B.B.C.'S YEAR

Evening Post, Volume CXXIII, Issue 124, 27 May 1937, Page 28

8.8.C.'S YEAR

SERVING THE LISTENERS

. While the famous Crystal Palace in Londpn was being destroyed by fire last December, people all over Great Britain listened with eager interest to a broadcast description of the fira from an observer who was in the blazing building with the firemen. This i:. but one of the examples of the enterprise shown by the. British Broadcasting Corporation last year in its efforts to give efficienjt and up-to-date service to listeners-in. This incident is recounted jft the 1937 issue of the "8.8.C. Annual."

Much attention has been given during the last year by the corporation lo the inclusion in its programmes of what are known as "actuality .items,'" that is, the broadcasting of events as they are actually happening. Apart from the Crystal Palace fire, outstanding incidents of this actuality reporting included a report from inside a gas-filled chamber by an observer who .' ad a micrbphone inside his gas mask, and a broadcast from the banks of the Mississippi at Memphis while the floods there were at their height. During this last broadcast, the shouts and songs of workers, th« sound of sandbags being flung down, the lapping of water'against the bank, and the noise of motor-boats on the river-could be heard behind the speaker.

The allocation of programme time in the corporation's broadcasts last year makes an •■ interesting study. light music predominated, taking up 32.32 per cent, of the total broadcasting time. News, talks, and readings occupied the next longest period, accounting for 16.69 per 'cent, of the broadcasting hours. Those who prefer serious music were catered for; by the corporation for 14.67 per cent, of the hours of transmission, and next came records (8 8 per cent), children's hour (8.8 per cent), variety (5.92 per cent), dance music (s.7B'per cent.), drama (4.3 per cent.), and religion (4.16 per cent) The main category in the news section—which took up 16:69 per cent, of broadcasting hours—was that devoted to talks (38 per cent.).-Next in length of transmission hours was news and eye-witness accounts (32 per cent.). Eighteen per cent, of the time in this category was spent in school broadcasts, the'remainder of the time being taken up by readings and functions and commentaries.

While the corporation welcomes op^ portunities to invite outstanding international figures'to: be'broadcast, it endeavours never to lose sight of its responsibilities towards the British musical profession and music. Foreigners are only'engaged _when they are of international reputation and interest, or offer something exceptionally valuable or even unique in performance and repertoire. Furthermore, they are as a rule invited only if and when they are in Great Britain on other business. The corporation does not feel itself responsible^—as. the impresario sometimes feels it should—for bringing forward unknown foreign talent visiting F.ngland unless the artist is not only, musically mature, but promises a quite exceptional and valuable future. ■ : . - ■

From the point of view of radio drama, certainly the most important event of last year was the recognition gl -en to the development of that. side of the corporation's work known as the "feature programme." The develop^ ment of these programme .items has been one of he most interesting in this sphere of broadcasting. Among them were such as "Post Haste" (dealing with the work of the General Post Office), "Scotland Yard," literary features such as "Erasmus", and "Coleridge," commemorative programmes of the type of "Gallipoli," "Coronel and the Falklan Is," and "Scott1 in the Ant T arctic," and the series of famous trials. Adaptations of stage plays were probably more successful than ever before, and an agreeable' new ' field for the broadcasting of plays has' been made by the opening of the Sunday programmes to.. dramatic classics outside Shakespeare.' Seven of Shakespeare's plays were presented during the year.

Televised studio programmes last year included extracts from West End productions, revue, variety, ballet, and illustrated talks and demonstrations. From outside the studio came demon-

strations of golf, riding, boxing, and oth:r sports. Personalities who have taken part in televised broadcasts include Albert Coates, Archie Compston, James Mollison, Squadron-Leader F. H D. Swain, Kay Stammers, Vicki Baum, Roger Quilter, David Low, ian Hay. Will Hay, Bebe Daniels, Ben Lyon, Frances Day, and George Robey. Among the television events were an anti-aircraft defence display by the Thirty-sixth Middlesex Anti-Aircraft Battalion, and the Sixty-first Anti-Air-craft Brigade, „ tour of the North London Exhibition at the Alexandra Palace, the Armistice Day programme, a serial feature dealing with the animals in the London Zoo. extracts from a new opera by Albert Coates, and plays by T. S. Eliot and Reginald Berkeley, and a pageant, "Citizen Soldiers of London," reconstructed from the Lord Mayor's show.