Tuning in…
Tuning in…
Desert Island Discs
Presented by Roy Plomley
Celebrated photographer and the fifth Earl of Litchfield.
Eight records
I'm Gonna Sit Right Down and Write Myself a Letter
Fats Waller was a favorite of mine. I think my mother used to play some of his tunes, and so I chose to sit right down and write myself a letter.
As Time Goes ByFavourite
In some ways, been so overplayed in my mind, but it just somehow says something about... a period of filmmaking that I particularly like, and I also think the stars... in it were wonderful, particularly Bogart, and I never tire of of hearing the theme which is known as time goes by.
Cyril Smith and Phyllis Sellick
Well, it again goes back, I think, to listening to my mother playing the piano, because it's the piano setting of Sheep May Safely Graze by Bach.
During that time Bob Dylan was well established, and I think of all the... the songs that he wrote, one that I... used to enjoy especially then and I wrote it down in a diary which is why I chase it for here was just like a woman.
Well, since we're sitting on this island I would need cheering up, and sometimes a parody of a song is better even than the song itself, and banana boat song is appropriate because I have a little house on an island where bananas grow anyway, and... The Harry Belafonte one is the best known one, but the one that I think would cheer me up most is the one by Stan Friedberg.
Gary Brooker, Keith Reid and Matthew Fisher
Well, this is a record that again is a sixties memory. It's so mad that I enjoy it, but I also enjoy it particularly for the melody. And it's a whiter shade of pale by Prokol Hahn.
Well, Don McLean was a late sixties discoverer who... was best known for a track called American Pie, which his album was called. But the B side of it, as I remember I think it was the B side, was called Vincent and it was about Van Gogh and I loved the the whole of it.
The Choir of Westminster Abbey
Well, my last record is something that... we referred to earlier... because with all the luck I had in landing that very nice assignment at the wedding, I because of that missed out on being in the Abbey, in in the in the cathedral I mean, and I didn't hear the singing of I V Out of thee My Country, which at school we used to sing, and the second verse is my favourite.
The keepsakes
The book
Having never actually written a book without pictures, I think that would be a good time to do that ... so a blank book.
The luxury
if I were not to use it practically, which is it's I was thinking in terms of a telescope. ... I have often at night lain on my back, and just looked at the stars. ... perhaps a telescope or a pair of binoculars to look upwards would be a nice thing to do.
In conversation
Presenter asks
Why did you choose not to use your title [Earl of Lichfield] initially?
I chose... Not to use... The title initially because I thought it would have been something of a disadvantage, although most people won't believe that. I think in the sixties it might have been because... Nobody's about to give a job to somebody who would appear to be well healed when... There were others, perhaps more hungry than myself... wanting to work.
Presenter asks
Did you grow up [on your estate in Staffordshire]?
Yes, in part. I was also brought up partly in Paris and partly in Tripoli. Um it was sort of wartime and post war and I whizzed about and... never really had a proper home as such. But... Saw quite a lot of the world in the process of growing up.
The recording
Timestamps play the recording from that turn
Speaker 1
Hello, I'm Kirstie Young, and this is a podcast from the Desert Island Discs Archive. The programme was originally broadcast in nineteen eighty one, and the presenter was Roy Plumley.
Patrick Lichfield
On our desert island this week is the celebrated photographer Patrick Litchfield. Now that's the name you work under professionally. In private life you are the fifth Earl of Litchfield.
Presenter
That's right. I chose
Presenter
Not to use.
Presenter
The title initially because I thought it would have been something of a disadvantage, although most people won't believe that. I think in the sixties it might have been because.
Presenter
Nobody's about to give a job to somebody who would appear to be well healed when
Presenter
There were others, perhaps more hungry than myself.
Presenter
wanting to work. Now I don't mind what I'm called because people tend to know, but I there was a a rather boring occasion when a newspaper that I was working for asked me to go and photograph Lord Litchfield.
Presenter
Yeah.
Patrick Lichfield
Well that was an easy one.
Patrick Lichfield
You have a very large estate in Staffordshire. That's off your hands now.
Presenter
No, it's not. I mean, it's very much in my hands because although the house itself in which I live is National Trust and administered by the Staffordshire County Council, the estate proper is still administered by us, and there's considerable farming interest there, and it's um very important to me.
Patrick Lichfield
Did you grab Uh
Presenter
The
Patrick Lichfield
Uh
Presenter
Yes, in part. I was also brought up partly in Paris and partly in Tripoli. Um it was sort of wartime and post war and I whizzed about and uh never really had a proper home as such. But
Presenter
Saw quite a lot of the world in the process of growing up.
Patrick Lichfield
Have this fascination by
Patrick Lichfield
things pictorial. Was there a collection of paintings in the house that
Presenter
To grow up.
Speaker 4
Yeah.
Presenter
No, they they were sold before I grew up. There's a m there's a a less than marvellous collection at the moment, but I don't know quite what it was that uh made me
Presenter
want particularly to to take photographs, but it must have been, I suppose, some influence in looking at other pictures. It um I think it stemmed from me not in fact liking the photographs that my parents or grandparents or anybody else took or schoolchildren and thinking that it couldn't be that difficult to do a bit better. How about music?
Patrick Lichfield
Uh
Presenter
Did you hear a lot as a child? Yes, my mother was a was a very accomplished pianist, and in fact that's what may have driven me out of doors to take photographs, because she would continually practise the same piece again and again and again, which is rather off putting.
Speaker 4
Um
Presenter
But nevertheless I
Presenter
began to listen to music and and um
Presenter
Really would hate to be without it.
Patrick Lichfield
Have you any talent yourself?
Presenter
No, I s can smack the drums a bit, but I'd rather give that up. I did learn to read drum music with You can read drum music, but it's very rare. Well, it's very strange. It it was such a handicap because I wasn't awfully good at it and it just makes you a bit slower if you read.
Patrick Lichfield
This is very rare.
Patrick Lichfield
Yeah.
Patrick Lichfield
Now whilst the first disc you've chosen, you've got just eight for the island.
Presenter
Well, uh Fat's Waller was a favorite of mine. I think my mother used to play some of his tunes, and so I chose to sit right down and write myself a letter.
Speaker 4
I'm gonna sit right down and write myself a letter.
Speaker 4
And make believe it came from
Speaker 4
I'm gonna break words oh so sweet
Speaker 4
Na no love me all my be
Speaker 4
A lot of kisses on the bottom
Speaker 4
I'll be glad I got a hand.
Speaker 4
I'm gonna smile and say
Speaker 4
I hope you're feeling better.
Speaker 4
And close with love.
Patrick Lichfield
Fout Swallow
Patrick Lichfield
How old were you when you started taking photographs? When did you handle a camera for
Presenter
I think my first camera was given to me on my sixth birthday.
Patrick Lichfield
Uh
Presenter
And the earliest photographs I've got must be about then because I photographed a number of my great grandparents who were alive at that time.
Presenter
And, um it was about then that I became really interested, I think. You were at Harrow, you had a reputation there as a photographer.
Presenter
Well, the curious thing is I went back the other day to look at the school and now i the photographic facilities are enormously good and
Presenter
Any boy who's interested can pursue virtually any hobby they want to do and become competent. There was nothing there when I was there, so I used to have to turn my room into a dark room at night and then turn it back into a room so that it looked all right by day and develop things in darkened bathrooms. And then I discovered that there was a habit, which may still persist, I think, of giving photographs as you leave the school to those friends of yours to remind you of them. And the local school shops charge rather more than I thought was necessary. And so I. I undercut them considerably and took lots of portraits. You were professional already. I was afraid to say I was moonlighting, yes.
Patrick Lichfield
You're
Patrick Lichfield
Yeah.
Presenter
Apart from photography, what were you good at at school?
Presenter
Avoiding things, really, I think. Essential. Yes. I'm quite good at boxing and um.
Presenter
rather good at swimming, which caused my family great heartache because every previous generation for countless years had played in the Eaton and Harrow match at Lourdes and I preferred swimming which my grandfather had apoplexy about. Did you swim for Harrow? Yes, I did. You were not nearly as good as playing cricket for Harrow, no.
Patrick Lichfield
Oh well that
Presenter
Matter of opinion.
Presenter
But still, I enjoyed the games, I enjoyed the all-round business of being um.
Presenter
You know, in such a complete environment as a public school like that. But I actually, all in all, didn't enjoy school because I didn't reach the height of more than five foot two until I was sixteen. And one was required to wear very strange clothes if one was under that height, like an eaten collar, which looked like an upturned soup plate. And we weren't allowed to get out of it until you reached a certain height. And being the smallest boy in the school for some considerable time, I hated that bit of it. But otherwise, I think it was marvellous. Let's have your second record. Well, this is really from a film, Casablanca.
Presenter
In some ways, been so overplayed in my mind, but it just somehow says something about.
Presenter
A period of filmmaking that I particularly like, and I also think the stars.
Presenter
in it were wonderful, particularly Bogart, and I never tire of of hearing the theme which is known as time goes by.
Speaker 4
Sing it, Sam.
Speaker 4
You must remember this.
Speaker 4
A kiss is just a kiss.
Speaker 4
A sigh is just a sigh.
Speaker 4
The fundamental things apply as time
Patrick Lichfield
That famous scene from The Soundtrack of Casablanca.
Patrick Lichfield
Well, after Harrow you went to Sandhurst.
Presenter
That I enjoyed, actually, I suddenly realised I was grown up.
Presenter
which um meant that I thought I would be allowed to rush up to London and get lots of parties and everything else again. In fact, I didn't. But I I realized that the army was something that I didn't at all mind doing and and I really felt that
Presenter
I might well have stayed there.
Patrick Lichfield
Mm-hmm.
Presenter
And did indeed sign on for five more years after.
Patrick Lichfield
Yeah. You are
Presenter
Yes.
Patrick Lichfield
Yeah.
Presenter
I saw a lot of
Presenter
life. And of course there was a lot more there were many more places to go to in those days and if you were in the army and you could uh we w got sent to West Africa and North Africa and all over the place and I did my stint outside um Buckingham Palace, or at least outside in in the Tower of London, Bank of England and all that kind of thing, which I enjoyed.
Speaker 1
Time to
Presenter
And the c there came the moment then when
Presenter
I found myself more and more drawn towards my camera, which I always had with me, and there was an opportunity one day suddenly well, it was october fourteenth, nineteen sixty two, at half past two, that it came. But I then became an assistant twenty minutes after leaving the army, and that was really the beginning.
Presenter
Well, at that
Patrick Lichfield
Yeah.
Presenter
Turning point in your career. Let's break your third record.
Presenter
Well, it again goes back, I think, to listening to my mother playing the piano, because it's the piano setting of Sheep May Safely Graze by Bach.
Patrick Lichfield
Sheep May Safely Graze, played by Cyril Smith and Phyllis Sellick. So at half past two one afternoon you became a photographer. Now there's more to it than just clicking the shutter.
Patrick Lichfield
How did you set about it?
Presenter
Well, in fact, I didn't really become a photographer. I became a photographer's assistant, which is
Presenter
Well, certainly then was a very lowly occupation, but the only way to enter the profession in the way that I wanted to, which was the practical way.
Patrick Lichfield
Yes.
Presenter
And indeed other friends of mine now, great friends of mine like Terence Donovan and David Bailey and people like that were also assistants then on just emerging from that kind of chrysalis.
Patrick Lichfield
That's moving the lights about, loading the cameras, cleaning up.
Presenter
And really watching lighting techniques and chatting up techniques and everything else which you which you can't really learn, but you can.
Speaker 1
Uh
Presenter
Adapt your own personality and your own liking.
Presenter
And I had the great fortune to work for
Presenter
People who helped me rather than just did it and let you clear up afterwards. I mean, I could ask questions.
Presenter
And it suddenly became the most exciting thing that I could conceive. And I.
Presenter
I don't think I can ever remember anything more exciting than that thrill.
Presenter
of really sort of beginning to be able to process one's own pictures properly.
Patrick Lichfield
What sort of work was being done in the studio? Was it mainly portraiture?
Presenter
Well, it was actually quite a lot of food photography, which was rather tempting for me because I was so grossly underpaid at the time, and my family didn't really help me much, because they regarded photography as much worse than being a pimp or something. Therefore, the money supply was cut off for a time. And suddenly I had changed my lifestyle from driving a relatively comfortable car to riding a bicycle down to a dark room in Balham. And um so the temptation was to of course eat the products when we'd photographed them. And sometimes I made the mistake of not processing the pictures before I'd eaten the products and then find they weren't good enough.
Patrick Lichfield
And sometimes a diet of Blancange or something for several days.
Presenter
Oh, yes, absolutely. And indeed, steak and kidney puddings made of Kleenex were quite calm.
Patrick Lichfield
Yeah.
Patrick Lichfield
What was the first session you were entrusted with to do
Presenter
On your own. Do you remember? Well, funnily enough, I do. It was photographing some fake fur coats on some models, and I was rather stuck for m the money to pay for the models, and so I rang up four friends and asked them if they'd
Presenter
Do the job for a little bit less than professional models would charge. And I found the photograph the other day, and it's quite unusable because there's amazing sort of fashions of that time. I might have included it in a book otherwise. But the girls left to right, who were then, none of them I think, very professional, were Jacqueline Bissett, Charlotte Rampling, Marisa Burnson, and Princess Salima Arga Khan.
Patrick Lichfield
Uh
Presenter
All is a cut red. Yeah, I think so.
Patrick Lichfield
Yeah.
Presenter
It's not bad
Patrick Lichfield
It's not bad.
Presenter
Yeah.
Patrick Lichfield
Yeah.
Presenter
So what happened after a year or two?
Presenter
Well, then I set up on my own properly and found a studio um
Presenter
Well, I was sadly worried about whether or not I could keep going.
Presenter
In order to make ends meet, I wound up by going to endless boring Deb Dance's photographing.
Presenter
I'm in endlessly boring debs dancing with their delights, and I was always the chap that got stuck in the corner with the guest that didn't come on one side and the pillar of the tent on the other side. And if I talked to any of them, they'd say, Look, the photographers talking to so-and-so and I was treated very much like a tradesman, and sometimes I was quite grateful for that, but I didn't mind the fact then that I couldn't actually photograph things that I really wanted to do. I photographed things that I had to do to survive. And gradually, slowly
Presenter
magazine started to use me and Jostin Stevens on on Queen magazine, which was then thriving. And he sent me on various different assignments and and they worked out and I went from there to Vogue and that was really the beginning of the real fun.
Presenter
Another record.
Presenter
During that time Bob Dylan was well established, and I think of all the
Presenter
The songs that he wrote, one that I
Presenter
used to enjoy especially then and I wrote it down in a diary which is why I chase it for here was just like a woman.
Speaker 4
She takes just like a woman.
Speaker 4
Yes, he does, he makes love just like a woman.
Speaker 4
Yeah, she does, and she pinks!
Speaker 4
Just like a woman.
Speaker 4
But she breaks just like a little
Patrick Lichfield
Bob Dylan
Patrick Lichfield
Just like a woman.
Patrick Lichfield
Sir Patrick, you were working very soon internationally for British, American and French magazine.
Presenter
Yes, I spent in fact a lot of time on the other side of the Atlantic working for Vogue, which was very illuminating. American photographers are, in my opinion, second to none.
Presenter
And um
Presenter
I began to get to know a lot of other photographers, and and that was very useful.
Presenter
particularly as I'd come from a background quite different to most of them and they then became really my main friends.
Presenter
So
Presenter
I was then getting a variety of work, which was good, and I never specialized particularly in anything. I mean, I didn't obviously particularly want to go and photograph interiors of churches or things like that, because that wasn't but I never thought, Well, I'll only do fashion and so that was useful, and I would counsel any photographer starting that
Speaker 1
That wasn't
Presenter
He should always take on something that he might find a bit of a challenge rather than just the things he knows he could do. A lot of editorial work. Yes, I was I was certainly doing mostly editorial work at that time, hoping for a chance to break into the challenge of commercial photography.
Presenter
A lot of travel of course, exotic locations particularly.
Patrick Lichfield
Life of fashion would
Presenter
Yes, and of course it that's always over exaggerated by people. They always think that uh you spend your life with the most beautiful girl in the world on a desert island. In fact, in this instance I'm on a desert island of my own. They made that very clear to me.
Patrick Lichfield
That's it.
Presenter
In fact, you do spend a great deal of your life in the dark rather than on a desert island. You spend your time-
Presenter
messing about with chemicals, but there are the compensations.
Presenter
of being able to go to places that you would not be able to afford to go to. I mean, I'm I'm enormously well travelled at other people's expense. I've averaged somewhere like two hundred thousand miles a year in the air for the last ten years, and that's extraordinary. Yeah.
Presenter
Yeah.
Patrick Lichfield
What about portraiture? How do you relax your subjects? That must be a very important professional.
Presenter
Well, I think if in doubt give them a strong drink, really. In fact, what I tend to do is to try and know a little bit about them, and you can always tell if they're nervous when they come in, and then you might just as well uh talk to them for a bit. And I do talk tremendously. I tend to be rather shy and nervous about portraiture still, and I rab it away, and um perhaps I
Presenter
Break the ice that way. But I know how awful it is because I don't like being photographed one a little bit myself.
Patrick Lichfield
But
Patrick Lichfield
There's a story that you were photographing some of the royal children and you put a television set under the camera to give them something to look at.
Presenter
Yes, I think you have to think up ideas like that. If you get very short periods in which you've got to photograph something very important, you've got to make very sure that it comes out. And I think a lot of professionals don't prepare themselves quite well enough for that eventuality. And I in that instance I realized that keeping everybody looking at the camera would be difficult. And it would be better ready to photograph over the top of a television and let them look at the television and Groucho Marx can do the work rather than
Patrick Lichfield
It was a Groucho Marx film, wasn't it?
Presenter
Yes, it was. I actually timed the session deliberately after working through the radio times to see what would be on.
Patrick Lichfield
And
Patrick Lichfield
During the years that you've been a professional photographer, what have been the most important technical developments? Photography seems to move very fast.
Presenter
Well, yes, I think since the war, probably the invention of the instant film, which you can peel off and look at straight away. I mean, that's the thing that has really made a massive difference to my life, because, as Norman Parkinson once said in an interview, you don't need an exposure meter, you can just guess it, and if it's slightly wrong on the print on the instant print, you adjust. And indeed, I can show an art director now or a client what I'm shooting, and there's no way that he can come back to me two days later and say, Look, that's not what I meant, because I'd shown him two minutes after I took it. You can do that. The other thing that probably has happened is that a great many of the technical aspects that I learnt about as an assistant are not necessary now because there are so many built-in automatic devices, which is rather a pity, because the camera that you might own now is going to be very likely as good as the one that I own when there was a huge difference years ago. So now it's much more up to one's eye.
Patrick Lichfield
Yeah.
Speaker 1
Two.
Presenter
Then it is up to one's technique.
Presenter
to stay ahead of the other fellow who's competing with you.
Patrick Lichfield
Yeah.
Presenter
Yeah.
Patrick Lichfield
No
Presenter
Uh
Patrick Lichfield
For the record
Presenter
Please.
Presenter
Well, since we're sitting on this island I would need cheering up, and sometimes a parody of a song is better even than the song itself, and banana boat song is appropriate because I have a little house on an island where bananas grow anyway, and
Presenter
The Harry Belafonte one is the best known one, but the one that I think would cheer me up most is the one by Stan Friedberg.
Speaker 4
Daylight come and me wanna go home. Hey, beautiful bunch of bright banana. Daylight come and me wanna go home. Hide the deadly black tarantula. Oh man, don't sing about spiders. I mean ooh, like I don't dig spiders. Well, that's how the song goes. He goes.
Speaker 1
Be like McCullough
Speaker 4
Hidey deadly, a black paranjla Daylight come when they won't go
Patrick Lichfield
Stan Freeberg Banana Bode Song
Patrick Lichfield
This year you had one of the most daunting photographic assignments of the decade as official photographer at the royal wedding.
Patrick Lichfield
That must have taken a tremendous amount of pl
Presenter
Batting.
Patrick Lichfield
Yeah.
Presenter
Yes, my first reaction was one of panic.
Presenter
It's easy to say, but quite hard in a way to comprehend, that something like that you just simply can't do again. There aren't many things a photographer has to photograph that cannot be put together again. Everyone, every professional I know, has had to do retakes, and it's inevitable.
Presenter
And certainly it would have been easy to produce.
Presenter
a photograph that would have looked like all those people standing.
Presenter
Together, but may not have had any expression, so my really daunting task was to try.
Presenter
and keep their attention once having arranged them.
Patrick Lichfield
You didn't photograph in the cathedral. You were only concerned with the Buckingham Palace end of things.
Presenter
Absolutely. I mean there were an enormous number of photographers. I think there were forty forty odd photographers in the cathedral and then of course hundreds on the route.
Presenter
And
Presenter
I was lucky enough to be given the job with as the official photographer, which meant doing the groups and the with the various different numbers of groups and then of course the the two of them together in a very short space of time. So we rehearsed it pretty well and um
Presenter
I also worked on one or two tricks that I'll
Patrick Lichfield
You rehearsed it. I mean, what could you rehearse?
Presenter
Well, I could get all my lights in there the day before, and then spread a few people out, like my assistants, and anybody else I could find, who I could sort of pretend were the principal figures in the group.
Presenter
And then I thought that um the most difficult thing would be of course to line them up in the right order, and that was quite a problem.
Patrick Lichfield
Uh
Presenter
Two.
Patrick Lichfield
There's protocol of course.
Presenter
Well, there was that first of all, and added to protocol, there was the heights of different people, so that you can't really have somebody who isn't terribly tall standing behind the Queen of Denmark who is terribly tall. And so one had to remember I was very lucky, I had photographed nearly everybody in that group once or twice before in my life.
Patrick Lichfield
Uh
Patrick Lichfield
As a cousin of a merchant of the queen, you you you knew everyone, which must have made things easier.
Presenter
Yes, it it certainly does make things much easier and things like that. But
Presenter
On the other hand, it would make it even more embarrassing if something went wrong. There was one family group of about sixty. Yes, it was fifty seven, I think, in the end. And I had had the luck to have thought of the idea that uh that if we put tape on the steps that they stood on,'cause there were sort of ranks of steps behind
Presenter
the Prince and Princess of Wales, I could put numbers on those and then tell them all which numbers they were, so that they would stand immediately in the right place. But of course, having put in, say, thirty people and you still had, you know, another twenty seven to go in, the first thirty would be starting to talk to one another. And I realized that this would be something of a
Presenter
a problem. So I invested in a referee's whistle the day before and when I got back to my camera the only thing I could do was to blow it and that of course did hush them all for a moment. And then I had their attention and I really think that's what mattered because
Presenter
The bad fairy at a wedding is in fact the photographer because he holds up the jollity and the and all that and he is the one person who, if he does a bad job, gets a terrible rocket, and if he does a good job, nobody says too much. But it is a hiatus, and that is the problem.
Patrick Lichfield
Uh
Patrick Lichfield
There was one particularly beautiful chart of yours of the Prince of Wales and his new bride, and he's looking down at her as she's sitting on the stool, and the train of that fabulous dress was arranged round her in a circle, most beautifully arranged. Who'd
Presenter
Well, what happened there was rather curious. I I mean they were all absolutely worn out, those children you see and everything else, and so I tried to make it as quick as possible. And when I'd finished all but the last frame on one of the rails, I said, Okay, everybody collapse and they literally did. Everybody relax, I think I said, and they all went bomph, and then I got one more picture like that, which was fun.
Presenter
And which I didn't release immediately because I wanted to get the clearance on that one, so I thought it might not like it, but they did release it. And while she was down there, the children moved away, and the Emmanuels, I think, and myself rearranged the train. And then I asked him to go and say something to her, and he went over, and that was the click that probably mattered most. And it is.
Presenter
An odd thing that when you're working under enormous pressure like that and you're very excited and probably very nervous, you do come up with better stuff than you would if you're feeling quite lethargic. And I was confident when I walked out of those gates that day that I had something pretty good. But there was still nonetheless four hours of agony to wait till you saw it. How many shots did you take altogether? Not that many. I mean I didn't do more than one roll of film, I eat twelve pictures of any one group, and we had to work pretty quickly because
Presenter
A great deal of the session that I had was taken in arranging the the big group.
Presenter
But it worked, and they all looked at me, and they all had their eyes open, and some of them were even smiling.
Presenter
And how long was that session altogether? Well, it was meant to be twenty minutes, and I think Francesa went over by about five, but not too bad.
Presenter
Yeah.
Patrick Lichfield
Yeah.
Presenter
Yeah.
Patrick Lichfield
Another echo, Patrick.
Presenter
Well, this is a record that again is a sixties memory. It's so mad that I enjoy it, but I also enjoy it particularly for the melody. And it's a whiter shade of pale by Prokol Hahn.
Speaker 4
So we won't make it
Speaker 4
As the middle told his tale
Speaker 4
Let our faces first just go sleep
Speaker 4
Turn the wire
Patrick Lichfield
Prekulharam, a whiter shade of pale.
Patrick Lichfield
You've just brought out your first book.
Patrick Lichfield
The most beautiful women
Patrick Lichfield
A personal selection which must have made you many friends and quite a few enemies.
Presenter
I haven't heard from the enemies yet.
Presenter
It hasn't been out very long.
Presenter
Fortunately, it seems to be out of print already, which is an extraordinary thing. But doubtless they'll bring some more back into the bookshops. It was a very arbitrary selection. I wanted some people to be included who, in fact, somehow we could not get because they were in Paris when I was going to be in New York and so on and so forth. So inevitably it's going to be incomplete. But it has to me the satisfaction of having a certain change of pace about it, which quite often books on beauty don't have. You just see a lot of sort of portrait-shaped things. And in fact, we've sometimes got very small people and big backgrounds and sometimes very close heads. I've enjoyed doing it. It was.
Presenter
Very difficult. In fact, I don't think I made too many enemies because there weren't many people I photographed for it that I didn't include. And you have to remember that when you do take pictures, you have got to take more than you ever
Patrick Lichfield
Well, you're having great success with the most beautiful women. And you've got another book coming out at the end of November, Litchfield on Photography. That's more technical.
Presenter
Well it is and it isn't. It's it's a collection of a lot of other things besides beautiful women, although there are one or two of them in there. But it's what I'm interested in photographing, which is much broader than most people would credit me for because I I've always had this thing about not specialising. But what I'm most pleased about with that is that I think it's the first time a book has ever been produced like that in conjunction with some tapes. Now a video is everything nowadays, or it's becoming tremendously important. Certainly is a learning tool and I wish I'd had a videotape to look at when I was trying to learn some techniques because you can stop the thing and go back and look at it again. So I mean you can buy the tape and not the book or the book and not the tape. But I mean if you really want to learn about photography as I do it and perhaps a lot of people don't want to learn about how I do it but certainly it's it's an opportunity to use a new technique of learning. It's valuable I think. Well that's an exciting new development in publishing.
Speaker 4
Hmm.
Presenter
I'm very happy about that. Pioneer work. Yes. Now the record. What now? Well, Don McLean was a late sixties discoverer who uh was best known for a track called American Pie, which his album was called. But the B side of it, as I remember I think it was the B side, was called Vincent and it was about Van Gogh and I loved the the whole of it.
Speaker 4
Hello.
Speaker 4
What you tried to say to me, And how you suffered for your sanity.
Speaker 4
And how you tried to set them free.
Speaker 4
They would not listen, they're not listening still.
Speaker 4
Perhaps they never wait.
Patrick Lichfield
Uh
Patrick Lichfield
Don McLean's Vincent, and I'm afraid we only had time for the latter part.
Patrick Lichfield
Now, your desert island life, you have got a home in the tropics, so you know what you're in for.
Presenter
Yes. I wouldn't have expected the my home in the trophics but I don't I don't think they're very similar. Ours is a small island all the same, Mastique, which is about three miles by a mile or so.
Presenter
But there are luxuries on it already.
Patrick Lichfield
Yes, and and of course you're a soldier, so you know about survival drill. You'd be able to put up shelter.
Presenter
Yes, I think I could do that.
Presenter
Fishing? Yes, I love fishing. I mean, if I ever am not taking photographs, I'd like to be fishing, providing I could find the wherewithal to do it.
Presenter
Yes, I am quite good at tickling fish.
Patrick Lichfield
Yeah, so I keep it.
Presenter
Depends on one they're trying to do.
Presenter
Would you try to escape?
Presenter
I am very restless as a person which I think has helped me as a photographer.
Presenter
And I would want to get off. I mean, I I'm if I'm alone on the island, I wouldn't have anything to photograph except the island, and I desperately li I want to photograph people. Right.
Presenter
Your last record.
Presenter
Well, my last record is something that um we referred to earlier, w because with all the luck I had in landing that very nice assignment at the wedding, I because of that missed out on being in the Abbey, in in the in the cathedral I mean, and I didn't hear the singing of I V Out of thee My Country, which at school we used to sing, and the second verse is my favourite.
Patrick Lichfield
I vow to thee my country recorded at the recent royal wedding. Now if you could take only one disc, Patrick, out of that eight, which would you choose?
Presenter
as time goes by. I suppose it's rather a appropriate title for sitting on an island. And it isn't boring. I mean it's something that can tinkle away and and is a pleasant tune and I wouldn't want anything terribly powerful. I think that would do me very nicely.
Patrick Lichfield
And one luxury Take
Presenter
Yeah.
Patrick Lichfield
to the island. Nothing of any practical use.
Presenter
Well, if I were not to use it practically, which is it's I was thinking in terms of a telescope. Now a practical use of that would be looking out to see to see if there's anything passing by. Well, we couldn't stop you doing that. No, but I would rarely want to on occasions when I've been working in hot countries, particularly in Africa, or travelling through the desert or something, I have often at night lain
Patrick Lichfield
Well we could
Presenter
On my back, and just looked at the stars. And I've never found that boring, and perhaps a telescope or a pair of binoculars to look upwards would be a nice thing to do. Surely.
Patrick Lichfield
And one book. We provide the Bible and Shakespeare, and you may choose one.
Presenter
Well
Presenter
Having never actually written a book without pictures, I think that would be a good time to do that. I mean, it it I've always found that the biggest problem about trying to get down to writing a book uh that doesn't contain photographs, but is, for instance, an autobiography.
Presenter
Is that I have no time?
Presenter
And here I would have lots of time, so a blank book. And I saw one the other day that had cork pages. So it might be quite useful, because then you could always just hurl it in the sea and hope somebody might pick it up somewhere else.
Patrick Lichfield
It all get washed up, I guess exactly. So back to me again.
Patrick Lichfield
And thank you, Patrick Litchfield, for letting us hear your Desert Island Disc.
Presenter
Thank you.
Patrick Lichfield
Uh Goodbye, everyone.
Speaker 1
You've been listening to a podcast from the Desert Islandists Archive. For more podcasts, please visit bbc.co.uk/radio four.
Presenter asks
Did you hear a lot [of music] as a child?
Yes, my mother was a was a very accomplished pianist, and in fact that's what may have driven me out of doors to take photographs, because she would continually practise the same piece again and again and again, which is rather off putting... But nevertheless I... began to listen to music and... Really would hate to be without it.
Presenter asks
Apart from photography, what were you good at at school?
Avoiding things, really, I think. Essential. Yes. I'm quite good at boxing and... rather good at swimming, which caused my family great heartache because every previous generation for countless years had played in the Eaton and Harrow match at Lourdes and I preferred swimming which my grandfather had apoplexy about.
Presenter asks
How did you set about [becoming a photographer]?
Well, in fact, I didn't really become a photographer. I became a photographer's assistant, which is... Well, certainly then was a very lowly occupation, but the only way to enter the profession in the way that I wanted to, which was the practical way.
Presenter asks
What was the first session you were entrusted with to do on your own?
Well, funnily enough, I do. It was photographing some fake fur coats on some models, and I was rather stuck for... the money to pay for the models, and so I rang up four friends and asked them if they'd... Do the job for a little bit less than professional models would charge... the girls left to right, who were then, none of them I think, very professional, were Jacqueline Bissett, Charlotte Rampling, Marisa Burnson, and Princess Salima Arga Khan.
“I think in the sixties it might have been because... Nobody's about to give a job to somebody who would appear to be well healed when... There were others, perhaps more hungry than myself... wanting to work.”
“I had changed my lifestyle from driving a relatively comfortable car to riding a bicycle down to a dark room in Balham. And... so the temptation was to of course eat the products when we'd photographed them.”
“I would counsel any photographer starting that... He should always take on something that he might find a bit of a challenge rather than just the things he knows he could do.”
“The bad fairy at a wedding is in fact the photographer because he holds up the jollity and the and all that and he is the one person who, if he does a bad job, gets a terrible rocket, and if he does a good job, nobody says too much.”