THINGS TO COME

New Zealand Listener, Volume 17, Issue 418, 27 June 1947, Page 4

THINGS TO COME

A Run Through The Programmes

Facttic Tour _ | HOSE of us whose ideas of the way | of life of people living in countries | surrounding the Pacific are not as well defined as they might be, will be able _to pick up some first-hand information from a new group of talks in Station | 2YA’s. Winter Course series. This new ses:ion, which starts at 7.15 p.m. on | Monday, June 30, has been planned to give a pic:ure of the standards of living of the Pacific peoples, their ambitions, and what they expect of the future. The first speaker will be Dr, Dean McHenry, : American political scientist, who visited | New Zealand recently, and who will talk about the Pacific Coast of the | U.S.A. Next, A. B. Rive, High Commissioner for Canada in New Zealand, will give a talk on the Pacific seaboard of ' Canada. Other speakers will deal with Asiatic Russia, China, Japan, the Neth--€rland East Indies. and Australia, and | among these speakers will be Professor _Ian Gordon and James Bertram. "Th ey" ‘HE BBC has set out to track down that elusive body of people called "They." You have heard about them, you may even quote them, but it’s highly likely that you have never met them. "They say ships will be running on atomic energy by next year." "They say the price of stockings is coming down," or even, "They say Mr. So-and-so beats his wife." They’re always saying something startling, they have access to the most unlikely sources of information, or they may be just plain busybodies. Yes, but who are they? Roger Falk suggested to the BBC the idea of a "They" series and Jenifer Wayne has written and produced the programmes, the first of which will be heard from 4YA at 7.30 p.m. this Friday, June 27. In this programme "They" are the originators of all those widely-accepted beliefs about Foreigners. "They say French women are the smartest in the world." . .. "They say Orientals are So mysterious, don’t they? Well, look at their eyes." ... "They say the Latin races are very passionate." ... "They say the Dutch are so phlegmatic." It’s quite remarkable what a picture of different nationalities They have painted, and which so many of us are perfectly ready to accept purely on Their word. In this programme Jenifer Wayne tries to find out how much truth there is in it all. And she does not forget that, to other peoples, the English are foreigners too. "They say Englishwomen are tall and plain, with tweeds and big flat feet." . "They say the English are slow, muddled, proud, unmusical." . . . "They" have been responsible for a lot of misconceptions in this world. Perhaps this programmie may help you to clear your mind of some of them. Tutois =. ‘TUTOIs was a mythical French character; he didn’t exist. Yet he was so real to the people of a small village that some swore they had seen him, and others that they had actually spoken to him. But he was simply a figment of the imagination of Anatole France, who tells in his pungent, mischievous style, of the odd-job man of Rue St. Denis, who was at once a thief, a lady-killer, and a legend. France’s story, Tutois, has been

adapted for radio by C. Gordon Glover, and produced by the NZBS,. It will while away half-an-hour for 2YA listeners on Sunday, July 6, starting at 10.5 p.m. Great American Seaman A FREQUENT guest at the Duchess de Chartres’ salon in Paris in April, 1780, was a dark handsome gentleman of slender but muscular build, whose bold black eyes, swarthy complexion, and indomitable hawk-like nose identified him to all and sundry as the dashing American hero and patriot, Commodore Paul Jones. (Okay, okay-we know he was born in Scotland.) Famous for his daring operations in British waters, where he had fought ship after ship to a standstill, and invaded the very coasts of Britain itself, he was now on a little shore leave, enjoying the pleasures and a + EE AS Ve

amenities which the people- of Paris were offering him. with open arms. Gay, and yet melancholy; friendly, and yet reticent; a man of action, and still a man of thought, he-but tune in to 2YA on Tuesday, July 1, at 7.15 p.m. for Basil Clarke’s talk, entitled "Paul Jones: An Anniversary Tribute to a Great American Seaman." Invercargill to Madrid FER three months’ study cf Spanish music in Madrid, and three weeks of rehearsals in Paris, Janetta McStay, formerly of Invercargill, is now touring the south-west and midland counties of England as solo pianist for a small ensemble organised by the British Arts Council. This travelling group consists of a Spanish dancer, Pepita, who accompanied Miss McStay to Spain to do a refresher course, a male dancer, a guitarist and a woman singer, all Spanish. Since giving her first. broadcast in Invercargill 12 years ago, Janetta McStay has had some of her work recorded by the BBC. One of her ambitions is to tour New Zealand with a concert party similar to the entertainment unit of which she is now manager as well as pianist. Three of her recordings, made in London, will be heard from 4YZ at 8.0 p.m, on Sunday, July 6. They will be Palmgren’s "En Route," Rachmaninoff’s Prelude in G Major, Op. 32, No. 5, and Medtner’s "A Fairy Tale" Op. 51, No. 3. (See potograph on page 21.) Brass Bandstand OVERS of band, music will welcome the arrival from England of BBC recorded programmes by British bands, which will be heard, under the title Brass Bandstand, from 3YA on Mondays, 4YA on Tuesdays, and 2YA on Fridays, and later from other stations, The

band to be heard from 3YA on Monday, June 30, is the Fairey Aviation Works Band, conducted by Harry Mortimer. Like many other successful bands, it comes from the North of EnglandStockport in Cheshire-and was founded in 1935. It startled the brass band world by winning the Belle Vue championship three times in four years, and in 1945 it carried off the National Championship of Britain, the youngest band to win championship honours. In this programme it will play the test piece for the championship, Denis Wright’s "Overture for an Epic Occasion," and-a novelty for brass bands-"The Sleigh Ride," a folk dance originally composed for orchestra by Mozart. Listeners to 4YA on Tuesday, July 1, will hear the Scottisn Co-operative Wholesale Society Band, and this same programme will also be broadcast from 2YA the following Friday, together with one by the Park and Dare Workmen’s Band, Further notes on these bands and their programmes will appear on this page later, For listening times turn to the programme pages in this issue. ; Forgotten Barrie Play \V HILE looking through the mass of papers in Sir James Barrie’s desk, his secretary, Lady Cynthia Asquith, came across the typescript of The Fight for Mr. Lapraik, written by Barrie some years previously (in 1916) and apparently entirely forgotten by its author. When it was first written, a theatrical manager wanted to present it at once,’ _ but Barrie considered a revolving stage indispensable to its proper and at that time only one such stage © existed in London and that was not available. Now, so many years after Barrie wrote it, The Fight for Mr. Lapraik is to be heard on the air, as produced by the BBC. Mr. Lapraik, created in Barrie’s most macabre vein, is a man whose degenerate self fights his old self for possession of his personality, and the character is played by Bernard Miles. The play will be heard from 3YA on Wednesday, July 2, at 9.52 p.m.