. If you can do all those things.

Presenter13:26

Sounds like kipling, doesn't it? Well, if you can do it if you'll be a session singer, yeah, they're much in demand, too.

Irene Thomas13:29

Yeah.

Speaker 313:31

Uh

Irene Thomas13:33

Let's have another record.

Presenter13:36

Well, I married a Welsh woman. I had the sense to do that, anyway. And I'd liked, I think, on this desert island to take a little Welsh song, which would remind me of all my lovely Welsh in laws and the beautiful country itself. It's a song that was written by a bard.

Presenter13:54

In, I suppose, about seventeen twenty. His name is Will Hopkin.

Presenter13:58

and he was in love with a girl called I think Anne Thomas.

Presenter14:02

She was known as the maid of Kevin Idvar, and her parents were very rich, and they didn't want Anne to marry Will, because he was a penniless poet. And uh she died in the end, poor soul of a broken heart, they say. And the song is called Beguile Yor Gwenydh Gwyn, and it means watching the white wheat, and I'd like it sung by a Welsh American baritone called Thomas Slunby Thomas. No relation, alas.

Speaker 314:41

Ye see the wan ye and carino hands.

Speaker 314:51

Marin be gaile your gweneth queen a cara sanai bedi.

Speaker 315:03

Vamna Viaro Rivi the Rolls.

Speaker 115:04

Why

Speaker 315:17

Why throughin the world of Indira?

Speaker 315:24

Can a lanach.

Irene Thomas15:27

Begwy Your Gwyneth Gwyn, sung by Thomas L. Thomas.

Irene Thomas15:32

Now session singing.

Irene Thomas15:34

This means really that you're hired as a singer for a few hours to do anything that's required.

Presenter15:39

That's right, like a session musician who hires himself out with his violin or his trombone or whatever it is. And apart from being a good timekeeper, all you really need is complete obedience and an ability to sight read very fast. In fact, British musicians, orchestral musicians, are considered

Presenter15:55

The best in the world by foreign conductors, and you often find an American film company will make a film in America and come over either to England or even to Vienna and use the orchestras there, because, let us whisper it, lo, they are better sight readers than their native.

Irene Thomas16:12

Codisters for all occasions. That's right. And a very specialized corner of the entertainment business you sometimes used to provide the voices for skaters in ice shows.

Presenter16:21

Okay.

Irene Thomas16:21

Uh

Presenter16:21

Uh

Presenter16:22

Very cold it was, too, I've still got the chill blanes to prove it.

Presenter16:26

You had to sit in a box above the ice, in in complete darkness, and give the impression that it was the skater himself or herself who was saying the lines, and you have to be very careful to time your words with a gesture that the skater makes.

Irene Thomas16:40

And you never knew really what was required of you learn. I mean, sometimes it would be oohs and ahs for the backing for a pop record.

Presenter16:47

That's right, yes, all sorts of things. You never knew what type of music it was going to be really. Sometimes you'd go and see a jazz quartet waiting to play with you, and sometimes you'd see somebody like Leon Gussens, you know.

Irene Thomas17:01

Time we had another record. What should we have?

Presenter17:04

Well, in my session singing days I worked for George Mitchell most of the time and in his choir at that time were people like Mike Sams who formed his own choir later on and Mickey and Griff who are now famous country music singers and we used to do lots of radio and television and film music and one of our happiest associations was with the wonderful radio producer Charles Chilton who used to be in all his shows and my favourite I think of them all was a programme about American Civil War songs which I always loved.

Presenter17:38

called The Blue and the Grey, and I'd like to hear Val Duniken, who used to sing solos for us in those days.

Presenter17:45

In the Battle Hymn of the Republic, which I think is one of the great tunes of all time, even though it was, as it were, the national anthem of the North, it was written by a Southerner.

Speaker 317:56

I have seen him in the watch fires of a hundred circling camps. They have builded him an altar in the evening dews and damps. I can read his righteous sentence by the dim and flaring lamps. His day is marching on.

Speaker 318:15

Glory, glory, hallelujah Glory glory hallelujah Glory

Irene Thomas18:26

Valdooniken with the George Mitchell Choir, the battle hymn of the Republic.

Irene Thomas18:31

Now you branched out into a very different form of broadcasting. You became Brain of Britain.

Irene Thomas18:37

Brain of brains. In fact, you were queen of the quiz shows. Now you were always a voracious reader, weren't you?

Presenter18:43

Yes, I fell quite ill once and couldn't do anything very uh energetic, and I used to get books from our local library and read and read and read anything no classics and historical novels and books of poetry, the lot. And I suppose some of it must have stuck.

Irene Thomas19:02

How did the quiz business start for you?

Presenter19:03

Well, the Radio Times put an advertisement in which said uh

Irene Thomas19:03

Uh

Presenter19:08

Women were required for the Welsh team, so very cheekily I wrote and said, I am Welsh by marriage, will I do? and they said, No, you will not do.

Presenter19:17

But some months later they did need female players for

Irene Thomas19:20

Yeah.

Presenter19:21

the London section of it, you know.

Irene Thomas19:23

Which show was this?

Presenter19:25

This was then called What Do You Know?

Irene Thomas19:27

Okay.

Presenter19:27

It's now called

Irene Thomas19:27

Call brainer prisons. Mm-hmm. And how many preliminary rounds were there before you became

Irene Thomas19:34

Brain and button.

Presenter19:35

Oh dear. I think there are about fifty-six people entering the whole thing. So that would make um

Presenter19:43

You played the sort of jump-off at the beginning and then there was a second one and then there was a semi-final and then the final.

Irene Thomas19:50

Now was this your first attempt?

Presenter19:51

Yeah.

Irene Thomas19:51

Yeah.

Presenter19:51

Yes, it was.

Presenter19:53

It's very frightening of us to

Irene Thomas19:55

So, brain of Britain, and then brain of brains. How does that work?

Presenter19:59

Well, every three years the brains, who have been victors for the past three years, play each other, and it's a matter of sheer luck, I assure you, there's no forced modesty there at all, because the two that I beat to become, I think, the only woman brain of brains so far

Presenter20:14

The two that I met I've met on other occasions and one of them has one or the other one as one or I have one, you know, we're all about the same. It's just sheer love.

Irene Thomas20:23

That means to say that it's no good doing any special study.

Presenter20:26

Not really, because you don't know what they're going to ask you. I mean, it might be about aircraft, it might be about Malawi, or it might be about Beethoven.

Irene Thomas20:33

You have been invited to take part in contests abroad.

Presenter20:37

Yes, in Australia. We had a marvellous trip to Australia because they have a very uh

Presenter20:42

formidable quiz champion called Barry Jones. He's now an Australian MP, by the way. And uh they wanted somebody from Britain to beat him, see, so they took three of us out to Australia and we had a marvellous time, first class all the way. Too much luxury really, I could have done with it spread over a number of years.

Irene Thomas20:59

Yeah.

Presenter21:00

Uh

Irene Thomas21:01

And you're a regular on Round Britain quiz. That's where we first met, of course, on the on the old Round Britain.

Presenter21:05

That's where we

Presenter21:06

Absolutely, yes, yes indeed, you are question master.

Irene Thomas21:09

And you do quite a lot of interviewing?

Presenter21:12

I do some, yes. I haven't done very much lately because I've been doing Round Europe quiz, Round Britain quiz, all those things, yeah.

Irene Thomas21:20

And on television you've been presenting the 607080 show.

Presenter21:25

Yes, that's really a delightful experience. Roy Hudd is the chief presenter and I've done four seasons now as his comedians laborise.

Irene Thomas21:32

Yeah.

Presenter21:36

No, that's really lovely. You meet such marvellous older people. It was specially designed for retired people, but it's not confined to them. In fact, anybody who is at home during the day and watching television, shift workers, young mothers with children, or disabled people lots of them watch it and write to tell us so, too.

Irene Thomas21:52

Good.

Irene Thomas21:54

Record number six.

Presenter21:56

Record number six is not really connected with anything I've talked about so far, except that I wish our European question master, Gordon Clough, who is bilingual in Russian, would translate it for me sometime. It's a Russian popular song and it's called The Field and it's sung by a baritone called Yuri Gulyayov.

Irene Thomas22:48

Yode Golyayov, the field. And that's all we can say about it.

Speaker 322:54

The friend

Irene Thomas22:54

Until you've got your translation.

Speaker 322:54

Until you've got

Presenter22:55

Yeah.

Irene Thomas22:56

Uh

Irene Thomas22:57

Right, time presses, so let's go directly onto your next disk.

Presenter23:00

It's the Thomas Tallis motette in forty parts, and it really is in forty parts, too. It's a most eerie, intricate sound, and it's a constant source of fascination to me. It's it's odd, you know, isn't it, that Elizabethan life that was so dirty and smelly and dangerous and full of bad drains and heresy could throw up this this great flower of music.

Irene Thomas24:22

The Thomas Tallis Motertin, forty parts, Sperm in Allium,

Irene Thomas24:26

by the Choir of King's College, Cambridge, with the Cambridge University Musical Society, conducted by David Wilcox. Now about your potential as a castaway, would you be capable, confident, and all the other requisites?

Presenter24:40

Dear you ever

Irene Thomas24:41

Will you ever

Presenter24:42

Uh

Irene Thomas24:42

Her girl guide

Presenter24:42

No, I wasn't. I couldn't afford the unit.

Presenter24:46

No, I think I'd be all right growing things. I love gardening.

Irene Thomas24:50

Gardening

Presenter24:51

Ah, that's good.

Irene Thomas24:52

Yeah.

Irene Thomas24:53

Could you run a

Presenter24:53

Uh Shelter of some sort.

Irene Thomas24:54

Yeah.

Presenter24:55

Dare say I could, given time, and wood, and leaves. Don't get any leaves on the silly aisles, not big enough to run a

Irene Thomas25:02

You're not on the silly island.

Irene Thomas25:06

Would you try to escape?

Presenter25:07

No, I wouldn't or no better the devil you know than the devil you don't know.

Irene Thomas25:10

Yes, that seems to make sense.

Irene Thomas25:13

Your last record.

Presenter25:15

I think I'd have to have something from Mozart, something from opera. I realized just now that I haven't got any opera yet, have I? And it's the trio from Cosi Fantute, and it's called Suave Sialvento.

Irene Thomas25:29

And who was going to sing?

Presenter25:30

Oh, Schwarzkopf and Krista Ludwig and Walter Berry.

Speaker 325:54

Mercy your Lord.

Presenter26:34

If I had that record on a desert island with me, I could learn all three parts, couldn't I, and sing them one at a time, sort of sing along a mozza.

Irene Thomas26:40

Yes, I'm not quite sure how you'd be as Walter Berry. Excellent as Elizabeth Fratzkopf or Krista Ludwig.

Irene Thomas26:48

If you could take just one disk out of the eight, which?

Presenter26:52

Oh, I think I'd have to take the Mozart. That sort of classical elegance is everlasting, isn't it?

Irene Thomas26:57

Mm-hmm. Cozy fantukte. And one luxury to take to the island with you?

Presenter27:02

No, I had to give this some thought to you. I can't have a cat, can I?

Irene Thomas27:06

No, it must be an animal.

Presenter27:07

Oh, I see. Well, in that case, it'll have to be specially made. Is that all right? Yes. Uh it's a specially made teddy bear, and it must be stuffed with earl gray tea bags, and round his neck he must have a bottle of Lily of the Valley scent. Rather like a decadent St Bernard.

Irene Thomas27:25

Right.

Irene Thomas27:26

Yes. How big is this object?

Presenter27:29

Ooh, um sort of reasonable size, about a three-foot bear, I should think.

Irene Thomas27:34

Oh, that's all right. Yes, we'll let you get away with all that. And and one book, apart from the Bible and Shakespeare, and we frown on big encyclopedias.

Presenter27:44

Well, a book. In that case, if I had the Bible and Shakespeare I don't think I'd want anybody else's prose or poetry. I could I take a music score the score of Beethoven's Fidelio, for instance. There's a lifetime of awe struck study there.

Irene Thomas28:00

Write the score of Beethoven's opera Fidelia. And thank you, Irene Thomas, for letting us hear your Desert Island discs. Thank you.

Irene Thomas28:09

Goodbye, everyone.

Speaker 128:17

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