BBC - Press Office - Network Radio Programme Information Week 52 Monday 22 December 2008 (2025)

BBC RADIO 1 Monday 22 December 2008

In New Music We Trust Christmas Party Monday 22 December 7.00-10.00pm BBC RADIO 1

Huw Stephens and Steve Lamacq host BBC Radio 1's "Alternative Christmas Party", a festive feast of music broadcast live from Maida Vale. Joining them for some special performances are Glasvegas, Florence And The Machine, Friendly Fires, Chase & Status, Chipmunk, Golden Silvers and some surprise guests who drop by for a chat.

Presenters/Huw Stephens and Steve Lamacq,
Producer/Clare Chadburn

BBC Radio 1 Publicity

BBC RADIO 2 Monday 22 December 2008

Listeners have another chance to hear Coldplay perform an intimate live gig for Radio 2 from the BBC Radio Theatre in London.

The band, introduced on stage by Dermot O'Leary, perform tracks from their fourth studio album, Viva La Vida Or Death And All His Friends, alongside classic tracks.

This concert was first broadcast live on BBC Radio 2 on Saturday 30 August.

Presenter/Dermot O'Leary, Producer/Sarah Gaston

BBC Radio 2 Publicity

Mark Lamarr concludes this four-part series about Roy Orbison – the Grammy award-winning singer, songwriter, guitarist and pioneer of rock 'n' roll – who died 20 years ago.

This final programme looks at Roy's revival, with film director David Lynch using In Dreams in his film Blue Velvet, kd lang breathing new life into Crying, and Roy being part of supergroup the Traveling Wilburys, who achieved both commercial and critical success.

Presenter/Mark Lamarr, Producer/Anna Harrison

BBC Radio 2 Publicity

Christopher Eccleston reads The Necklace, the second in a series of Christmas stories with a fiendish sting in the tail.

In this story by Guy de Maupassant, a young wife yearns, like Cinderella, to go to the Twelfth Night ball. Her husband gets hold of a coveted invitation and she borrows a priceless necklace from a friend. What happens at the party, however, ruins their lives for ever...

Reader/Christopher Eccleston,
Abridger and producer/Frank Stirling

BBC Radio 2 Publicity

BBC RADIO 3 Monday 22 December 2008

Today's Afternoon On 3 celebrates the 150th anniversary of Puccini's birth with an historic performance of Tosca, which comes from the radio archives of the Metropolitan Opera, New York. It features a cast with some of the leading Puccini singers of the time, including soprano Renata Tebaldi as Floria Tosca, tenor Richard Tucker as Mario Cavaradossi and baritone Leonard Warren as Baron Scarpia, with the Metropolitan Opera Chorus and Orchestra conducted by distinguished conductor Dmitri Mitropoulos.

Tosca is one of the most popular of Puccini's operas. Set in three locations in Rome, it tells of the political struggle between painter Mario Cavaradossi and police chief Baron Scarpia, which is amplified by Scarpia's obsession with Cavaradossi's lover, Floria Tosca.

Presenter/Louise Fryer, Producer/David Gallagher

BBC Radio 3 Publicity

Paradise Lost Ep 1/12 Monday 22 December to Friday 2 January 5.00-5.50pm BBC RADIO 3

Paradise Lost is arguably the greatest epic poem in the English language. In words remarkable for their richness of rhythm and imagery, Milton tells the story of man's creation, fall and redemption "to justify the ways of God to men".

Read with sensitivity and power by Anton Lesser, Paradise Lost tells of the plight of Adam and Eve and the vengefulness of Satan and his cohorts.

Marking the 400th anniversary of Milton's birth, Paradise Lost is presented unabridged in 12 daily episodes.

Presenter/Anton Lesser, Producer/Nicolas Soames

BBC Radio 3 Publicity

Performance On 3 – Bach At Christmas Ep 1/3 Monday 22 to Christmas Eve Wednesday 24 December 7.00-8.45pm BBC RADIO 3

Sir John Eliot Gardiner conducts The Monteverdi Choir and The English Baroque Soloists in the first of three all-Bach programmes, recorded earlier this month at Nicholas Hawksmoor's glorious Christ Church as part of the Spitalfields Winter Festival. Each programme features one of the cantatas that make up the Christmas Oratorio, as well as one of the Motets and a Brandenburg Concerto.

Nowadays, Bach's Christmas Oratorio is usually performed in one (rather long) sitting. In reality, it is a composite work consisting of six cantatas which, like many others, Bach conceived in groups of two or more, linked thematically or by their structural patterns. He composed these six cantatas for performance in Leipzig on their appropriate feast days – from Christmas to Epiphany – in 1734/5. In the spirit of the Bach Cantata Pilgrimage (2000) John Eliot Gardiner places three of these consecutive cantatas as close to their original liturgical day as possible, recorded in the Baroque splendour of Christ Church.

Today's programme includes: Bach Motet – Komm, Jesu, Komm, BWV.229; Brandenburg Concerto No. 6 in B flat, BWV.1051; and Christmas Oratorio – Cantata No.1 Jauchzet, frohlocket, auf preiset die Tage with tenor Nicholas Mulroy as the Evangelist.

Producer/Kevin Bee

BBC Radio 3 Publicity

Joan Bakewell explores areas of belief with artists, thinkers and other public figures in a returning series of programmes on BBC Radio 3. In a society where the arena of belief has become increasingly personal and subjective, religion remains a significant influence in society. Joan explores, in conversation with her guests, the influences that have shaped them, the ideas they have about life's big questions and how their beliefs affect their personal and working lives.

In the first of the new series, Joan talks to the Church of England's first non-white diocesan bishop, the Bishop of Rochester, the Right Reverend Michael Nazir-Ali. Born in Pakistan, his early influences were both Muslim and Christian, yet today he courts controversy, publically expressing his fears about the dangers of Islam.

Bishop Michael is a conservative evangelical who will defend his brand of Christianity with intellectual vigour.

Presenter/Joan Bakewell, Producer/Karen Maurice

BBC Radio 3 Publicity

BBC RADIO 4 Monday 22 December 2008

Book Of The Week – My Judy Garland Life Ep 1/5 Monday 22 to Boxing Day Friday 26 December 9.45-10.00am BBC RADIO 4

Part memoir, part biography, part love letter, My Judy Garland Life is Susie Boyt's irreverent and often hilarious tribute to her lifelong passion for the iconic film star.

Susie has adored Judy Garland since her first visit to the cinema, where she heard Dorothy singing Somewhere Over The Rainbow.

Susie was a lonely and sensitive child, and every word Garland sang spoke directly to her. As she grew up, she found Judy and her music could help drag her out of the "hellish bits of the everyday".

In this book, Susie interweaves her own personal reminiscences – from growing up as the daughter of artist Lucian Freud in a ramshackle house full of children, where "every major personality type has been taken", to her failed attempts to make it onto the stage – with Judy Garland's own triumphs and failures.

The reader for the Book Of The Week will be confirmed closer to transmission.

Producer/Justine Willett

BBC Radio 4 Publicity

Woman's Hour Drama – Old Peter's Russian Tales Ep 1/5 Monday 22 to Boxing Day Friday 26 December 10.45-11.00am BBC RADIO 4

This week's Woman's Hour drama sees the welcome return of Arthur Ransome's charming collection of Russian folk tales, as told by Old Peter the forester to his grandchildren, Vanya and Maroosia, who live in a hut in the middle of a snowbound forest.

First published in 1916, the tales have never been out of print, and feature firewood, good soup and Vladimir, the affectionate cat.

The first story, Salt, tells the story of Ivan the Ninny, the youngest and least successful of three brothers, who builds his fortune on a rare commodity – salt – winning the love of a princess and suffering the jealous rage of his brothers.

In Fish Tales, an old fisherman's kindness to a golden fish is repaid almost endlessly until his shrewish wife starts making bigger and bigger demands.

In Prince Ivan, a kingdom and the fortunes of a young prince are thrown into disarray when a new baby is born bearing an uncanny resemblance to the most terrifying witch in all of Russia – the Baba Yaga.

In The Stolen Turnips, the story for Christmas Day, Broad and Long share a poor and meagre existence, until their turnips are stolen over and over again by a magical troupe of forest-dwelling children.

In Frost, Martha's life is made a misery by her two older sisters. Martha's stepmother decides that she should marry Frost, but her father fears for her life. However, her politeness and sweet nature bring her all she deserves.

Trevor Cooper stars as Old Peter, with Harry Hughes and Megan Williams as the children. The tales are adapted by DJ Britton.

Producer/Jessica Dromgoole

BBC Radio 4 Publicity

Together Against The Odds Ep 1/3 Monday 22 December 11.00-11.30am BBC RADIO 4

Together Against The Odds returns with more stories of couples whose relationships survive difficult challenges.

In the first of three programmes, Professor Janet Reibstein meets Nuala and Jamie Gardner. When their son, Dale, was born in 1988, they were worried that he seemed different from other babies. It took them nearly four years to discover that he was severely autistic. In the meantime, the stress of looking after Dale led to talk of divorce. Then Nuala went part of the way through a suicide attempt.

The Gardners tell Janet how their relationship coped with a life which drove them, individually, to breaking point.

Professor Janet Reibstein is a psychologist who specialises in researching and working with couples.

Presenter/Professor Janet Reibstein, Producer/Chris Ledgard

BBC Radio 4 Publicity

Afternoon Play – The Borrowers Ep 1/2 Monday 22 December 2.15-3.00pm BBC RADIO 4

It is 1890, and miniature 10-year-old Arrietty Clock lives beneath the floorboards with her mother, Homily, and her father, Pod, in a big house in Leamington Spa.

They survive by borrowing from the human beings who also live in the house. Pod is an expert Borrower, but the Clocks are the last of their kind left in the house. There used to be lots of tiny families, including the Mantleshelves and the Harpsichords, but they've all gone and have either emigrated or suffered at the paws of a cat bought by the humans.

The Clocks have never left because Pod is such a good Borrower and would never be caught ... until one day, when he is seen. The family then decides that Arrietty should learn to borrow, too, but on her first outing, she is also seen by a boy who has come to live in the house. Arrietty and the boy strike up a friendship but, soon, the boy's curiosity brings the end of the family's lives under the floorboards.

This two-part dramatisation of Mary Norton's famous story of the little people who live under the floorboards is adapted by Sarah Woods, and stars Paula Wilcox as Homily Clock, Jeff Rawle as Pod Clock, Clare Corbett as Arrietty Clock and Barbara Flynn as Kate.

Producer/Chris Wallis

BBC Radio 4 Publicity

Songs Everlasting Ep 1/4 Monday 22 December 3.45-4.00pm BBC RADIO 4

Operatic baritone Bryn Terfel explores classic Christmas songs and asks what makes them so iconic, in this four-part series.

In the first programme, he looks at the chorus from Handel's Messiah, Unto Us A Child Is Born, which marks the arrival of Christ on Earth and is one of the nation's most cherished Christmas pieces. Bryn speaks to the Archbishop of Canterbury, Dr Rowan Williams, and composer John Rutter, among others, and asks them what is behind its enduring appeal.

Other pieces in the series are Deck The Halls, Ave Maria and Ralph Vaughn Williams's Fantasia On Christmas Carols.

Presenter/Bryn Terfel, Producer/Llinos Jones

BBC Radio 4 Publicity

Genius is the comedy programme which sees Dave Gorman and a celebrity guest chew over the ridiculous, unworkable but sometimes genius inventions, schemes and policies of the public.

Dave invites "pitchers" from the audience to join him and his guest on stage and to be completely unlimited in the type of Christmas ideas they bring. The show wants ideas that address issues both whimsical and serious. The pitchers can propose concepts from the pointless – such as creating mini elephants to be kept as pets – to the seemingly very reasonable – such as helium-filled bubble wrap, enabling post to simply float to the recipient.

After listening to as many pitches as time permits, Dave's guest chooses his or her favourite ideas, leaving the audience to vote on which they think is the most inspired. The pitcher with the most votes wins an immense sense of self-fulfilment and the legendary cut-glass Genius trophy.

Presenter/Dave Gorman, Producer/Simon Nicholls

BBC Radio 4 Publicity

BBC RADIO 5 LIVE Monday 22 December 2008

5 Live Sport Monday 22 December 7.00-10.00pm BBC RADIO 5 LIVE

Mark Saggers presents all the day's sports news and is joined by John Motson for The Monday Night Club, in which the latest football news is discussed.

From 8pm there is live Barclays Premier League commentary as Everton face Chelsea at Goodison Park.

Presenter/Mark Saggers, Producer/Steve Houghton

BBC Radio 5 Live Publicity

BBC 5 LIVE SPORTS EXTRA Monday 22 December 2008

The Test Match Special team brings uninterrupted commentary on the fourth day of the Second Test between India and England, live from Mumbai.

Producer/Jen McAllister

BBC 5 Live Sports Extra Publicity

BBC 6 MUSIC Monday 22 December 2008

Nemone catches up with her favourite Texas three-piece, White Denim, to find out if they will be having a White Christmas.

White Denim's critically-acclaimed debut album came out this year and made it into Nemone's top three albums of 2008.

Presenter/Nemone, Producer/Jax Coombes

BBC 6 Music Publicity

Gideon Coe ventures into the BBC archive to select summer concerts from PJ Harvey and Broken Social Scene. Mouse On Mars provide the classic session from 1997.

Presenter/Gideon Coe, Producer/Mark Sheldon

BBC 6 Music Publicity

BBC WORLD SERVICE Monday 22 December 2008

Sir John Tusa, former Director of BBC World Service, uses archive and music from 1968 to trace what made it such an important year. Although the dramatic events of 1968 took place more than a generation ago, they remain relevant to the world today.

The final programme focuses on Czechoslovakia's Prague Spring, the subsequent Russian invasion and anti-Communist rumblings in Poland and China. Sir John also assesses the impact of those attempting to reform Communism.

Presenter/Sir John Tusa, Producer/Robert Abel

BBC World Service Publicity