Well, I’m not sure if two years in a row makes it a tradition, but it’s starting to feel like one. We’re back again with our individual round up blogs, highlighting the best bits of our year on About the BBC. Here’s my whistlestop tour through the last 12 months:
My year started very pleasantly with a band trip up to Salford in January to play a live session on Marc Riley’s 6Music show. I was excited to finally get the opportunity to have an, albeit brief, nosey around the habitat of BBC North. Very lovely it was too.
Chris T-T and The Hoodrats with Marc Riley
Manchester was the location for the first BBC 6Music Festival in February. I was, shall we say, disappointed not to have attended but am hoping there will be a ‘second BBC 6Music Festival’ in 2015, for which I will be more on the ball about getting tickets to.
In March, BBC staff went running mad for Sport Relief. A Perspex box set up in the Plaza at Broadcasting House saw Jo Whiley run on a treadmill for 26 hours and many others do their bit for the charity, whose £71.8 million provided a large proportion of this year’s BBC charity appeals total. I didn’t run, or cycle but I did get to film two of my colleagues doing so.
BBC Two turned 50 in April. Being as demure as it is, the channel didn’t want a big fuss, but the corporation did mark the occasion with a balloon and a party popper or two. I particularly liked my jobshare Hannah’s tribute, a compilation of all BBC Two’s controllers from 1964 to present day.
Happy 50th Birthday BBC Two
In May a ‘little’ BBC drama called Happy Valley came on the scene. Grippingly unpretentious, Sarah Lancashire as sergeant Catherine Cawood had the nation hooked as she tackled her demons and the man who destroyed her family. The Sally Wainwright penned drama is set to return for a second series, and the 2014 Radio Times critic’s poll put the show at no.1 ahead of fellow BBC programmes Line of Duty and Sherlock, in second and third place respectively.
The last weekend in June was the domain of Glastonbury. The BBC’s coverage went further than ever before. The now, sadly, Ex-Editor of the Media Centre website, Ben Murray wrote a wonderful blog on the BBC’s history (and some of his own) with the festival.
Gearing up to the World War One centenary in August, I was sent ‘out into the field’ in July to cover the launch of BBC Learning’s World War One at Home. An interactive experience that went round the country, it gave people the opportunity to learn more about how the war affected their local area and communities. It was an amazing experience, especially finding my grandfather’s records online with the help of the Imperial War Museum.
August saw a brand new Doctor Who regenerate onto our screens in the shape of Peter Capaldi, and also marked the tenth anniversary of the death of John Peel. The BBC also commemorated the outbreak of World War One on August 4th.
The About the BBC team moved offices this year, from White City to Broadcasting House in W1A (so that’s all good then), but I am glad I was at W12 long enough to have a look round the ‘doughnut’ of Television Centre before they closed it down for good in September.
Sir David Attenborough
In October I got to sit in the same room as Sir David Attenborough, that’s THE Sir David Attenborough. Admittedly there were a few hundred other people there too in the BBC Radio Theatre watching the preview of the first episode of Life Story, but still, I’m having that one… as a highlight… of my life.
In November Blondie’s Debbie Harry and Chris Stein walked through our office and Mackenzie Crook’s understated comedy The Detectorists tickled my sides and melted my heart.
Launched this year, BBC Music held its inaugural awards ceremony in December, but the glitz and glamour of that night passed me by. I was more interested in the BBC Music event the following day, On The Beat, which debated the current state of the music industry and how music will be consumed in the future.
And so, looking to the future, may I take this opportunity to wish you all the very best for 2015.
Jen Macro is Digital Content Producer, About the BBC website and blog.
