Tuning in…
Tuning in…
Castaway
1 appearance
A British politician at the centre of politics since the 1960s, renowned for his intellect and oratory, and a Second World War veteran.
On the island
Eight records
London Symphony Orchestra, conducted by Leonard Slatkin
He wrote wonderful piano music which I learned to play when I was young. but also wrote wonderful vocal music, particularly his oratorios. And this piece, Sheep May Safely Graze, is from one of those oratorios.
She was a an astonishing woman. She started singing folk songs, and I've chosen one of them. I know where I'm going. And the great tragedy of her was just as she's becoming well known through the radio, she died, and I think she would have been an enormous influence on British music if she lived longer.
I like it among many things because when Charles a Ghoul Told Harold Macmillan, the British Prime Minister at the time, that he was going to veto Britain's entry into the common market. He told a friend afterwards, when I told him that He looked so unhappy. I felt like singing to him D'Aqué Piat, Mais pluré, Villa, Jeanneuré, James Cruis.
as I told you, I was very keen on the cavaretes in Montmatre, and used to go there with Edna a great deal after the war. And my favourite singer in those days, male singer, was Yves Montan. The one I've chosen is a song called Barbara. which is one of my favourites by him.
Polonaise No. 6 in A-flat major, Op. 53, 'Heroic'
I had a great friend who was at the Polish Embassy when I was an MP, called Malczysinski. And they invited me to Poland several times, and I went to Wavel Castle, which is a medieval castle near Krakow. And Mausinsky's brother, Vitold, played the uh heroic Polonaise. And uh the three aristocracies of Poland all dissolved in tears at the end of it.
Piano Concerto No. 21 in C major, K. 467 (Andante)
Howard Shelley and the London Mozart Players
I love Mozart. He is astonishing because uh he had a fairly short life, he died young, but he wrote an enormous amount for the piano. Duets, quintets, chamber music. And of course he wrote them great offerings, some of the greatest in the world as well. But I've chosen this one because uh I found this slow movement from this concerto. Very moving and so um I've chosen it for this programme.
I've always been very keen on cabaret music and musical comedies. But the one I've chosen, because I love the words and I love the singing by Ella Fitzgerald, is Miss Otis Regrets, which is about American society.
Cavatina from String Quartet No. 13 in B-flat major, Op. 130Favourite
Over the last piece of music I've chosen is certainly one of the very greatest pieces of music ever written. And it was written by Beethoven at the end of his life when he was deaf and couldn't actually hear what he was writing. It's the Cavatina from one of his last quartets, and the record is an old one, which is the one I have myself and first heard it on, by the Bush Quartet. And this, I think, is as deep and profound a statement about human life as you could find.
In conversation
Presenter asks
2:20Why did you choose to pursue a life in politics rather than becoming a poet, writer, or artist?
I had a chance to spend my life as a in a university. … But the war came and I joined the army. … The plain fact is that war is made by governments and if you want to stop war, you've got to go into politics, and that's why I went into it and stayed in it.
Presenter asks
6:06What sort of character was your father, and how was your relationship with him?
My mother had infinitely more influence on me, particularly on the arts, because she was very interested In poetry and music. … I had a bad relationship, I would say, on the whole, on my father, partly because I saw so little of him when I was young. But after he died I used to get letters very often from people who'd been his students. who showed me that there was a warm, very human side to him which I'd never noticed myself.
Presenter asks
8:40Do you think we are in a worse economic position now than we were back in the nineteen thirties?
the economy is in a downturn to which one can't really at the moment forecast an end. But of course, the big difference is that The standard of life of people is infinitely higher than it was then.
The keepsakes
The book
The Oxford Book of English Verse
Arthur Quiller-Couch
I think I'd take probably the favourite book of English verse, which is uh I think the best anthology of English verse, and it goes right up to the Pleasant day.
The luxury
I think a very big box of chocolates. Luggage I like, and soft sensors I love.
Presenter asks
16:07Do you think lacking war experience is a failing in many modern politicians?
I think it's an enormous disadvantage. Because apart from learning to be courageous in dangerous situations. You learn the importance of two things which are vital in the whole of politics. One, interdependence. and the other the importance of planning. but of knowing that planning at some stage will go wrong and then you have to be very quick on your feet. And I think war experience brought advantages to politicians which the post war politicians have not really been able to enjoy.
Presenter asks
16:50Did you speak out against the Vietnam War in private, and did that stand between you and becoming leader of the Labour Party?
I was very much against it. … I would certainly have uh done myself a lot of good if I'd expressed my views in public, but um The real problem was I didn't want to undermine the position of the troops involved in the fighting. … I think the basic thing is I never wanted to be Prime Minister. Now, of course, I now regret that I didn't become Prime Minister, but at the time I didn't have the slightest ambition.
Presenter asks
29:43What is your view of Margaret Thatcher these days?
Well, it's changed very much because she's changed. I mean, I thought she was uh frankly appalling as Prime Minister because she wouldn't listen to anybody who didn't share her views. But uh since she lost power, nobody really listens to what she has to say, poor thing. And I feel very sorry for her now, and we get on very well whenever we meet.
“Politics is about power. And uh if you're only interested in politics It weakens you as a personality enormously, in my opinion. Politics must only be a small part of your life. And people who have no interest except politics, who have for example no interest in the arts, are very, very bad politicians, like Maggie Thatcher.”
“I don't think that music or the arts have shaped my politics. But um I think my real life is in the arts rather than in politics and always has been.”
“I don't know, but I'd rather people wondered why I wasn't Prime Minister than wondered why I was.”
“First of all, I do the most important single thing. Is you've got to give, whether you're a man or woman, to give your spouse space. To live their own lives as well as the one they live with, the family.”