THINGS TO COME

New Zealand Listener, Volume 13, Issue 321, 17 August 1945, Page 4

THINGS TO COME

A Run Through The Programmes

MONDAY "THE British Show Business at War" is the title of a BBC programme to be heard from 1YA at 8.25 p.m. on Monday, August 20. Listeners will hear the Lunts (Alfred Lunt and Lynn Fontanne), Laurence Olivier and Ralph Richardson, Myra Hess and Leslie Henson. Olivier and Richardson get into an argument about whether Shakespeare goes down with the Forces, and Olivier does a speech from Henry V., which he has produced as a film; Dame Myra Hess talks about the National Gallery LunchHour concerts and plays Bach’s "Jesu Joy of Man’s Desiring." Leslie Henson talks about entertaining the troops in this war and the last. Also worth notice: 1YX, 8.8 p.m.: Symphony No. 2 (Rachmaninoff ). 3YL, 8.16 p.m.: Monthly Choral Programme. TUESDAY "THE Fred Emney Show" to be heard | from 3YA at 9.25 p.m. on Tuesday, August 21, is, in the words of the announcer, "a 30-minute contest with no laughs barred, provided by the heavyweight champion of Broadcasting House, London." A photograph of the diminutive comedian will be found on page 21 in this issue. Emney is all of 18 stone, is said to keep his staff well under his thumb, and follows the current fashion of his size and eminence to smoke large cigars more or less continuously. Also worth notice: ' 1YA, 8.0 p.m.; "The Will Hay Programme." 4YA, 8.0 p.m.: "Spotlight." WEDNESDAY NEW series of Winter Course talks from 3YA,: which will start on Wednesday, August 22 (at 6.45 p.m.), is devoted to studies of the Southern Alps by various experts. First of all Dr. R. S. Allan, who is interested in their geology, will answer the question "What Are the Alps?" A week later Dr. Brian Mason (whom The Listener interviewed after his return from Sweden some months ago) and who is a climber as well as a geologist, will talk about the discovery and exploration of these mountains. There will be two talks on "Mountaineering," by Guy Mannering and Roy Twyneham, and later in the series I. L. Holmes, of the Canterbury Engineering School, will discuss "Overcoming the Barrier by Road, Rail, and Air." Also worth notice: 1YA, 8.0 p.m.: Sonata in B Flat (Mozart). 3YA, 9.30 p.m.: Symphony No. 4 (Brahms). THURSDAY HE Fairey Aviation Works. Band, one of England’s leading bands, is also one of the youngest. It was formed only seven years ago and has won the Bellevue Brass Band Contest three times. The players are all working at full pressure on aircraft production and have never once practised in working hours. During the war, they have given many concerts for servicemen and charitable objects, all outside working hours. Their conductor, Harry Mortimer (the well-known cornet player), is the son of Fred Mortimer, conductor of Foden’s Motor Works Band (which Harry leads) and has been first trumpet in the Halle Orchestra

and Liverpool Philharmonic for many years. A programme by this band (recorded by the BBC and scheduled to be heard from 1YA at 9.44 p.m. on Thursday, August 23), contains the fantasia "The Tempest," by Dr. Maurice Johnstone, the BBC’s North Regional Music Director. Also worth notice: 2YA, 8.0 p.m.: Clarinet Quintet (Brahms) 4YA, 9.25 p.m.: ’Cello Concerto (Dvorak). FRIDAY RECORDING was recently released of a composition by a Hawaiian composer, Dai -Keong Lee, who aims at something rather. more substantial than the strumming of ukuleles and electric guitars which is usually attributed to his countrymen. It consists of a Prelude and Hula, and is played by the National Symphony Orchestra, conducted by Hans Kindler. The work was broadcast in Aus-. tralia some time last year, when the composer was there with the American Armed Forces, and will be heard from 1YA at 7.30 p.m. on Friday, August 24. Also worth notice: 2YA, 8.28 p.m.: "The Daughters of the Late Colonel." 3YA, 8.0 p.m.: "The Violin Sonatas." SATURDAY NGRAINED Nonsense, as engrained as the dust of the boarding house and schoolroom, is the BBCjs own description of "The Will Hay Programme" which will be heard from 4YA at 2.0 p.m. on Saturday, August 25. A photograph of Will Hay in the character of Dr. Muffin will be found on page 21 in this issue. Dr. Muffin, it should be explained, is that immortal music-hall schoolmaster, celebrated here by his "Fourth Form at St. Michael’s." Listeners will probably discover him engaged in a duel of words with his landlady, who gives him nothing but tea and toast, toast and tea, and calls it "breakfast"; whom he never pays; and whose small son Alfie he "educates" by way of consideration for the accommodation he doesn’t get. Also worth notice: 2YC, 8.0 p.m.: Music by "The Five." 3YL, 8.0 p.m.: Three Masters of the Symphonic Poem. SUNDAY NOTHER programme by the New London String Ensemble, to be heard from 3YA at 9.22 p.m. on Sunday, August 26, contains a Concertino for Piano and Strings by the British composer Walter Leigh, who was killed in action in Libya. Leigh was. a composer of great gifts. He was born in London in 1905, educated at University College School and Christ’s College, Cambridge; then for two years he studied composition in Berlin with Paul Hindemith. Leigh wrote chamber music, two comic operas, "The Pride of the Regiment" and "Jolly Roger," incidental music for Aristophanes’ "The Frogs," music for two West End Revues, and some orchestral music, including "Agincourt," commissioned by the BBC for the Jubilee celebrations in 1935 (and already broadcast in New Zealand). He was musical director at the Cambridge Festival Theatre in 1931-32. Also worth notice: ] 2YC, 8.0 p.m.: Music by Elgar. ; 4YA, 4.15 p.m.: "Robinson Crusoe." 7}