THINGS TO COME

New Zealand Listener, Volume 14, Issue 341, 4 January 1946, Page 4

THINGS TO COME

A Run Through The Programmes

MONDAY E have often thought it one of the happier circumstances of the calendar that the festive season (sic). should coincide wth the legal holidays. Indeed, it is probably more than purely coincidental. Santa Claus and Old Father Antic the Law have not a great deal in common and we like to imagine our friends in the profession (we hope we may continue to be saved from them) putting up the shutters for three weeks and acting as if goodwill to (and between) all men was their fondest wish. Apparently, however, even this illusion is to be denied them. From 1YA at 8.26 p.m. on January 14 Chief-Inspector French will be heard in "The Case of the Solicitor’s Holiday." Sounds almost like an omnibus driver’s vacation. Also worth notice: 2YA, 7.15 p.m.: "Birds of the Wild," Talk by A. P. Harper. 3YA, 8.0 p.m.: Studio Concert by Woolston Brass Band.

TUESDAY , BC talks have added variety in plenty to National programmes in the past few years, but we cannot recall having come across a BBC farming falk until we found "On Your Metal: Power on the Farm," in the 4YA programme for Tuesday, January 8 (7.17 p.m.). The value of a British farming talk to New Zealand farmers is perhaps debatable, since conditions and attitudes vary greatly between one country and the other, but so far as it tells us something about the British farmer, "On Your Metal" should interest us all. For the British farmer, sadly neglected in years of peace, has twice pulled himself up by his own boot-straps in the past 30 years and we owe more to him than perhaps we realise. Also worth notice: 1YA, 8.0 p.m.: "Trial by Jury." 2YA, 11.0 a.m.: "Rambles with a Botanist." WEDNESDAY . PALACE OF VARIETIES," by the BBC, is a series of recordings which revives all the sights and sounds, and almost the very aroma of the old London music hall. The singers in ‘the programme are among the best known in London to-day, while they are accompanied by the BBC Variety Orchestra.

Last, but very far from least, are, the producer, Ernest Longstaffe, and Bill Stephens, who relives, in all his genial broadness, the act of the old music hall chairman. The feature is brought to us ‘by the BBC’s London Transcription Service, and the next instalment will be heard from 2YA on Wednesday, January 9, at 9.25 pm. ~ Also worth notice: 3YA, 9.30 p.m.: Maurice Clare and Frederick Page. 3YL, 8.14 p.m.: Fun Fare with Jane Carr. THURSDAY T the risk of seeming ungallant we shall be interested in an item from 2YA at 3.15 p.m. on Thursday, January 10. Many a time we have stood on the street corner waiting for our wife to load us up with odds and ends bought in an afternoon’s shopping. Now we are to hear how a producer transfers the wedgie to the other foot, for there is to be a recorded drama in cameo entitled

"The Woman Who Waited." We don’t know what or for whom she waited, or whether she tapped her foot in impatience or joyous anticipation, but the title is. at least intriguing. Also worth notice: : 2YA, 8.0 p.m.: Dorothy Helmrich (with Owen Jensen at the piano). : 4YA, 9.44 p.m.; Elgar’s Cockaigne Concert Overture, : FRIDAY CERTAIN number of years ago we were delighted to learn the philologists’ stories of the developments of such words as Cockney, ostler and that adjective. We even became involved once in a bitter argument with a man who claimed that Cockney was derived from Cockaigne and not from the term cock’s egg or its equivalent in our ancient mother tongue. We ourselves can pass many a happy hour merely speculating on the possible changes in the meanings of words in wars and peaces to come,

and when we read in the programmes the announcement of a talk, "The Romance of Words," by Cecil Hull, from 3YA on Friday, January 11, at 7.15 p.m., we quickly made a note to be at home that evening. Also worth notice: 2YA, 11.0 am.: "Painting and Sculpture," BBC talk. 3YA, 8.32 p.m.: Organ Recital. SATURDAY A NEW series of morning talks entitled "Part-time Women" will begin from 2YA on Saturday, January 12. These talks have been prepared by Judith Terry, of Auckdand, and the first will have the sub-title "In the Glasshouse." Morning listeners to the YA stations know Mrs. Terry well, for she has already dealt with many subjects, including the price of vegetables, the size of pumpkins, horseback holidays, and New Caledonian gardening. Now she is, we gather, going to tell us just what a time-and-a-half person, even a double-time person, the part-time woman is, except in the matter of pay, which is never at overtime rates. During the war years there have been thousands of them in New Zealand. For a part of their story listen in to 2YA at 11.0 am, on January 12.

Also worth notice: 2YC, 8.0 p.m.; Haydn’s Symphony No, 94. 3YL, 8.0 p.m.:, Music by Richard Strauss. SUNDAY ONTRARY to popular belief, women spies in the 1939-45 war were not all as beautiful as Olga Pulloffski, of popular song fame, nor did they, on the male side, lurk about railway stations, whiskered, cloaked, and daggered. Gergeous blondes might have wheedled information from infatuated majors, but the person doing the real work was more likely to be a mild-mannered little man who was on speaking terms with death. If you are interested in the work of the British Secret Service, tune in to 4YA on Sunday, January 13, at 2.0 p.m., when you will hear a BBC programme explaining how’ coded information in musical symbols helped to bring defeat to Hitler’s Reich. Also worth notice: 1YA, 3.30 p.m.: Contemporary Composers, 3YA, 2.45 p.m.: "Madman’s Island." ~