SATURDAY 26 AUGUST 2017

SAT 19:00 The Brain with David Eagleman (b06zdnkm)
Who Is in Control?

Series in which Dr David Eagleman takes viewers on an extraordinary journey that explores how the brain, locked in silence and darkness without direct access to the world, conjures up the rich and beautiful world we all take for granted.

This episode explores the great deception that greets us each morning when we wake up - it feels as though we are in conscious control of our lives, but in fact almost every action we take, every decision we make, every belief that we hold is driven by parts of the brain that we have no access to.

Dr Eagleman reveals the electrical storm of unconscious neural activity that accompanies even the simplest of actions. We meet a patient who has lost the ability to walk without consciously controlling every movement. If he's distracted for even a moment he will fall.

To demonstrate the proficiency of the unconscious brain, Dr Eagleman competes with a ten-year-old world champion in the sport of cup stacking. Wearing EEG caps to record their brain activity reveals that although the champion is performing at much greater speed and precision, his brain is almost at rest. When a skill sinks below the level of conscious, controlling this allows for much greater speed and efficiency.

Dr Eagleman reveals that everything from who we find attractive to how we describe the relationship we have with our mother can be influenced by factors that we have no conscious control over. But the unconscious has a dark side, as the story of Ken Parks - who killed his mother-in-law in his sleep - demonstrates. Our consciousness is needed to arbitrate between competing systems in the brain that, left to their own devices, are liable to run amok.

Dr Eagleman ends with a brief journey through free will, and the deep question of whether we have any conscious control over our lives. Although there is tantalising evidence that we can feel as though we are consciously in control when we are not, the experimental jury is still out on whether or not free will is an illusion. However, free will or no free will, the human brain's extraordinary complexity guarantees that life will never feel predictable.


SAT 20:00 Fossil Wonderlands: Nature's Hidden Treasures (b03yfqj8)
Feathered Dinosaurs

Professor Richard Fortey travels to north eastern China to see a fossil site known as the 'Dinosaur Pompeii' - a place that has yielded spectacular remains of feathered dinosaurs and rewritten the story of the origins of birds. Among the amazing finds he investigates are the feathered cousin of T-rex, a feathered dinosaur with strong parallels to living pandas, and some of the most remarkable flying animals that have ever lived.


SAT 21:00 Inspector Montalbano (b08rn19h)
The Mud Pyramid

A man's body is found inside an industrial pipe on a building site. Montalbano and Fazio manage to identify the victim and try to contact his missing wife. Meanwhile, journalist Lucia Gambardella reaches out to Montalbano with information on a local corruption ring involving fraudulent building contracts.

In Italian with English subtitles.


SAT 22:45 Top of the Pops (b092scmr)
Simon Bates and Peter Powell present the pop chart programme, first broadcast on 17 May 1984. Includes appearances from Break Machine, Deniece Williams, Marillion, Hazell Dean, Womack & Womack, Ultravox, Duran Duran and Kenny Loggins.


SAT 23:15 Billy Fury: The Sound of Fury (b077x1fk)
Documentary which recounts the story of Billy Fury and the birth of British pop music. His first album, The Sound of Fury (released in 1960), has become a landmark record in British rock 'n' roll history.

Born in Liverpool during the Second World War, Ronnie Wycherley became an overnight sensation in 1958 when he was asked to go on stage and sing a couple of his self-penned songs by showbiz impresario Larry Parnes. Ronnie's knees shook with nerves, but over 2,000 screaming girls welcomed the new star of British rock 'n' roll and the headline in the local newspaper the following day was 'Dingle boy with a hot guitar'.

With more Top 40 hits than The Beatles during the 60s, Billy Fury's major hits included Halfway to Paradise, Wondrous Place, Jealousy, Last Night Was Made For Love and many more.

Aged just 42, Billy died of heart failure after a recording session. But his fans have never forgotten him, and every year on the anniversary of his death they gather to pay their tributes at Mill Hill cemetery. Lord Puttnam sums up Fury's contribution to modern music in the programme by saying that, 'without Billy Fury, I honestly don't think The Beatles would have happened'.


SAT 00:45 Britain's Most Fragile Treasure (b0161dgq)
Historian Dr Janina Ramirez unlocks the secrets of a centuries-old masterpiece in glass. At 78 feet in height, the famous Great East Window at York Minster is the largest medieval stained-glass window in the country and the creative vision of a single artist, a mysterious master craftsman called John Thornton, one of the earliest named English artists.

The Great East Window has been called England's Sistine Chapel. Within its 311 stained-glass panels is the entire history of the world, from the first day to the Last Judgment, and yet it was made 100 years before Michelangelo's own masterpiece. The scale of Thornton's achievement is revealed as Dr Ramirez follows the work of a highly skilled conservation team at York Glaziers Trust. They dismantled the entire window as part of a five-year project to repair centuries of damage and restore it to its original glory.

It is a unique opportunity for Dr Ramirez to examine Thornton's greatest work at close quarters, to discover details that would normally be impossible to see and to reveal exactly how medieval artists made images of such delicacy and complexity using the simplest of tools.

The Great East Window of York Minster is far more than a work of artistic genius, it is a window into the medieval world and mind, telling us who we once were and who we still are, all preserved in the most fragile medium of all.


SAT 01:45 The World's Most Expensive Stolen Paintings (b03n2yzh)
Art critic Alastair Sooke delves into the murky world of art theft. Despite the high stakes - and often daring - involved, many cases are shrouded in mystery and go unnoticed by the media.

Around 47,000 works of art are reported missing each year, yet it is only the heists involving the world's most valuable paintings that hit the headlines. But high-profile or not - once gone, the works are rarely recovered.


SAT 02:45 Fossil Wonderlands: Nature's Hidden Treasures (b03yfqj8)
[Repeat of broadcast at 20:00 today]



SUNDAY 27 AUGUST 2017

SUN 19:00 BBC Proms (b093lvn5)
2017

CBSO play Beethoven’s Fifth

Katie Derham introduces the first of six weekly programmes celebrating the 125th anniversary of the Proms, featuring some of the most memorable concerts from the unrivalled Proms archive. Katie is joined by conductor Mirga Gražinyte-Tyla to mark Beethoven’s 250th birthday year with another chance to see her acclaimed Proms appearance with the City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra from 2017.

As well as a thrillingly fresh interpretation of Beethoven’s famous Fifth Symphony, the concert also includes his Leonore Overture No 3 and a world premiere by Irish maverick Gerald Barry, performed by tenor Allan Clayton. All this alongside Stravinsky’s Violin Concerto in D Major performed by Leila Josefowicz.


SUN 20:40 London to Brighton Side by Side (b00f2zxt)
In 1953, the BBC made a point-of-view film from the London to Brighton train. In 1983, they did the same again. This is a film made of both runs at once, with every bridge, siding, tunnel and station running side by side in unlikely synchronisation.


SUN 20:45 Wild (b00jd9yx)
Scotland

Otters, Puffins and Seals

Wildlife cameraman Gordon Buchanan explores his native Mull and some of the nearby islands, filming otters, deer, puffins, seals and a minke whale.


SUN 21:00 Gluck - Who Did She Think He Was? (p057nlsd)
The untold story of Britain's cross-dressing high society painter.

Gluck was one of the British Establishment's go-to portrait painters of the 1930s. Her shows were attended by royalty, aristocrats and celebrities. She also dressed as a man and called her exhibitions 'one-man shows'. Her lovers were all women, including flower arranger to the stars Constance Spry, and Edith Heald, the ex-mistress of WB Yeats.

How did Gluck get away with it?


SUN 22:00 Metal at the BBC (b00r600p)
Compilation of memorable heavy metal performances from BBC TV shows, including Iron Maiden, Black Sabbath, Judas Priest and Motorhead.


SUN 22:30 Reading and Leeds Festival (b0938kx8)
2017

Muse

Supermassive riffs and plenty of rock bombast from Matt Bellamy and co


SUN 00:00 Queen: From Rags to Rhapsody (b06s76l4)
To mark the 40th anniversary of Bohemian Rhapsody, this documentary digs deep into archive to tell the story of Queen as it follows their journey from a struggling band gigging at pubs and colleges to the moment they captured the UK's hearts and minds with what was to become one of - if not the - greatest song of all time.

Queen's formative years have never been explored in such detail. With a wealth of unseen interviews, recently unearthed rushes of Queen's first ever video and outtakes from the recording sessions of Bohemian Rhapsody itself, this is the unique story of early Queen, told by the band themselves.

This documentary completes the final part of the trilogy alongside Days of Our Lives and Freddie Mercury: The Great Pretender.

It's simple. It's real. It's raw. It's what happened.


SUN 01:00 Radio 2 In Concert (b06pk50c)
Jeff Lynne's ELO

The BBC's Radio Theatre opens its doors to an iconic band that have been making music history since the 1970s. ELO and their frontman Jeff Lynne have sold over 50 million albums worldwide and created a back catalogue of chart-topping hits that include Mr Blue Sky, Telephone Line, Livin' Thing and Strange Magic. Jeff Lynne's ELO play his classic tracks along with some new songs from their first album of new material in almost 15 years, Alone in the Universe, to an intimate crowd of fans.

Known as one of the most iconic forces in music history, ELO delivers the new album, Jeff Lynne's ELO Alone in the Universe , which will be the first new ELO music in a decade. As with ELO's previous chart-topping albums, Jeff Lynne continues to serve as ELO's producer, songwriter, arranger, lead singer and guitarist. Jeff Lynne was the creative genius behind ELO which sold more than 50 million albums worldwide, had more than 20 Top 40 Hits across the US and the UK and received countless awards and accolades. At the time of ELO's formation, Lynne had said the goal was to create modern rock and pop songs - a goal that remains true some 30 years later with the creation of this new material.


SUN 02:00 Metal at the BBC (b00r600p)
[Repeat of broadcast at 22:00 today]


SUN 02:30 Gluck - Who Did She Think He Was? (p057nlsd)
[Repeat of broadcast at 21:00 today]



MONDAY 28 AUGUST 2017

MON 19:00 World News Today (b092y1g3)
The latest national and international news, exploring the day's events from a global perspective.


MON 19:30 World War I at Home (b045gj40)
Despatches from Tyneside

Chris Jackson follows a community project creating a unique picture of the impact of conflict on those living and working on Tyneside with rarely seen footage. Chris hears that Tyneside bore not just physical but deep emotional scars from World War I.


MON 20:00 War at Sea: Scotland's Story (b05qqhcn)
The Dreadnoughts of Scapa Flow

As the Great War began, the Royal Navy rushed to Orkney's great natural harbour, Scapa Flow.

David Hayman uncovers the compelling characters of the little-known naval war - cautious Admiral Jellicoe and Admiral Beatty, a playboy.

The story of great technologies and epic battles for control of the North Sea.


MON 21:00 The Normans (b00tcgkl)
Men from the North

In the first episode of a three-part series, Professor Robert Bartlett explores how the Normans developed from a band of marauding Vikings into the formidable warriors who conquered England in 1066. He tells how the Normans established their new province of Normandy -'land of the northmen' - in northern France. They went on to build some of the finest churches in Europe and turned into an unstoppable force of Christian knights and warriors, whose legacy is all around us to this day. Under the leadership of Duke William, the Normans expanded into the neighbouring provinces of northern France. But William's greatest achievement was the conquest of England in 1066. The Battle of Hastings marked the end of the Anglo-Saxon aristocracy and monarchy. The culture and politics of England would now be transformed by the Normans.


MON 22:00 Blood and Gold: The Making of Spain with Simon Sebag Montefiore (b06rwgp7)
Conquest

In the first episode, Simon explores Spain's early years, its emergence as the battleground of empires and its golden age under the Cordoba Caliphate.


MON 23:00 Storyville (b05t2h9x)
Himmler: The Decent One

Through previously undiscovered private letters, photos and diaries that were found in the Himmler family house in 1945, this documentary exposes a unique and at times uncomfortable access to the life and mind of the merciless 'architect of the Final Solution', Heinrich Himmler. Himmler writes, 'In life one must always be decent, courageous and kind-hearted'. How can a man be a hero in his own eyes and a mass murderer in the eyes of the world?

The text of the film consists exclusively of original documents from Himmler's lifetime, combined with news and personal archive from sources ranging from the descendants of top Nazis to working-class individuals. It forms a unique portrait of one the most prominent figures of the Third Reich, the SS commander Heinrich Himmler.


MON 00:30 Fabric of Britain (b03bgrvf)
Knitting's Golden Age

Documentary exploring how knitting rose from basic craft to the height of popular fashion in the 20th century. It's a craft that has given us scratchy jumpers, sexy bathing costumes and the infamous poodle loo cover, has sustained Britain through the hardships of war and shown a mother's love to generations of little ones. Today, knitwear has become a staple of every wardrobe thanks to a prince's golfing taste, The Beatles and 80s breakfast television. Warm-hearted and surprising, this is the story of the people's craft, and a very British one at that.


MON 01:30 War at Sea: Scotland's Story (b05qqhcn)
[Repeat of broadcast at 20:00 today]


MON 02:30 The Normans (b00tcgkl)
[Repeat of broadcast at 21:00 today]



TUESDAY 29 AUGUST 2017

TUE 19:00 World News Today (b092y1gg)
The latest national and international news, exploring the day's events from a global perspective.


TUE 19:30 World War I at Home (b045gjql)
The Equine Army

Saul David follows the story of hundreds of thousands of animals prepared in the West Country for the frontline. From cavalry horses to mules, he rediscovers the lost camps set up to train the animals, what life in them was like and the changes they made to society as a whole.


TUE 20:00 India's Frontier Railways (b0555xgw)
The Maitree Express

Filmed during the holy month of Ramadan, this is a journey from India into Bangladesh on a train that reunites the region of Bengal. Partitioned in 1947, Bengal was divided in half, creating East Pakistan - a satellite state ruled by Pakistan. It was an unwelcome occupation. In 1971, they fought a war of independence and East Pakistan became the People's Republic of Bangladesh. 37 years later, the first train ran between India and Bangladesh - the Maitree Express. Maitree means friendship.

It takes 12 hours to make the 392km journey from Kolkata to Dhaka, and staffing on the train is almost the same on both sides of the border. They speak the same language, share a history and all love fish.

Amirul, once a freedom fighter in the war of independence, now plays announcements and religious tapes on the Maitree. Aalo supports his family by selling chocolates on the train, but has a problem with the 30-degree heat. Sixteen-year-old Abdullah ran away from home and a madrasa. Now he sells papers on Dhaka's trains and platforms, hoping for a brighter future. Gautam Bannerjee is a guard on the Maitree and a respected astrologer. Can his calculations foretell the future? Urmi Rahman, a writer, was born in Bangladesh, married an Indian and lives in Kolkata, but she is very clear about her identity. Krishendu Basu is happy with his life. Not only a guard, he is also a tabla player, photographer and self-confessed foodie. But music is his passion.

These stories of people who work, travel or depend on the Maitree Express take us on a journey through history, sharing their hopes, needs and desires - on India's frontier railways.


TUE 21:00 Awesome Beauty: The Art of Industrial Britain (b093q7gp)
Lachlan Goudie explores Britain's spectacular industrial landscapes and the artists and artworks inspired by them in a passionate and thought-provoking journey that challenges our national stereotypes. Travelling the length and breadth of the UK, and visiting an impressive range of industrial sites, from shipyards to quarries, mines to abandoned wind tunnels, steelworks to space age laboratories, Goudie builds a surprising and compelling alternative picture of Britain.

Featuring revelatory industrial art by the likes of JMW Turner, Graham Sutherland and photographer Maurice Broomfield, the film reveals the awesome beauty, drama and significance of our industrial heritage and proves there is so much more to these isles than the picture postcard cliche of a 'green and pleasant land'.


TUE 22:00 Inspector Montalbano (b08rn19h)
[Repeat of broadcast at 21:00 on Saturday]


TUE 23:45 The Brain with David Eagleman (b07030n9)
How Do I Decide?

Series in which Dr David Eagleman takes viewers on an extraordinary journey that explores how the brain, locked in silence and darkness without direct access to the world, conjures up the rich and beautiful world we all take for granted.

The human brain is the most complex object we've discovered in the universe, and every day much of its neural circuitry is taken up with the tens of thousands of decisions we need to make. This episode takes a journey through the unseen world of decisions, and how they get made. We start with a simple one - choosing a flavour of frozen yoghurt - and learn that every decision we make is born of a 'winner takes all' competition between rival neural networks.

We meet a woman who is unable to make decisions because of damage to her orbito-frontal cortex - an area that is key to integrating the signals streaming in from the body - and discover that feedback from the body is vital to the decision-making process. Dr Eagleman reveals that something as simple as when you ate your last meal can even influence life-changing decisions, as a study of judges showed they were less likely to give parole when they were hungry.

So many of our conscious life-defining decisions are actually steered by unconscious influences, whether it's deciding whom we find attractive or how to vote in the next election. Professor Read Montague reveals that he can be 95 per cent certain about which political party we will vote for based on our brain's response to disgusting imagery. The more disgusted a brain response is, the more likely that person is to vote Conservative.

Finally, Dr Eagleman takes a look at how we can take better control of the decisions we make, and uses an exciting new technique called fMRI neurofeedback to retrain the brains of drug addicts who want to make better decisions, to say 'no'.


TUE 00:45 A History of Art in Three Colours (b01lng0m)
White

In the Age of Reason, it was the rediscovery of the white columns and marbles of antiquity that made white the most virtuous of colours. For flamboyant JJ Wickelmann and British genius Josiah Wedgwood, white embodied all the Enlightenment's values of justice, equality and reason.


TUE 01:45 India's Frontier Railways (b0555xgw)
[Repeat of broadcast at 20:00 today]


TUE 02:45 Awesome Beauty: The Art of Industrial Britain (b093q7gp)
[Repeat of broadcast at 21:00 today]



WEDNESDAY 30 AUGUST 2017

WED 19:00 World News Today (b092y1gx)
The latest national and international news, exploring the day's events from a global perspective.


WED 19:30 World War I at Home (b045gjnp)
The Spies Who Loved Folkestone

Writer Anthony Horowitz learns how Folkestone became a hotbed of espionage and discovers the men, women and children who risked their lives operating as spooks during the First World War.


WED 20:00 Storm Troupers: The Fight to Forecast the Weather (b07d7mqg)
Episode 2

Alok Jha investigates how modern weather forecasting was born amid the horrific catastrophes of the 20th century, as meteorologists helped fight two world wars and tried to predict natural disasters across the globe.

He tells the story of Lewis Fry Richardson, a visionary scientist who laid the foundations of modern computer-based weather forecasting in between shifts as an ambulance driver in the trenches of World War I.

In Norway, Alok sees how meteorologists managed to unravel the mysteries of weather fronts and in India he sees how famines, which cost millions of lives, spurred meteorologists to try to understand climate on a global scale.

Alok investigates how, during World War II, weather forecasters working from a secret camp outside London under the most testing wartime conditions were called on to make the most important weather forecast in history - they were asked to predict if conditions would be good enough for the D-Day invasion to proceed. He sees how a family operating a tiny weather station on the west coast of Ireland became a key part of this extraordinary drama, as they provided weather readings that were vital to the outcome of the war.


WED 21:00 Frank Lloyd Wright: The Man Who Built America (b08ywgvm)
Frank Lloyd Wright is probably America's greatest ever architect. But few people know about the Welsh roots that shaped his life and world-famous buildings. Now, leading Welsh architect Jonathan Adams sets off across America to explore Frank Lloyd Wright's masterpieces for himself. Along the way, he uncovers the tempestuous life story of the man behind them and the secrets of his radical Welsh background.

In a career spanning seven decades, Frank Lloyd Wright built over 500 buildings and changed the face of modern architecture. Fallingwater, the house over the waterfall, has been called the greatest house of the 20th century. The spiralling Guggenheim Museum in New York reinvented the art museum.

Wright's Welsh mother was born and raised near Llandysul in west Wales, and emigrated to America with her family in 1844. Her son Frank was raised in a Unitarian community in Wisconsin. The values he absorbed there were based on a love of nature, the importance of hard work and the need to question convention and defy it where necessary. Wright's architecture was shaped by these beliefs. He built his lifelong home in the valley he was raised in, and he named it after an ancient Welsh bard - Taliesin. It was the scene of many adventures and of a horrific crime. In 1914, a servant at Taliesin ran amok and killed seven people. They included Wright's partner Mamah Cheney and her two young children.

150 years after his birth, Adams argues that Frank Lloyd Wright is now a vitally important figure who can teach us how to build for a better world. Wright's belief in what he called organic architecture - buildings that grace the landscape and respond to people's individual needs - is more relevant than ever, in Wales and around the world.


WED 22:00 Tales from the National Parks (b016psp6)
The Peak District

The national parks are Britain's most treasured landscapes, but they are increasingly becoming battlefields. They were designated 60 years ago as places for everyone, but is that still the case? In this series, the award-winning film-maker Richard Macer spent a year amid conflicts in three different parks, on a journey to discover who they are really for.

In each park the stories are very different, but there is something that unites them all - fiercely divided communities who are prepared to fight in order to preserve their right to enjoy the countryside. For each film Macer has secured access to the National Park Authority - an organisation which looks after the landscapes and decides upon planning matters. In all these stories the park authorities have a key role to play in trying to find amicable solutions to the problems which confront them.

A war is breaking out in the charming villages of the Peak District, with walkers, horseriders and residents angry at 4x4 drivers and trailbikers motoring up and down the green lanes for pleasure. So an 80-year-old retired primary school teacher decides to launch a campaign to get the motorists banned from a lane in her village of Great Longstone. Over the next few months the campaign snowballs, and more and more villages decide they've had enough of the off-roaders on their lanes.

Macer filmed for over a year in the Peak District and was granted exclusive access to the inner workings of how the park is run. Will the Peak District Park Authority bow down to public pressure or will it side with the off-roaders?


WED 23:00 How It Works (b01g98vb)
Ceramics

Professor Mark Miodownik traces the story of ceramics. He looks at how we started with simple clay, sand and rock and changed them into pottery, glass and concrete - materials that would allow us to build cities, transform the way we view our world and communicate at the speed of light. Deep within their inner structure Mark discovers some of ceramics' most intriguing secrets. He reveals why glass can be utterly transparent, why concrete continues to harden for hundreds of years and how cooling ceramics could transform the way we power cities of the future.


WED 00:00 Storm Troupers: The Fight to Forecast the Weather (b07d7mqg)
[Repeat of broadcast at 20:00 today]


WED 01:00 Fabric of Britain (b03bm1rg)
The Story of Wallpaper

Paul Martin presents the surprisingly compelling story of wallpaper. From its origins in the 16th century to the present day, wallpaper has always had something to say about us and our tastes and aspirations. It's a journey that takes Paul from the grandest of stately homes to the poorest of two-up-two-downs, the height of luxury to industrial grime and infestation. There are some fascinating tales along the way; wallpaper may seem insignificant, but governments have tried to control it, and it's even threatened to poison us.

The programme also reveals the art and craft of wallpaper. Paul learns how to make flock wallpaper, very much a deluxe item in the 18th century, helps to uncover a rare antique piece of wallpapering from a building site, and prints the designs of Marthe Armitage. Along the way, he meets contemporary designers and makers, and tells the stories of such historical wallpaper luminaries as Pugin and William Morris.


WED 02:00 Tales from the National Parks (b016psp6)
[Repeat of broadcast at 22:00 today]


WED 03:00 Frank Lloyd Wright: The Man Who Built America (b08ywgvm)
[Repeat of broadcast at 21:00 today]



THURSDAY 31 AUGUST 2017

THU 19:00 World News Today (b092y1hb)
The latest national and international news, exploring the day's events from a global perspective.


THU 19:30 Top of the Pops (b093lx59)
John Peel and David Jensen present the pop chart programme, first broadcast on 7 June 1984. Includes appearances from Spandau Ballet, Howard Jones, Evelyn Thomas, Bananarama, Bronski Beat and Wham!


THU 20:00 Britain's Outlaws: Highwaymen, Pirates and Rogues (b06qgh3w)
Knights of the Road: The Highwayman's Story

Few figures in British history have captured the popular imagination as much as the outlaw. From gentleman highwaymen, via swashbuckling pirates to elusive urban thieves and rogues, the brazen escapades and the flamboyance of the outlaw made them the antihero of their time - feared by the rich, admired by the poor and celebrated by writers and artists.

In this three-part series, historian Dr Sam Willis travels the open roads, the high seas and urban alleyways to explore Britain's 17th- and 18th-century underworld of highwaymen, pirates and rogues, bringing the great age of the British outlaw vividly to life.

Sam shows that, far from being 'outsiders', outlaws were very much a product of their time, shaped by powerful national events. In each episode, he focuses not just on a particular type of outlaw, but a particular era - the series as a whole offers a chronological portrait of the changing face of crime in the 17th and 18th centuries.

Sam begins with the arrival of a new breed of gentleman criminal out of the ashes of the English Civil War - the highwayman. Heavily romanticised in literature, these glamorous gangsters became a social menace on the roads and a political thorn in the side of the creaking British state - threatening to steal our wallets and our hearts. But underneath the dashing image of stylish robbers on horseback lay a far darker reality.


THU 21:00 Andrew Marr's The Making of Modern Britain (b00p1gc0)
Having a Ball

Andrew Marr's epic series charting the events that shaped Britain.

In the 1920s, Imperial Britannia was sliding from view and a more modern Britain tried everything new and asked endless questions about how we should live our lives. A great new age of experiment arrived in politics, writing, art, sex and drugs. Survivors of World War I threw themselves into the new urban scene of nightclubs, cocktails and jazz, where royalty, gangsters and Hollywood stars rubbed shoulders with new money.

With rare archive material and vivid anecdotes, Andrew Marr tells the story of the postwar housing boom; the birth of radio broadcasting and the creation of the BBC; and revolutionary union activities on 'Red' Clydeside. Michael Collins risked his life by negotiating with Lloyd George over Ireland, and his assassination kicked off a bloody civil war that was feared by some to be the beginning of the end of the British Empire. The modern scourge of political sleaze engulfed Lloyd George in a cash-for-honours scandal involving blackmail, spies and the strange disappearance of a radical MP. The General Strike and the Wall Street Crash brought Britain's Roaring Twenties to a dramatic close. As the cocktail party of the decade came to an end, there were uncertain times ahead for modern Britain.


THU 22:00 Wonders of the Universe (b00zv39p)
Falling

In the third episode, Professor Brian Cox takes on the story of the force that sculpts the entire universe - gravity.

Gravity seems so familiar, and yet it is one of the strangest and most surprising forces in the universe. Starting with a zero-gravity flight, Brian experiences the feeling of total weightlessness, and considers how much of an effect gravity has had on the world around us.

But gravity also acts over much greater distances. It is the great orchestrator of the cosmos. It dictates our orbit around the sun, our relationship with the other planets in our solar system, and even the way in which our solar system orbits our galaxy.

Yet the paradox of gravity is that it is actually a relatively weak force. Brian takes a face distorting trip in a centrifuge to explain how it is that gravity achieves its great power, before looking at the role it plays in one of the most extraordinary phenomena in the universe - a neutron star. Although it is just a few kilometres across, it is so dense that its gravity is 100,000 million times as strong as on Earth.

Over the centuries our quest to understand gravity has allowed us to understand some of the true wonders of the universe, and Brian reveals that it is scientists' continuing search for answers that inspires his own sense of wonder.


THU 23:00 Timeshift (b06pm5vf)
Series 15

How Britain Won the Space Race: The Story of Bernard Lovell and Jodrell Bank

The unlikely story of how one man with some ex-WWII army equipment eventually turned a muddy field in Cheshire into a key site in the space race. That man was Bernard Lovell, and his telescope at Jodrell Bank would be used at the height of the Cold War by both the Americans and the Russians to track their competing spacecraft. It also put Britain at the forefront of radio astronomy, a new science which transformed our knowledge of space and provided the key to understanding the most mind-bending theory of the beginnings of the universe - the Big Bang.


THU 00:00 Top of the Pops (b093lx59)
[Repeat of broadcast at 19:30 today]


THU 00:30 The Heart of Country: How Nashville Became Music City USA (b04ndxlr)
This historical biography of the city that is the glittering hub of country music reveals the dynamic relationship between commerce and art, music and the market, that has defined Nashville since 1925. It explores the conflicts and demons that have confronted Nashville's artists and music industry down the years, such as the creative pressures of the 'Nashville Sound', the devastating impact of Elvis and then Bob Dylan, the rise and fall of the urban cowboys and the struggle of several Nashville legends to confront their inner demons.

The story unfolds through the testimony of musicians, producers, broadcasters and rare archive of the country legends. These include Dolly Parton, Charley Pride, Willie Nelson, Ricky Skaggs, Steve Earle, Kris Kristofferson and several hit-making contemporary stars - Kasey Musgraves, Brad Paisley and Jason Aldean. This cast reveal the unique power of country music to hold up a mirror to its fans and create a music that has - for decades - touched the hearts of the south and of working people. Kristofferson calls it the 'white man's soul music'.

Also featured are extensive musical performances by Nashville's greatest, from Johnny Cash to Loretta Lynn and George Jones to Garth Brooks. Several of Nashville's younger stars describe their ongoing journey from their hometowns in the south to the streets of this city, from the first studio demos and the sawdust of the Broadway bars to the stadiums and promo videos that now define country stardom.


THU 02:00 Wonders of the Universe (b00zv39p)
[Repeat of broadcast at 22:00 today]


THU 03:00 Britain's Outlaws: Highwaymen, Pirates and Rogues (b06qgh3w)
[Repeat of broadcast at 20:00 today]



FRIDAY 01 SEPTEMBER 2017

FRI 19:00 World News Today (b092y1hs)
The latest national and international news, exploring the day's events from a global perspective.


FRI 19:30 Top of the Pops (b093lyjn)
Peter Powell and Mike Read present the pop chart programme, first broadcast on 14 June 1984. Includes appearances from The Art Company, The Smiths, Scritti Politti, Ozzy Osbourne, Nick Heyward, Nik Kershaw and Frankie Goes To Hollywood.


FRI 20:00 BBC Proms (b093m2wv)
2017

Big Band Swing with Clare Teal

Singer and broadcaster Clare Teal heads the charge in this big band spectacular. Travel back in time with this rip-roaring Prom to the 1930s and 1940s and celebrate the irrepressible music of Duke Ellington, Benny Goodman, Count Basie, Tommy Dorsey, Stan Kenton and more, plus a special tribute to the unassuming giant of the big band world, Mary Lou Williams.

Band leaders Guy Barker and Winston Rollins take to the stage alongside their eponymous big bands with help from a myriad of guest artists.


FRI 22:15 BBC Proms (b093m2wx)
2017

Stax with Jools Holland

Founded in 1957, Memphis-based Stax Records was synonymous with southern soul - a distinctive blend of funk, gospel and R&B that brought listeners across America together at a time of racial conflict and political unrest. In this Late Night Prom, Jools Holland and his Rhythm & Blues Orchestra pay tribute to the pioneering label and celebrate the 50th anniversary of the Stax/Volt Revue's first tour of the UK, in a concert featuring some of the label's greatest surviving artists. Stax legends Booker T Jones and Sam Moore appear alongside Sir Tom Jones, a longtime fan and interpreter of the Stax songbook.

Both Jones and Moore were part of the 1967 tour and join fellow Stax artists William Bell, Steve Cropper and Eddie Floyd in this unique coming-together. They are joined by more fans of the Stax sound in Beverley Knight, James Morrison, Nadia Rose & Sweetie Irie and Ruby Turner.

Classic songs performed include the likes of Green Onions, Knock on Wood, Soul Man, Try a Little Tenderness and many more!


FRI 23:30 Sounds of the Sixties (b075f7r4)
Reversions

Swinging Sixties 1

Forget Madchester, forget Factory, forget Oasis. Manchester never sounded better than Herman's Hermits and the Hollies, who feature in this archive extravaganza.


FRI 23:45 Hello Quo (b03hy6vp)
You don't sell 128 million albums worldwide without putting in the graft and Status Quo are, quite possibly, the hardest-working band in Britain. Alan G Parker's documentary Hello Quo, specially re-edited for the BBC, recounts the band's epic story from the beginning - when south London schoolmates Francis Rossi and Alan Lancaster formed their first band with big ambitions of rock 'n' roll domination, quickly adding drummer John Coghlan and guitarist Rick Parfitt.

The film tells the story of Quo's hits from their unusually psychedelic early hit, Pictures of Matchstick Men, followed by a run through their classics from Down Down to Whatever You Want.

The band laughs off the constant ribbing about only using three chords and the film explores how Quo's heads-down boogie defined UK rock in the early 70s. Fender Stratocaster in hand, Quo have stood their ground and never shifted, but they have managed to adapt to scoring pop hits over five decades.

The original members of the 'frantic four' tell their story of a life in rock 'n' roll, alongside interviews from some prominent Quo fans, such as Paul Weller, whose first gig was the Quo at Guildford Civic Hall, to Brian May, who waxes lyrically about the opening riff to Pictures of Matchstick Men, while even Sir Cliff plays homage to the denim-clad rockers.


FRI 01:05 Top of the Pops (b093lyjn)
[Repeat of broadcast at 19:30 today]


FRI 01:45 When Pop Ruled My Life: The Fans' Story (b05wn8hf)
Journalist Kate Mossman explores the unique relationship between artist and fan, from The Beatles to One Direction, and her own evolving fascination with Queen.


FRI 02:45 One-Hit Wonders at the BBC (b05r7nxx)
Compilation of some indelible hits by artists we hardly heard from again, at least in a chart sense. Featuring Peter Sarstedt's Where Do You Go To (My Lovely)? - a number one in 1969 and a hit he never really matched, Trio's 1982 smash Da Da Da, Phyllis Nelson's 1985 lovers rock-style classic Move Closer, and The New Radicals' 1999 hit You Get What You Give.

We travel through the years selecting some of your favourite number ones and a few others that came close, revealing what's happened to the one-off hitmakers since and exploring the unwritten laws that help make sense of the one-hit wonder phenomenon.