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Betjeman's World

Readings by Tamsin Greig and archive recordings of former poet laureate John Betjeman are set alongside music by Butterworth, Grieg, and Flanders and Swan.

...Ringers in an oil-lit belfry - Bitton? Kelston? who shall say? -
Smoothly practicing a plain course, caverned out the dying day
As their melancholy music flooded up and ebbed away...

Today's Words and Music hears BBC archive recordings of Betjeman performing some of his best-loved poems - A Subaltern's Love Song and Christmas - and excerpts from broadcasts he gave on two of his passions: Victorian Architecture and the regional railway. Tamsin Greig reads more of his poetry, including his tender tribute to his dead father, On a Portrait of a Deaf Man, alongside assessments of the poet from the likes of Alan Bennett and former chair of the Arts Council Lord Goodman.

The world Betjeman evokes is one in which beauty is prized above all else - not a Romantic ideal of beauty but an everyday kind of beauty: the beauty of a still day at the seaside, the beauty of a peal of bells across a landscape, and yes, the beauty of the women who were frequently his muses. A man of his time, he was simultaneously nostalgic for the past and ahead of the curve in many respects. His acute observation, his wit, and his palpable passions fill his work with a genuineness that brings his subjects to life vividly and directly.

The music we hear ranges from Grace Williams's Welsh seascape to Arnold Bax's dramatic depiction of the Cornish coast, via Anglican hymns, Pink Floyd and Flanders and Swan's comic and moving rendition of The Slow Train. There are musical settings of Betjeman's poetry from Madeleine Dring and Jim Parker, the latter taken from Banana Blush, a niche recording made in the 1970s and featuring Betjeman himself reciting his poetry. And there are bells - lots of bells.

Producer: David Fay, in collaboration with BBC Archives.

12 days left to listen

1 hour, 14 minutes

Last on

Christmas Day 202517:00
BBC Radio 3

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Music Played

Timings (where shown) are from the start of the programme in hours and minutes

  • 00:02

    Grace Williams

    Calm sea in summer (Sea Sketches)

    Orchestra: English Chamber Orchestra. Conductor: David Atherton.
    • LYRITA.
  • 00:10

    Thomas Morley

    Now is the Month of Maying

    Ensemble: The King’s Singers. Director: Anthony Rooley.
    • WARNER.
  • 00:11

    Vincent Youmans

    Tahiti Trot, Op 16

    Orchestrator: Dmitry Shostakovich. Orchestra: Royal Scottish National Orchestra. Conductor: Neeme Järvi.
    • Chandos.
  • 00:15

    George Butterworth

    Loveliest of Trees (A Shropshire Lad)

    Singer: Christopher Maltman. Performer: Roger Vignoles.
    • Hyperion.
  • 00:18

    Jim Parker

    A Shropshire Lad

    Ensemble: Banana Blush Ensemble. Conductor: Jim Parker.
    • VIRGIN CHATTERING CLASSICS.
  • 00:23

    Johann Abraham Peter Schulz

    We Plough the Fields and Scatter

    Performer: John Keys.
    • John Keys.
  • 00:28

    Edvard Grieg

    Aase’s Death (Peer Gynt Suite No 1)

    Orchestra: Bournemouth Symphony Orchestra. Conductor: Paavo Berglund.
    • EMI.
  • 00:33

    Change Ringing On Handbells Group

    Bristol Surprise Maximus

    • SAYDISC.
  • 00:37

    Morten Lauridsen

    O Magnum Mysterium

    Choir: ORA. Conductor: Suzi Digby.
    • harmonia mundi.
  • 00:43

    Madeleine Dring

    Song of a Nightclub Proprietess

    Performer: Susan Manoff. Singer: Adèle Charvet.
    • Alpha.
  • 00:46

    Pink Floyd

    Have A Cigar

    • Pink Floyd Records.
  • 00:50

    Arthur Honegger

    Pacific 231

    Orchestra: Tonhalle-Orchester Zürich. Conductor: David Zinman.
    • DECCA.
  • 00:57

    Gustav Holst

    A Somerset Rhapsody Op.21`2

    Orchestra: Royal Scottish National Orchestra. Conductor: David Lloyd‐Jones.
    • Naxos.
  • 01:06

    Arnold Bax

    Tintagel

    Orchestra: London Philharmonic Orchestra. Conductor: Osmo Vänskä.
    • London Philharmonic Orchestra.
  • 01:11

    Michael Flanders

    Slow Train

    Composer: Donald Swann. Singer: Michael Flanders. Performer: Donald Swann.
    • EMI.

Broadcasts

  • Sun 12 May 202418:00
    BBC Radio 3
  • Christmas Day 202517:00
    BBC Radio 3

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