Radio 4 Extra Live - but for how long?

Like many other listeners I have been distressed to learn that by next spring the BBC's Radio 4 Extra may be no more - as a DAB radio station, that is.

Billy Shelton

Sorry to learn that Billy Shelton, whom I had the privilege of interviewing, is unwell. Jan D'Agostino Trapani recently posted the following on Facebook:

In Which Edward Bear Scores a Century

 

 Today marks 100 years since that perennial children's favourite, Winnie the Pooh, was published.

Birkenhead to Barrow or The Moving Theatre

If you saw the documentary Freddie Davies: A Life in Show Business on Talking Pictures TV recently you will have caught a glimpse of his grandfather, Jack Herbert, walking past a theatre and standing on its stage (above).

Freddie Davies documentary on Talking Pictures TV

If you missed the broadcast yesterday, Martyn Tott's "chatumentary", as he has called it, about Freddie Davies is currently available to watch online on TPTV Encore.

No leading definitions: R.C. Sherriff

 

A distinction drawn in Radio 4's Today programme between the genres of autobiography and memoir  may be less than wholly convincing - is "a work of literature that is verging on fiction" really an adequate definition of a memoir? - but it did remind me of my feelings when reading Ronald Wales's comprehensive 2016 biography of the playwright and screenwriter R.C. Sherriff, best remembered for Journey's End. 

Musical differences: Sven Klang's Combo

 

At last the film Sven Klang's Combo (as it was known on its UK release) is - at the time of writing, anyway - available to watch online.

Of Gospel Groups and Coastal Cottages ...

 

 

When I first heard the Flamingos' doo wop classic Golden Teardrops I was puzzled by the reference to "a cottage by the sea", which seemed an arbitrary place in which to picture the loved one.

Kommendable Kinks Kompositions

 

As the Guardian has published a list of the Kinks' 40 greatest songs which omits several of my favourites I've dusted off these notes about some of Raymond Douglas Davies's finest. 

Summer day reflections on two socially distanced Leitch gatherings

Hard to believe but Donovan, that seeming child of faerie, recently turned eighty. 

Your budget stationer's has left its Croydon once for all

 Danish chain Flying Tiger Copenhagen has been based in Croydon's Whitgift Centre for at least seven years, but its store is now labelled as "permanently closed" on Google Maps.  

[Daily Express, 28 April 2026] 

Number One? Ah, that'll be this day ...

 

The soundtrack double album for the fifties-set British film That'll Be the Day was number one  on the UK charts today in 1973, or so I have recently been informed by social media. 

Shuttling between Count Arthur Strong's radio and video shows

Although I found Count Arthur Strong's Radio Show on Radio 4 entertaining I had reservations about whether it really worked as a sitcom, as opposed to an extended sketch or "turn".

Safka's Metamorphosis

 Today, or hereabouts, marks fifty years since West Country group the Wurzels had a UK Number One with Combine Harvester, their parody of Melanie's Brand New Key, a British hit in 1972. 

morecambeandwise

Today, as is readily apparent on social media sites, marks 100 years since Eric Morecambe was born.