Tuning in…
Tuning in…
Castaway
1 appearance
Invented the modern stately home industry, chairs English Heritage, and founded a motor museum.
On the island
Eight records
Triple Concerto in C major, Op. 56
Well, I think the first classical music I've ever had any impact was Beethoven. And I've had great difficulty in choosing something from this period, whether it's Mozart or Bach or what. But um in my early life I suppose Beethoven was my great passion, especially when I was at Eton and so on during the war, listening to the promenade concerts from Albert Hall occasionally when the doodle buns didn't cottage it off. And I've chosen the triple concerto because I think this combines um piano, violin, cello, and also parts of it is just like chamber music. And um I think this would actually keep me most satisfied.
When the Saints Go Marching In
During the war I was sent to Canada as a boy and began to listen on my little cat whisker radio, illegally I think, under the blankets at night, and began listening to all the jazz bands then, like Benny Goodman and Artie Shaw and Tommy Dorsey and so on. And that started my love of jazz. I came back to Eton in the war and met Humphrey Littleton, who had a house there and was my schoolmaster. And that started me off on jazz. And so that led, of course, to my jazz festivals for the 1950s, which were quite famous. I mean, it wasn't riots. And we always used to end every jazz festival at Bewley and elsewhere with a great rendering of saints. And I think the great renders of all is really Sidney Bechet's great performance, which was live. It's a bit noisy, but it's it would certainly keep me very happy and remind me of those jazz festivals.
Symphony No. 1 in A flat major, Op. 55
London Philharmonic Orchestra, conducted by Sir Adrian Boult
Well, I've always been a great patriot and a great lover of my country, and I I think there's nothing that sums up the glory and majesty of England better than Edward Elgar, not Pump and Circumstance Marches, but certainly the first theme of the great number one symphony of Elgar, which I think is to me everything which uh an English composer should say about this country.
Diminuendo and Crescendo in Blue
Duke Ellington and His Orchestra
Well of course I have to have another jazz record and to me the greatest jazz composer, the greatest jazz practitioner that we've ever known was Duke Ellington. I knew him quite well at times and I think one of the most exciting things he ever did was his great performance at the Newport Jazz Festival with Dimino, Duke Mesendo and Blue with those fantastic choruses of Paul Gonzalez on the saxophone and I really think this is something I'd never get bored of.
Elisabeth Schwarzkopf, conducted by Herbert von Karajan
Well, another great thing in my life is opera. And I suppose the first time I really came across opera properly was when I went to Salzburg for the first time after the war. And it was a time, I think the second festival in 1949, when the great giants like Frot Wengler, Brüller Walter, Catherine Ferrier were there. I had my first Rosen Cavalier, my first Fidelia, and so on. And it's very difficult for me to choose just one opera record. But I'm choosing Rosen Cavalier because, first of all, it reminds me of those lovely days in Salzburg. Secondly, those lovely Viennese warses. And Richard Staat is one of my favourite composers, but I also am a great old friend of Lisa Schwatzkov. And her interpretation of the marshaline in Rosen Cavalier, I think, is one of the greatest it's ever been. And I think she would keep me very happy listening to that final trio from the last act.
I have always enjoyed going to America and I've always loved the pop music that comes from there. I've also been a great admirer of the good composers in the pop world and one of my favourite is Paul Simon who I think writes marvellous music. And it might seem very odd but I'm going to have that incredible number called Bridge Over Troubled Waters. I've had some troubled waters in my life and I'd like to think I've built a few bridges over them so perhaps anyway that would make me feel the happy times I've had in America.
Symphony No. 2 (Resurrection)Favourite
New York Philharmonic, conducted by Bruno Walter
Well, I obviously must have a great romantic symphony from the 19th century and I think my favourite symphony of all, the one that really moves me and one which I have listened to with friends many times and had wonderful emotional moments is of course Amala. I have great problems whether it should be Amala or Bruckner because I like them both but I think there's no doubt for me that one of the greatest music experiences I've ever had in my life is listening to the Resurrection Symphony of Mahler. And the last movement is to me really the height of my musical emotional love. So I think the Bruna Walter version, Bruna Walter knew Mahler, a great Mahler interpreter and I'd like to hear his version of the last movement of Mahler's second symphony.
Well, I have uh uh a great affection for the music of the last war, the war which and I was eighteen, twenty-one, and of course to me the great voices which one heard in those days, the Glen Millers and so on. But the voice which to me is everything, is Vera Lynn, who came to my fifties birthday party, which was uh the theme of which was the Second World War, and she walked down stairs at midnight singing We'll Meet Again. And I hope that theme would um keep me happy on the Desert Island, that we would meet again. And Vera is really one of our great stars, and um I would have a little tear, I think, when I heard her sing that.
In conversation
Presenter asks
0:29How significant has music been in your life?
Oh, it is one of my passions, really. It's very wide. I like everything from, say, Wagner right down to pop and jazz. In fact, I I I had enormous difficulty choosing these records. It's been the greatest dilemma of my life.
Presenter asks
3:22Where did the Montagus come from, and how far back do you go?
Well, we can trace our male line back right to um before William the Conqueror in fact. Um I'm really a Scot more than a Montagu. This the Montagu side is my female line. But um the Montagues originally meant to come over with William the Conqueror, whose family didn't, but I think the name is Monte Acuteau or Mont Aigoux, a sharp mountain, and um they're still Montagues in France. But I say I'm really descended from Charles II, Father Duke of Bucleu, and I'm really I've got a Scots descent.
Presenter asks
4:28What is the history of the stately home [Beaulieu]?
Well, Bewley was originally part of the monastery which was founded in twelve hundred and four by King John. It was one of the very few good things he did, I suppose. And uh it was suffered the dissolution of the monasteries and was bought by the Earl of Southampton, who was my ancestor, whose grandson incidentally was Shakespeare's patron, and has been in the family ever since. It's not a grand house like um Blenheim or Woburn and places like that, but it has got a lovely setting and of course the most unique thing is the river which runs through the estate, which is a privately owned river and a very famous yachting centre now.
The keepsakes
The book
J.R.R. Tolkien
I've always been fascinated with people talking about Lord of the Rings, but I've never read it, and I hear it's a very complicated book, so I think I'd take that, and maybe by the time I came off I'd understand all about it.
The luxury
I'd like a windsurfer, which I'd be able to buzz round the island. I'd also use the sail as a hammock, and maybe as a tent, and go fishing on the board. I think it'd be a very good thing to have, and I'd really enjoy just getting out off the island occasionally.
Presenter asks
7:07Was it a happy childhood growing up [at Beaulieu]?
Oh yes indeed. Unfortunately my father died when I was two and a half, but I had a big family, lots of sisters and we had a great time. It was a beautiful state to be brought up on. There's sailing and there's shooting and there's bird watching and uh you know we had a good time, but then of course the war did intervene and um that was a very traumatic time.
Presenter asks
8:17What were your ambitions at the time, and what were you aiming to do?
I think all of us then, we we knew we were going to be called up when we were eighteen. My great ambition was to fly a Spitfire. But in fact I um ended up in the Grenadier Guards, which uh was a wonderful experience. Um and I certainly don't regret it, but um I was certainly in love with the Spitfire at the time.
Presenter asks
19:11What are the problems involved in living above the shop, so to speak, with all those people coming through?
Well, they are considerable, but I think it would be very galling if you went to all the trouble of opening to the public. Nobody came. … And certainly, I think it is behoven of us who are privileged to live in these great houses now to share them with the great mass of the people. … But there are problems, of course. Your privacy is not possible to keep. We sacrifice our privacy rather than keeping our privacy and sacrificing our homes.
“I think to welcome people is the most important part of our stately home business. We certainly have always done that at Beulie. We're not a great house, I say, like some other stately homes, but of course, the National Motor Museum is a great draw, and that's grown from very small beginnings to being what it is today.”
“I think that we've got to earn our right to go on with these great estates. I think as long as we, as I say, go on sharing them with the public, then I think they will continue. They're no longer a private garden. I think that they must be considered as part of our heritage.”
“I think it's more joy to manage these estates rather than own them. And I think that is the great joy, the great skill, is keeping them in good order.”