Tuning in…
Tuning in…
Castaway
1 appearance
Industrialist who revitalized GKN as its chairman, served as President of the CBI, and chaired BSB and National Power.
On the island
Eight records
Piano Concerto No. 3 in D minor, Op. 30
Sergei Rachmaninoff (piano), Philadelphia Orchestra, Eugene Ormandy (conductor)
this is the one concerto that I would like to have time to learn and to play
Royal Philharmonic Orchestra, Sir Thomas Beecham (conductor)
takes us to Bradford again, because the Bradfordian composer Delius is one of my favourites, though he doesn't sound like a Yorkshire composer. And of course he was German. I think Delius hated Bradford actually, but but glorious music, and I still think his music is very English.
King's College Choir, Cambridge, New Philharmonia Orchestra, David Willcocks (conductor)
church music was bred into me at that point. So I've selected Fauré's Requiem, and I think that's just a nice reminder of nice church music and boys' choirs.
I Feel Pretty (from West Side Story)
jazz is the 20th century inheritor of the ability to improvise that used to be in the classical stream but is no longer there. And jazz is just marvellous for improvisation and all students of music should be able to do it. So I pick one of the greatest of the improvisers, Oscar Peterson, on the piano, playing probably the best musical writer, Bernstein.
I've always been intrigued by the music of Billy Mayle, who was a 1930s pianist, but a very good composer. I think he's underrated and I think he's going to come back. And I'd love to be able to have his most famous piece, Marigold.
Nimrod (from Enigma Variations, Op. 36)
London Symphony Orchestra, Sir Adrian Boult (conductor)
very English. It's Elgar, chosen for its Englishness and b because the Enigma variations on a desert island. It's all about my friends within, and you can take those twelve pieces and pop your own friends into those variations.
Vocalise, Op. 34 No. 14Favourite
Suzanne Murphy (soprano), Scottish National Orchestra, Neeme Järvi (conductor)
it takes the human voice and female voice and makes it into an instrument. And it's just a perfect little piece.
if I had to choose one opera, it is Così fan tutte by Mozart. And I think on the desert island, the very end, the last tutti, which loosely translated, happy is the man who looks at everything on the right side and through trials and tribulations makes reason his guide would be a very nice thing to play frequently.
In conversation
Presenter asks
1:21It's an unusual combination, a love of Mozart and a love of manufacturing. Have you found them difficult to marry?
Not at all. There seemed to have been a natural pairing all through my life. … I think that I wanted to be a musician and it didn't happen that way. But I kept it going in parallel all the time.
Presenter asks
2:16But do you use the one love to solve the other? That is, if you've got a manufacturing problem, do you sit at the piano and try and solve it?
No, no, I don't think I use one. It's a marvellous relaxation. I find that music is the one thing that when I do it I don't think about anything else. It's all absorbing. … I can't solve manufacturing problems playing Mozart. I just have to solve Mozart's problems.
Presenter asks
5:45Are you in a way still testing yourself to find out whether you should have taken that gamble and actually not gone into industry but gone onto the concert platform?
No, I don't regret not having gone in for music. I think it's almost certain my parents were right, and it was my parents who decided I wasn't going to be musician. … I think also that with music if you think you've got a choice one thing or the other you should do the other thing. There shouldn't be a choice.
The keepsakes
The book
Collected plays of J.B. Priestley
J.B. Priestley
And my choice would be the Collected plays of JB Priestley. We're back to uh Bradford again
The luxury
Yes, and I was hoping you'd allow me the luxury item of a piano on the desert island. Then I can really have the time to learn that
Presenter asks
20:45What effect did [steel nationalisation] have on the company?
Well, it's very dramatic. It was like ripping the core of the whole business out. It had always been the steel. Steel had been the whole rationale of the business was making steel and using it. Therefore it made a lot of other things irrelevant, so one had to start changing.
Presenter asks
22:53Shortly after you became chairman, isn't it true that the profits of GKN went from one hundred twenty six million down to minus one point two million? How did you explain away that?
Yes, part of it was the steel strike. It started on the first of January, nineteen eighty, just as I started, yes, which is a good start. So it was a tough time and manufacturing industry in particular had to make a lot of changes. … We needed to change and we did change and it worked.
Presenter asks
29:47How do you persuade young people that the future is in industry and not in the city and the fast buck, as they might think?
Yes, it is difficult. … British culture which has been an anti-industry culture since the Victorian times … It's that excitement that I think one ought to feel about making things and products and technology. … at the heart of a really strong economy is its capability in manufacturing industry.
“I can't solve manufacturing problems playing Mozart. I just have to solve Mozart's problems.”
“Noise, power. Yes, probably. That was manufacturing industry to me.”
“I ended up by getting Guest out of steel, keen out of bolts, nettlefold out of screws.”
“Strategy is knowing what to do when there is nothing to do, as against tactics, which is knowing what to do when there is something to do.”
“At the heart of a really strong economy is its capability in manufacturing industry.”