Tuning in…
Tuning in…
Castaway
1 appearance
Property developer and patron of the arts who led the controversial redevelopment of the Mansion House site and chairs the Arts Council.
On the island
Eight records
London Symphony Orchestra, conducted by Claudio Abbado
the first piece of music that I can really, apart from lullabies, ever remember, which my mother used to play to me.
Philharmonia Orchestra, conducted by Vladimir Ashkenazy
It always reminds me of the Farnsworth House. I play it a great deal when I'm there
Vermont has wonderful memories for me, as does the United States, for which I've had a great love affair for 40 years.
Pomp and Circumstance March No. 1
London Philharmonic Orchestra, conducted by Sir Georg Solti
This is really in memory of my father, who was not musically inclined, but who had a great sense of the visual arts and the applied arts.
a recollection of the other love of my life, which is South America.
Bix Beiderbecke with the Paul Whiteman Orchestra
It's a recollection, really, of an evening spent in 1972 in Florence when I went to see the Henry Moore Exhibition of Sculpture
Symphony No. 2 (The Resurrection)Favourite
City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra and Chorus, conducted by Simon Rattle
This is something that I'd like to dedicate to my wife. We spent a magical evening and a very emotional evening in June 1992 in the new orchestra hall in Birmingham listening to this wonderful, wonderful music.
Beim Schlafengehen (Four Last Songs)
Jessye Norman, with the Gewandhausorchester Leipzig, conducted by Kurt Masur
And this is really what my last record is about, being played out, if you like, never, never having the possibility of rescue.
In conversation
Presenter asks
1:08Are you a hoarder as well as a collector?
I do, really. I wouldn't say I'm a hoarder. I think I am a bit of a collector.
Presenter asks
5:48When did you first begin to feel [an appreciation of the arts]? Was it at school?
I think it probably was, yes. … I think it was really at school that my taste was formed, or basically formed, by a remarkable man, Oliver Van Oss, who was my housemaster at Eton.
Presenter asks
20:27How did you feel when those kinds of insults [from Prince Charles] are thrown at the people whose work you revere?
Well, I think that we have in this country we're intensely musical and we're intensely literary. Where I think we have a weakness is in the awareness of the visual arts. … it's only when you are able to see and appreciate great works of contemporary architecture that you understand, I think, that this is very much part of the heritage and that what we build today is actually the heritage of tomorrow.
The keepsakes
The book
Jack Kerouac
It had a profound influence on me in the sixties, I remember, and it is, in a way, a travel book.
The luxury
Not simply to look for ships on the horizon, but also to look at the stars at night, which have always fascinated me.
Presenter asks
23:41Tell me about meeting your second wife, because it was quite an unusual meeting, wasn't it?
Yes, we found ourselves sitting next to one another on a flight from Paris in 1976. And my wife was coming to London to meet the man she was to marry. And we began chatting because she said to me quite suddenly, out of the blue, Do you mind very much if I paint my fingernails? … And we got into conversation. And that was that.
Presenter asks
25:57Is it important to you, putting something back, making a contribution?
I think it is. I think those who are fortunate in life should help the less fortunate. And I must say it's always been part of my education, part of my parents' teaching, if you will. But certainly at public school at Eton, it was an essential part of life really, whether you were the son of a a dustman or a duke. You had to give this kind of service to others
“I called him sir. I called him sir till I was eighteen.”
“what we build today is actually the heritage of tomorrow. And so the shock of the new doesn't apply. It's a matter of education and education is a slow, slow process.”
“Having a little bit of experience of islands, I do of course know that one might never come back. You might never see that sail on the horizon, or if you did, it might sail off somewhere else. And so one might be stranded there for the rest of one's life, and one might even perish.”