George Mitchell

George Mitchell0:00

This download is the only extract the BBC has of this edition of Desert Island Discs. The presenter was Roy Plumley.

Presenter0:08

George, where have you gone?

Presenter0:10

In Larbert, Stirlingshire, Scotland. Come from a Scots family? Yes, I do, in spite of this accent. I was born in Scotland. Do you come from a musical family?

Presenter0:18

Yes, um

Presenter0:19

Both my parents are very keen on music and my grandfather used to run three choirs when I was a kid and I I heard

Presenter0:25

twires morning, noon, and night.

Presenter0:28

How is it? Where did you start?

George Mitchell0:28

Study musical sound.

Presenter0:30

I started taking piano lessons when I was eleven, I think.

George Mitchell0:33

Uh

Presenter0:33

Lebanon twelve.

George Mitchell0:34

As a youngster, was it your ambition to be a professional musician?

Presenter0:38

No, it wasn't really, although I I used to play in a in a downspand. I used to play the piano on Saturday evenings for a few shillings.

George Mitchell0:44

Your parents encourage us.

Presenter0:47

No, well, not really. I had a sort of deal with my father that uh

Presenter0:52

Any money I got in that way I would spend on classical records, which I did actually, and um built up a very good library.

Presenter0:59

What did you do when you left school?

Presenter1:01

I was articled to a firm of chartered accountants. Did you take all your exams? No, I was going in for my intermediate when I was called up for the army and they put me in the Royal Army Pay Corps. Were there any opportunities for music in the army?

Presenter1:15

Eventually we used to have a few wing socials that people used to get up and sing and I used to accompany them and I started off with four or five people singing round the piano and then gradually wrote stuff for twelve people and sixteen until we had quite a large choir operating.

George Mitchell1:29

Was that

Presenter1:29

An unofficial spare time occupation. Oh, yes, done in the canteen at Lunsteins and that sort of thing. What sort of repertoire did you have?

Presenter1:37

Well I remember the first one we had a guy was a Hawaiian War chant and um crazy things like the boogie woogie bugle boy from Company B. All the rhy rhythmic stuff. Where did he perform?

George Mitchell1:45

Yeah, it's not.

George Mitchell1:46

But

Presenter1:48

We used to perform at uh gun sites and the Woolwich Garrison Theatre and places like that.

George Mitchell1:54

Yeah.

Presenter1:56

It was from there that we got our first audition with the BBC and we we did a show at Woolwich Garrison Theatre and we were asked to do an audition for uh

Presenter2:03

Cecil Madden and Ronnie Woolman and uh we were put into Variety Bandbox while we were still in uniform. The choir's first broadcast in Variety Bandbox was quite a success, wasn't it?

Presenter2:12

Yes, we we were quite lucky, really. We carried on and did another series, I think it was called Knocking at Your Door with a lot of new

Presenter2:18

New discoveries. We did that while we were still in uniform. But of course, when the war finished, it all packed up.

George Mitchell2:25

What did he do though? What he went back to accountants.

Presenter2:27

Yes. Mm. Then?

Presenter2:30

Well, I had a surprising phone call from Charles Chilton, who we're still working for, incidentally.

George Mitchell2:30

Go ahead.

Presenter2:35

Um, asking me if I'd like to do some Negro spirituals and if it was possible to get the choir together again. He was doing a show called Cabin in the Cotton with Edric Connor and

Presenter2:43

Pat Clark, who was very small at that time.

Presenter2:46

Um

Presenter2:47

And so we had to go at it. I managed to get, I think, nine of the original people and we auditioned for some others and formed a choir to do this programme, which ran for, I think, fifteen fifteen shows we did.

George Mitchell2:57

Then the choir broke up into all sorts of smaller units, I remember, for other shows.

Presenter3:01

Yes, we we called them all sorts of names in those days. I remember in Ipmar we were called the curbside choristers. In High Gang we were the high gangsters. The girls used to do Charlie Chester's uh stand easy. They were called the singing silhouettes and we had a group of about eight I think it was in um

Presenter3:18

Waterlog Spa with Eric Barker, called the Waterlog Spa Glee Party.

George Mitchell3:23

George Mitchell Glee Club starred.

Presenter3:25

That was in nineteen fifty. This was a much bigger choir, something I wanted to do for a long time. We have forty singers.

Presenter3:31

and we used to tour the country.

Presenter3:33

Asking various guest choirs to do one spot in the show and broadcast it from different towns all over the British Isles. That was great fun.

George Mitchell3:41

Yes.

George Mitchell3:42

I remember the the Glee Club did a command performance at that time.

Presenter3:46

Yes, yes. We we were actually we we put the whole show on stage and we went round all the theatres in the country and um it was after we'd been on stage I suppose for about three weeks they asked us to put part of it in the command performance in nineteen fifty.

George Mitchell3:59

How many command performances have you done?

George Mitchell4:02

Uh

Presenter4:02

Um

Presenter4:03

It's a

George Mitchell4:03

Either eight or nine, I'm not sure.

Presenter4:05

Yeah.

George Mitchell4:05

Uh

George Mitchell4:06

Now you've always written all the arrangements yourself.

Presenter4:09

Yes, up to this year I managed to do everything myself, although the television series we did in the summer was done by um

Presenter4:15

Robert de Cormier.

Presenter4:17

He's an expert on folk music and I wanted to do this sort of material. I'd done it with him before when Harry Belafonte was over here. Mhm. And uh he writes some marvellous stuff and it was again this was most enjoyable to do this kind of material.

George Mitchell4:30

Have you worked out how many chordal arrangements you've made altogether?

Presenter4:35

Yes, I think I know exactly. It's um

Presenter4:38

I keep them in library bags and there must be three thousand nine hundred and something. That's a lot of arrangements, George. An awful lot, yeah.

Presenter4:46

How many choristers do you employ? Well at peak times we've had as many as three hundred because we often do I supply singers for summer shows and pantomimes and that sort of thing, as well as the radio and television work.

George Mitchell4:57

Now this is big business and it must need a tremendous amount of travelling to rehearse them all and keep an eye on them all.

Presenter5:02

Uh

George Mitchell5:03

Uh

Presenter5:04

Yes, it does really. I've I've done thirty-two thousand miles in the last five weeks because that included a trip to Australia.

George Mitchell5:11

Are any of the original Army corristers with you still?

Presenter5:14

Yes, there are two or three still with me, and uh there must be eight or nine people now who've done more than ten years with me.

Presenter5:20

Most of them have done.

Presenter5:22

At least five years now.

George Mitchell5:23

Really? Well, it's obviously a good management to work for. George, we haven't yet talked about this really sensational show, The Black and White Minstrels. When did that start?

George Mitchell5:33

Well, that started at the um

Presenter5:34

Uh

George Mitchell5:34

Earls Court Radio Exhibition.

Presenter5:36

Uh In, um, I think it was nineteen fifty eight. Mm.

George Mitchell5:39

Uh

Presenter5:40

Now this must need a great deal of arranging. How many numbers are there in a shaft?

Presenter5:44

Oh, this is terrible. We get through probably fifty to sixty songs in every show, but of course

Presenter5:49

Before deciding on those I might have gone through five hundred. It's quite it's quite an epic.

Presenter5:55

Uh black and white

George Mitchell5:55

White Winstrells won the first International Television Award, I believe, in Switzerland.

Presenter6:00

Yes, it went it went very well there. We got the um golden rose at Montreaux and we also got the silver rose which was the

Presenter6:07

Critics award and the cash prize. I don't think there was anything left.

George Mitchell6:11

Yes.

George Mitchell6:12

and it's now a smashed stage hit at the Victoria Palace in London.

George Mitchell6:16

Yes, I'm very pleased.

George Mitchell6:19

Yes, we opened in Melbourne a month ago. Hence that thirty-two thousand miles in five weeks. Yes, that was part of it.

George Mitchell6:25

And those three black and white minstrels long playing discs you've done, I believe, are all in the top ten of long players. Yes, uh.

Presenter6:32

All of them, it's quite incredible, but there they are.

George Mitchell6:36

You also send choirs over to European countries for

Presenter6:38

Television? Yes, we do television in um Holland and Belgium and uh we were in Vienna last month doing

Presenter6:46

One of their programmes. Singing in German and English. We have to do everything these days.

Presenter6:51

Where do you find all your characters, George?

Presenter6:54

Well, I audition pretty consistently all through the year, probably once a month. An awful lot of people write to us, and although I'm about a year behind, I do hear most of them that have got any any prospects at all. I try to use them. What qualifications do you need?

Presenter7:07

They're very high now. They've they've got to be able to read music well, that's the first thing really. And they've got to be reasonably young. They've got to look good. They've got to be able to dance.

George Mitchell7:18

Have you any particular ambition so far unfulfilled?

Presenter7:21

Well, I think really I would like to have the best choir in the world. That's what I would like. And I shall try very hard to get it. Do you sing yourself?

Presenter7:31

Well, I think I do, but nobody in the choir does. It's a bit of a standing joke. I they tell me I make some terrible noises, but I I I like people who can sing well.