Bradshaw's 1913 Continental Railway Guide in hand, Michael Portillo makes a grand tour of a favourite Edwardian destination - Italy - where he experiences first hand the nation's need for speed in a state-of-the-art Maserati sports car.
Michael discovers from a British engineer how the leaning tower of Pisa was rescued from near collapse. In Carrara, he finds out how the marble used by Michelangelo is still quarried today and is invited to chip away at a contemporary sculpture. In Bologna, he embarks on a doomed search for spaghetti bolognese - until a cookery teacher takes pity on him and shows him how to make a much more authentic tagliatelle al ragu.
Following in the footsteps of Bradshaw's travellers, Michael explores the cradle of the Renaissance through Edwardian eyes but learns in Florence that the tourists' 'Italietta' was far removed from the new Italy envisaged by the futurists of the time. Heading north to Gargnano, Michael discovers the romantic hideaway of one of Britain's most famous writers, DH Lawrence, whose affair with his professor's wife scandalised his home country. Michael ends his journey in futuristic style with a high-speed boat trip across Lake Garda.
Iain Stewart follows in the footsteps of the founding father of geology, James Hutton. This Scottish rogue was a profound and original thinker who, 250 years ago, overturned ancient beliefs about how and when the world was formed. His ideas clashed with those of the most eminent scientist of his day. Lord Kelvin was determined to prove Hutton wrong.
Following on from his documentary Operation Mincemeat, based on his book of the same name, writer and presenter Ben MacIntyre returns to the small screen to bring to life his other bestselling book - Agent Zigzag.
As part of the Timewatch series, MacIntyre reveals the gripping true story of Britain's most extraordinary wartime double agent, Eddie Chapman. A notorious safe-breaker before the war, Chapman duped the Germans so successfully that he was awarded their highest decoration, the Iron Cross. He remains the only British citizen ever to win one.
Including remarkable and newly discovered footage from an interview Chapman gave three years before his death in 1997, the programme goes on the trail of one of Britain's most unlikely heroes - a story of adventure, love, intrigue and astonishing courage.
Lucy Worsley concludes her history of the Romanov dynasty, investigating how the family's grip on Russia unravelled in their final century. She shows how the years 1825-1918 were bloody and traumatic, a period when four tsars tried - and failed - to deal with the growing pressure for constitutional reform and revolution.
Lucy finds out how the Romanovs tried to change the system themselves - in 1861, millions of enslaved serfs were freed by the Tsar-Liberator, Alexander II. But Alexander paid the ultimate penalty for opening the Pandora's box of reform when he was later blown up by terrorists on the streets of St Petersburg.
Elsewhere, there was repression, denial, war and - in the case of the last tsar, Nicholas II - a fatalistic belief in the power of God, with Nicholas's faith in the notorious holy man Rasputin being a major part in his undoing. Lucy also details the chilling murder of Nicholas and his family in 1918, and asks whether all of this horror have been avoided.
Lucy also shows how there was a growing movement among the people of Russia to determine their own fate. She traces the growth of the intelligentsia, writers and thinkers who sought to have a voice about Russia. Speaking out came with a risk - after Ivan Turgenev wrote about the appalling life of the serfs in 1852, he was sentenced to house arrest by tsar Nicholas I. Lucy also shows how anger against the Romanov regime created a later generation of radicals committed to overturning the status quo. Some would turn to terrorism and, finally, revolution.
As well as political upheaval there is private drama, and Lucy explains how Nicholas II's family life played into his family's downfall. His son and heir Alexei suffered from haemophilia - the secrecy the family placed around the condition led them into seclusion, further distancing them from the Russian people. It also led them to the influence of man who seemed to have the power to heal their son, and who was seen as a malign influence on Nicholas - Rasputin.
Professor Brian Cox shows how Earth's basic ingredients, like the pure sulphur mined in the heart of a deadly volcano in Indonesia, have become the building blocks of life. Hidden deep in a cave in the Dominican Republic lies a magical world created by the same property of water that makes it essential to life. Clinging to a precipitous dam wall in Italy, baby mountain goats seek out Earth's chemical elements essential to their survival. In the middle of the night in a bay off Japan, Brian explains how the dazzling display of thousands of glowing squid shows how life has taken Earth's chemistry and turned it into the chemistry of life.
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.
This documentary explores the lives of dwarfs through centuries of representations in art and culture, revealing society's shifting attitudes towards people with dwarfism.
Presented by Richard Butchins, a disabled film-maker, artist and journalist, the film shows how people with dwarfism have been seen as royal pets, creatures from a separate race, figures of fun and freaks; and it reveals how their lives have been uniquely intertwined with mythology in the popular imagination, making it it all but impossible for dwarfs to simply get on with their everyday lives.
The film features interviews with artists, like Sir Peter Blake, who saw dwarfs in the circus as a young man and has featured them prominently in his work; academics, like Professor Tom Shakespeare, who has dwarfism himself and feels strongly about how dwarfs are represented in art; and ordinary people with dwarfism who would just like dwarfs to be seen like everybody else. It also features artists with dwarfism who offer us a glimpse of the world from their perspective, revealing the universal concerns that affect us all, regardless of stature.
Taking in relics from antiquity, garden gnomes and some the greatest masterpieces of Diego Velazquez, the film uncovers a hidden chapter in both the history of art and the history of disability.
WEDNESDAY 03 JULY 2019
WED 19:00 Beyond 100 Days (m0006gyz)
Series 1
03/07/2019
The latest news, exploring the day's events from a global perspective.
WED 19:30 Great Continental Railway Journeys (b08h7s8h)
Series 4 - Reversions
Pisa to Lake Garda - Part 2
Bradshaw's 1913 Continental Railway Guide in hand, Michael Portillo makes a grand tour of a favourite Edwardian destination - Italy - where he experiences first-hand the nation's need for speed in a state-of-the-art Maserati sports car.
Michael discovers from a British engineer how the leaning tower of Pisa was rescued from near collapse. In Carrara, he finds out how the marble used by Michelangelo is still quarried today and is invited to chip away at a contemporary sculpture. In Bologna, he embarks on a doomed search for spaghetti bolognese - until a cookery teacher takes pity on him and shows him how to make a much more authentic tagliatelle al ragu.
Following in the footsteps of Bradshaw's travellers, Michael explores the cradle of the Renaissance through Edwardian eyes but learns in Florence that the tourists' 'Italietta' was far removed from the new Italy envisaged by the futurists of the time. Heading north to Gargnano, Michael discovers the romantic hideaway of one of Britain's most famous writers, DH Lawrence, whose affair with his professor's wife scandalised his home country. Michael ends his journey in futuristic style with a high-speed boat trip across Lake Garda.
WED 20:00 Russia with Simon Reeve (b096sc3z)
Series 1
Episode 1
A hundred years after the Russian Revolution, Simon Reeve embarks on the first leg of an extraordinary three-part journey across Russia.
Setting out amongst the active, snow-capped volcanoes of Kamchatka, over 4,000 miles from Moscow, Simon explores one of the remotest regions of the country. The population of Russia's far east has fallen dramatically in recent years, but travelling by chopper and skidoo, Simon finds indigenous reindeer herders who are still eking out a fragile existence in this spectacular but inhospitable wilderness.
Despite an exodus of Russians moving west, the government is trying to maintain a grip on its eastern territories. In the port city of Vladivostok, Simon visits a newly built mega casino, designed to attract high rollers and tourists from neighbouring China. Russia's far east is full of natural resources, including huge amounts of timber from the vast Boreal Forest. Deep in the forest, Simon meets the inspirational conservationist who has created a sanctuary for the country's most iconic predator, the giant Amur tiger. Their habitat is threatened by illegal logging. It is a sensitive story involving political corruption, and throughout his stay Simon is followed and harassed by the authorities, finally being forced to leave the area. It is a powerful reminder of Russia's authoritarian and corrupt system.
Simon heads north, travelling on treacherous ice roads to Yakutsk, a city south of the Arctic Circle that is built entirely on permafrost. This vast layer of frozen earth is melting and Simon ends his journey on the rim of a giant crater that has emerged in the Siberian landscape - chilling evidence of the impact of global climate change.
WED 21:00 The River: A Year in the Life of the Tay (m0006gz1)
Writer and naturalist Helen Macdonald traces the dramatic journey of Britain’s greatest river, the Tay, over an entire year. Mixing natural history, cutting-edge science and historical biography with a spectacular travelogue, the film is a celebration of our largest river as it transforms from melting Highland snow to a vast torrent flowing into the cold North Sea.
Following the river’s course from Ben Lui in the west to Dundee in the east, Helen explores the Tay’s magical landscapes, encounters its rare and beautiful wildlife and traces the epic lifecycle of its iconic Salmon population across four spectacular seasons. Spring’s mountain glens reveal hardy lifeforms, honed for life in rushing water, from the Dipper, the world’s only swimming songbird, to a mayfly nymph that mimics the shape of a racing car’s aerofoil to withstand fast-flowing streams.
Helen continues her travels with a visit to the remote Tay tributary, whose riverbed rocks led to an 18th-century man of science, James Hutton, becoming the first person to fully grasp the Earth’s true age, sparking the ‘heretical’ concept of deep time. As spring moves into summer, Helen studies a newly introduced wild Beaver colony to see how this controversial returnee is transforming the Tay’s landscape. She also takes a fascinating look at the microscopic life that fills the sun-drenched waters in a lab where these tiny green algae are helping to answer one of life’s great questions: how multicellular bodies like ours first evolved.
Autumn’s cooling air creates darker, richer waters as the Tay’s riverside trees shed millions of leaves. This huge influx of nutrients threatens to upset the delicate balance of the river’s ecosystem. But Helen meets an unlikely saviour: the unassuming freshwater pearl mussel. As winter starts to grip, Helen’s journey reaches Perth, the point where the river begins to mingle with the sea. In the brackish water downstream lies the UK’s largest reed bed, a sanctuary for one of our rarest birds, the bearded tit, a wonderful example of man and nature working together to support each other. As the river finally becomes the North Sea beyond Dundee, Helen reflects on the extraordinary legacy of local polymath D’Arcy Thompson, whose insights a century ago revealed how simple mathematical rules can explain the complex beauty of the natural world.
Interwoven with Helen’s journey downstream is the story of the Tay’s most iconic species: Atlantic salmon. The majestic king of Fish has suffered a rapid decline in recent decades. Helen will meet the river guardians striving to save these wonderful creatures, and the scientists using new technology to solve the mystery of why they are disappearing. More than just the Tay’s stunning natural and geographical highlights, Helen also seeks to understand how rivers enter our imaginations. The story of the Tay interweaves history and nature, human endeavour and misadventure, and ultimately captures how the fine balance of our complex lives is reflected in its constant winding silver thread.
WED 22:30 The Secrets of Scott's Hut (b010n2lm)
Ben Fogle joins an expedition across Antarctica to find Captain Scott's hut, frozen in time for a century. The hut was built to support Scott's 1911 attempt to be first to the South Pole, and was later abandoned together with 10,000 personal, everyday and scientific items.
Ben uncovers the hut and its contents, finding new information about his hero Scott and his famously tragic expedition. Scott's diaries are read by Kenneth Branagh.
WED 00:00 A Timewatch Guide (b052vcbg)
Series 1
Roman Britain
Using years of BBC history archive film, Dr Alice Roberts explores how our views and understanding of Roman Britain have changed and evolved over the decades.
Along the way she investigates a diverse range of subjects from the Roman invasion, through Hadrian's Wall, the Vindolanda tablets and the eventual collapse of Roman rule. Drawing on the work of archaeologists and historians throughout the decades, Alice uncovers how and why our views of this much-loved period of our history have forever been in flux.
WED 01:00 Hull's Headscarf Heroes (b09r8jvr)
Documentary which marks the 50th anniversary of the triple trawler tragedy during January and February of 1968, in which 58 men died. It was one of Britain's deadliest maritime disasters, which tore through the heart of Hull's Hessle Road fishing community. The film tells the epic story of the Hull fishermen who did the most dangerous job in Britain and their wives whose protest ensured such a disaster never happened again. The women's campaign was one of the biggest and most successful civil action campaigns of the 20th century. Combining rare archive and emotional testimony - including that of Yvonne Blenkinsop, the last surviving leader of the women - those who lived through the tragedy and fought for change tell their incredible stories for the first time.
By the 1960s Hull was home to the greatest deep sea fishery on earth. 150 deep sea trawlers were based at St Andrews Dock and every year they brought in up to a quarter of a million tons of fish - 25 per cent of Britain's total catch. But to bring in such large quantities Hull's trawlermen had to take enormous risks, because the best hunting grounds were 1,000 miles away in the dangerous Arctic waters around Iceland. There was little regard for the men's health and safety, making this by far the most dangerous job in Britain with 6,000 Hull men lost at sea.
For Hull's women the fact that their men could die at work at any time was a constant worry, made bearable only by the joy of their return. We hear tragic stories of lost loved ones that cast a shadow over family life. This long history of hurt formed the background to the triple trawler disaster of January and early February 1968- an event which rocked even this extraordinarily stoic community.
In January 1968, Hull's trawlers headed into the Arctic in their quest for the biggest catch. By early February it became clear that three of them had sunk, first the St Romanus, then the Kingston Peridot and finally the Ross Cleveland. The last two were fishing in Arctic waters when they were hit by the worst storm in living memory and were obliterated by the hurricane force winds, blizzards and ferocious waves. Altogether 58 men were drowned.
Among those who lost a loved one was 17-year-old mother-of-two Denise Wilson. She tells the story of how she became the youngest widow in Hull. The man whose task was to break the news to the families was young port missionary Donald Woolley. He reveals that despite the grief and devastation at the catastrophic loss of so many fathers, brothers and sons, there was an extraordinary spirit of resilience amongst the young wives and mothers.
Fuelled by years of suffering and loss, the headscarfed women rose up to protest against the dangerous working conditions. They were led by larger-than-life fishwife Lilian Bilocca. Her daughter Virginia remembers how she began a petition that was signed by almost everyone in Hessle Road. This was followed by mass meetings, a march on the trawler bosses' offices and dramatic attempts to stop any unsafe trawlers going to sea. What they all wanted was a safer fishing industry - and they were prepared to do anything to get it.
Unbeknown to 'Big Lil' as she came to be known, while she was protesting, her young son Ernie was also caught up in the storm and fighting for his life. He tells the story of his nightmare ordeal. So too does trawlerman Ken Shakesby, who also nearly died in the storm. His wife Jean was another headscarf protester who almost lost her husband.
Yvonne Blenkinsop is the last survivor amongst the women who led the protest. She tells how she was inspired to fight for change by the death of her own father at sea a few years before. She made passionate speeches to the women of Hessle Road about the need for greater safety at sea. After preventing unsafe ships from leaving St Andrews Dock in Hull, during the first week of February 1968 three of the leaders - including Yvonne - travelled to London for top-level talks with the government. 88 safety measures were enacted immediately. The first to be implemented was a mother ship complete with up to date medical and radio facilities. The new fishermen's charter laid the foundations for safety at sea for generations to come, and was welcomed by all.
But in the 1970s the Hull fishing industry fell into rapid decline with the Cod Wars and sadly the old fishing industry disappeared. As it went the memory of what Yvonne, Lil Bilocca and the other women had achieved also faded. When Lil died in 1988 at the age of 59 there was little fanfare. Nevertheless today, with Hull as City of Culture there is now at last new recognition for the women who led one of the most successful protest movements of the last 50 years: Lil Bilocca and the 'headscarf heroes,' including the last surviving leader, the extraordinary Yvonne Blenkinsop.
WED 02:00 Tales of Tudor Travel: The Explorer's Handbook (b0bk2k1x)
A remarkable travel guide compiled from first-hand records of Tudor seafarers in the 16th century.
Professor Nandini Das explores Hakluyt's Principal Navigations, which records accounts of ventures in search of lucrative spices and dyes. It is a prototype for today's travel guides with advice, warnings, descriptions of remarkable people and a list of vocabulary to converse with foreigners. It became a book that all English seafarers kept on board ship. But the descriptions of encounters with foreigners also lay the foundations for later colonialism and conquest.
WED 02:30 The River: A Year in the Life of the Tay (m0006gz1)
[Repeat of broadcast at
21:00 today]
THURSDAY 04 JULY 2019
THU 19:00 Wimbledon (m0006xyy)
2019
Andy Murray in men’s doubles
Coverage of the first-round men's doubles match featuring Andy Murray and Pierre-Hugues Herbert in action against Marius Copil and Ugo Humbert.
THU 20:00 The Queen's Palaces (b014s302)
Buckingham Palace
The Queen has three official residences - the best known, Buckingham Palace; the oldest, Windsor Castle; and the most romantic, Palace of Holyroodhouse. Among the few working royal palaces in the world today, they serve as both family homes and as the setting for the business of Monarchy. Each has its own distinctive story - long histories that reflect good and bad times, triumph and tragedy and, of course, the lives of some of our most memorable kings and queens. But they all share certain features - incredible collections of treasures that reflect both the tastes of their occupants and the artistic development of the nation, and architecture that has evolved across the centuries to meet the needs of different ages, reflecting the story of Britain and its people like no other buildings.
Buckingham Palace may be just about the most famous building in the world, but its story is much less familiar. Fiona Bruce reveals how England's most spectacular palace emerged from a swampy backwater in just 300 years. The journey of discovery takes her from the sewers of London to the magnificent State Rooms, from a home for camels and elephants to the artistic brilliance of 18th-century Venice and from a prince's Chinese fantasy to the secret of how the palace's glittering chandeliers are cleaned today.
THU 21:00 Tales from the Royal Wardrobe with Lucy Worsley (b048wss8)
Today, few people's clothes attract as much attention as the royal family, but this is not a modern-day Hello magazine-inspired obsession. As Dr Lucy Worsley reveals, it has always been this way. Exploring the royal wardrobes of our kings and queens over the last 400 years, Lucy shows this isn't just a public preoccupation but our monarchs' as well.
From Elizabeth I to our present Queen, Lucy believes that the royal wardrobe's significance goes way beyond the cut and colour of the clothing and that royal fashion is, and has always been, regarded as their personal statement to their people. So most monarchs have carefully choreographed every aspect of their wardrobe and, for those who have not, there have sometimes been calamitous consequences.
THU 22:00 Madagascar (b00z03pl)
Land of Heat and Dust
Madagascar is an island of extremes. While the east is cloaked in soaking rainforest, the west and south is almost a desert. This is a scorching landscape where it might not rain for nine months of the year, and some years not at all. To live here, you have to be a specialist. The animals and plants of the dry southern lands are stranger and more mysterious than on any other part of the island, and their strategies for surviving the dryness are extraordinary.
Verreaux's sifaka, a kind of lemur, lives in Madagascar's 'spiny forest' where trees have savage spikes, and some drip toxic chemicals. Amongst the bulbous trees of the baobab forests, huge-eyed mouse lemurs, the world's smallest primates, emerge at night to feed on the sugary droppings of bizarre fluffy bugs.
When at last the rains come, everything changes. Labord's chameleon is the shortest-lived land vertebrate in the world. This striking animal lives just 12 weeks from hatching to adulthood. It spent nine months in an egg and has only three months to pack in the rest of its life.
These animals are all unique to Madagascar and exquisitely adapted to the island's seasonal changes. But this is not their only challenge. Much of Madagascar's extraordinary wildlife is under threat, from hunting and loss of habitat, and none more so than in the south of the island.
At the end of the episode, the filming team's biggest challenge is revealed - how to find and film one of Madagascar's most elusive animals, the rare and cat-like fossa. It lives in remote forests and is active mostly at night - and it has a fearsome reputation.
THU 23:00 Britain's Lost Masterpieces (b0bgnwy3)
Series 3
Petworth
Petworth House in West Sussex is one of the great Baroque treasure houses of England, and Dr Bendor Grosvenor finds two paintings which he feels warrant investigation: a portrait of a lady from Genoa which was once attributed to Rubens, but Bendor is convinced is by Anthony van Dyck, and a portrait of a young cardinal in the style of Titian, which Bendor believes may be by Titian himself.
The restoration of the possible Titian starts to reveal a painting of two halves - the face and upper parts are the work of a very fine painter indeed, but the lower section with a badly painted hand is found to be a later repair with some very crude stitching adding an extra section of canvas to the bottom of the picture.
While work continues, Bendor travels to Italy to look at some Titian masterpieces to support our understanding of his genius. In Titian's home city of Venice, he explains how the peculiar damp climate of the city led to canvas becoming the preferred medium for Venetian painters. He tells us how colour became the defining characteristic of the city's art and how Anthony van Dyck was so struck by Titian's paintings that he spent years in Italy following in his footsteps to study his techniques.
Bendor's final visit is to the city of Genoa, where the Petworth portrait of a lady was painted. He shows us some works by van Dyck made in the city in support of his attribution of the picture to the Flemish master.
Emma Dabiri explores the story of the third Earl of Egremont, who inherited Petworth in 1763 when he was 12. He had 15 mistresses, who all lived in the house, and he eventually had 43 children - all illegitimate. He died leaving no heir. He had a colourful life and was a friend and patron of JMW Turner. His Petworth Emigration Scheme allowed him to support the journeys of his tenants to start a new life in Canada - though, Emma discovers, it was quite advantageous for the earl to reduce his expanding workforce.
Emma also tells the story of the acceptance of Petworth's extraordinary art collection for the nation in lieu of tax - the first time paintings and sculpture had been used in this way. A new act of parliament was required, and Petworth became a pioneering arrangement that has led to similar
bequests elsewhere.
THU 00:00 Top of the Pops (m0006gyx)
Steve Wright and Gary Davies present the pop chart programme, first broadcast on 21 January 1988 and featuring Bros, AC/DC, Joyce Sims, The Christians, Motley Crue, Bananarama, the Beatmasters ft. Cookie Crew, Dollar, Belinda Carlisle and The Stranglers.
THU 00:30 Bacchus Uncovered: Ancient God of Ecstasy (b09z8d01)
Professor Bettany Hughes investigates the story of Bacchus, god of wine, revelry, theatre and excess, travelling to Georgia, Jordan, Greece and Britain to discover his origins and his presence in the modern world, and explore how 'losing oneself' plays a vital role in the development of civilisation.
In this fascinating journey, Bettany begins in Georgia where she discovers evidence of the world's oldest wine production, and the role it may have played in building communities. In Athens, she reveals Bacchus's pivotal role in a society where his ecstatic worship was embraced by all classes, and most importantly women. On Cyprus, she uncovers startling parallels between Bacchus and Christ. Finally, Bettany follows the god's modern embrace in Nietzsche's philosophy, experimental theatre and the hedonistic hippie movement to conclude that, while this god of ecstasy is worthy of contemporary reconsideration, it is vital to heed the warning of the ancients - 'MEDEN AGAN' - nothing in excess.
THU 01:30 Barneys, Books and Bust-Ups: 50 Years of the Booker Prize (b0bntjf6)
The Man Booker Prize is the world's most distinguished literary award for English fiction. Its winners instantly acquire a level of fame and wealth which most writers can only dream of. To commemorate its fiftieth birthday, this documentary looks back over six decades of the prize, exploring how, from humble beginnings, the Booker quickly went on to revolutionise the sleepy world of literary fiction and become a central part of British cultural life.
We hear the inside story of scandal, gossip and intrigue from a host of former winners, judges and prize administrators. Over the years, the prize has changed its rules, its sponsors and its name. But it has never lost sight of its core purpose: to stimulate debate and encourage the reading of literary fiction. This is a tale of bruised egos and bickering judges and, most importantly of all, of countless brilliant books.
Contributors include Booker-winning authors Peter Carey, Penelope Lively and John Banville.
THU 02:30 The Queen's Palaces (b014s302)
[Repeat of broadcast at
20:00 today]
FRIDAY 05 JULY 2019
FRI 19:00 World News Today (m0006gz9)
The latest news, exploring the day's events from a global perspective.
FRI 19:30 Top of the Pops (m0006gzc)
Gary Davies and Bruno Brookes present the pop chart programme, first broadcast on 11 February 1988 and featuring Eddy Grant, Debbie Gibson, The Mission, Taylor Dayne, Sinead O'Connor, Tiffany and Jermaine Stewart.
FRI 20:00 Top of the Pops (m0006gzf)
Gary Davies and Nicky Campbell present the pop chart programme, first broadcast on 18 February 1988 and featuring Bomb the Bass, Billy Ocean, Was (Not Was), Vanessa Paradis, Michael Jackson, The Bangles, Coldcut ft. Yazz & The Plastic Population, Kylie Minogue, and Alexander O'Neal and Cherrelle.
FRI 20:30 Classic Albums (b08pg5tq)
Carly Simon: No Secrets
Carly Simon is one of the most influential singer-songwriters of her generation. The classic album that made her a global star was No Secrets, which included the enigmatic song You're So Vain. The album spent five weeks at number one in the US chart.
In this new interview Carly ties together her life and work on No Secrets - she is at her most honest, sometimes defiant, but with a wit and wisdom that comes from her rich and turbulent life. She tells of how the second single from the album, Right Thing to Do, was a refreshingly realistic love song, choosing to ignore her lover's problems. That lover was James Taylor; Carly wrote the lyrics on a plane after looking over at James and thinking 'there's nothing you can do to turn me away.'
The album's title track, We Have No Secrets, struck a chord with a generation trying to reconcile honesty in relationships with the emotional consequences that followed. Carly had a number of highly public affairs in the early 70s and her experience fed into the album's most famous song, the global hit You're So Vain. She performs the missing fourth verse on the piano, the first time she has ever sung it along with the melody.
Carly tells of how her producer made her do the vocal track on 'Vain' over and over, and how Mick Jagger ended up on backing vocals. The film has access to the master tapes and we hear Jagger's vocal track. Her producer reveals Carly was 'so turned on' after singing with Jagger that she recorded the whole vocal again - and that is the one on the album.
Finally, the film includes footage of Taylor Swift and Carly Simon performing You're So Vain together, and extracts from an interview where Swift herself talks about her love for the song.
FRI 21:30 Charley Pride - I'm Just Me (m0006gzh)
Music documentary that traces the improbable journey of Charley Pride, from his humble beginnings as a sharecropper’s son on a cotton farm in segregated Sledge, Mississippi to his career as a black American League baseball player and his meteoric rise as a trailblazing country music superstar.
Pride’s love for music led him from the Delta to a larger, grander world. In the 1940s, radio transcended racial barriers, making it possible for Pride to grow up listening to and imitating Grand Ole Opry stars like Ernest Tubb and Roy Acuff. Pride arrived in Nashville in 1963 with the city embroiled in sit-ins and racial violence. But with boldness, perseverance and undeniable musical talent, he managed to parlay a series of fortuitous encounters with music industry insiders into a legacy of hit singles, a Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award and a place in the Country Music Hall of Fame.
Narrated by Grammy-nominated country singer Tanya Tucker, the film features original interviews with country music royalty as well as on-camera conversations between Pride and the programme’s other guests.
FRI 22:40 New Power Generation: Black Music Legends of the 1980s (b0177bjb)
Prince: A Purple Reign
Film which explores how Prince - showman, artist, enigma - revolutionised the perception of black music in the 1980s with worldwide hits such as 1999, Kiss, Raspberry Beret and Alphabet Street. He became a global sensation with the release of the Oscar-winning, semi-autobiographical movie Purple Rain in 1984, embarking on an incredible journey of musical self-discovery that continued right up to his passing in April 2016, aged 57.
From the psychedelic Around the World in a Day to his masterpiece album Sign O' the Times and experiments with hip-hop and jazz, Prince was one of most ambitious and prolific songwriters of his generation. He tested the boundaries of taste and decency with explicit sexual lyrics and stage shows during his early career, and in the 1990s fought for ownership of his name and control of his music, played out in a public battle with his former label, Warner. Highly regarded as one of the most flamboyant live performers ever, Prince was a controversial and famously elusive creative force.
Contributors include Revolution guitarist Dez Dickerson, Paisley Park label president Alan Leeds, hip-hop legend Chuck D and Prince 'Mastermind' and UK soul star Beverley Knight.
FRI 23:45 Top of the Pops (m0006gzc)
[Repeat of broadcast at
19:30 today]
FRI 00:15 Top of the Pops (m0006gzf)
[Repeat of broadcast at
20:00 today]
FRI 00:45 The Jazz Ambassadors (b0b16sfh)
In 1955, the African-American congressman Adam Clayton Powell Jr and trumpeter Dizzy Gillespie announced a new Cold War weapon to combat the Soviet Union - America's iconic jazz musicians and their racially integrated bands would cross the globe to counter negative propaganda about racism in American.
Over the next decade, Louis Armstrong, Duke Ellington and Dave Brubeck would tour the world in service of US Cold War interests. But the unfolding Civil Rights movement back home forced them into a moral bind; how could they promote a tolerant image of America abroad when racial equality remained an unrealised dream?
This is the story of how the state department unwittingly gave the Civil Rights movement a voice on the world stage when it needed one most.
FRI 02:15 Classic Albums (b08pg5tq)
[Repeat of broadcast at
20:30 today]