Sir Clement Freud's funeral
17:35, Friday, 24 April 2009
It was Sir Clement Freud's funeral today (Friday) at St Bride's, Fleet Street in London. It was billed as being both a funeral and a celebration - and so it was. It was poignant and beautiful and peppered with references to Radio 4. One of the pieces of music chosen was 'Oh What a Beautiful Morning' from Oklahoma - a Clement Freud choice when he was on Desert Island Discs in 1967.
And the coffin was carried out of the church to the sound of 'The Minute Waltz' - the theme tune (of course) of Just a Minute (JAM). Various people used the key Just a Minute phrase - no hesitation, deviation or repetition - and one of his youngest grandchildren (he had 17) read out a string of words he liked to use on JAM - including ubiquitous and parallelogram... but ended up quoting his grandfather's favourite set of words. "And the winner is Clement Freud."
It was a vivid reminder of how the great Radio 4 programmes run deep in national life - and humbling.
- BBC News: In Pictures: Funeral for Freud
- BBC News: Brown Joins Sir Clement mourners.
- Further Coverage: The Daily Telegraph | The Guardian
- Stephen Fry: "it was touching, elegant, funny" Audio report of of the service
- Radio 4 Blog: Remembering Freud | BBC News: Parsons pays tribute to Sir Clement
Comment number 1.
At 22:03 26th Apr 2009, lordBeddGelert wrote:I shall miss Clement Freud very much on Just a Minute, although I believe some of his work has yet to be broadcast. So maybe we can enjoy that dry wit and lugubrious delivery with his swansong.
There is also a good article reporting his funeral in the Telegraph.
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/culture/culturenews/5215159/Sir-Clement-Freud-funeral.html
Clearly there will never be another Clement Freud. But will we ever even see his type again ? The emphasis nowadays on being a 'specialist' and in getting a degree and then working all hours mitigates against people becoming 'polymaths' and really enjoying life. We are all living longer and supposedly becoming healthier - but surely we are meant to have fun as well ?
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At 18:45 3rd May 2009, alexsandison wrote:This comment was removed because the moderators found it broke the house rules. Explain.
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