Radio 4
How the BBC made the most unlikely TV hit of the swinging Sixties
‘Comedy is like music,’ said Edwin Apps, one of the characters in Wednesday afternoon’s Radio 4 play, All Mouth and…
How trauma is passed down through the generations in our DNA
Sue Armstrong’s programme on Radio 4 All in the Womb (produced by Ruth Evans) should be required listening for anyone…
A timely reminder of what junior doctors actually do – and it's not pleasant
All this week Radio Five Live has been giving us an insight into what it is like not just to…
The Archers v the cricket: which was the more dramatic?
It was a toss-up on Sunday between the atmosphere in the Radio Five Live Sports Extra studio in Kolkata for…
Could radio save Syria?
Could radio, and in particular a weekly soap, have a role to play in the Syrian crisis? You might think,…
‘I could do many things... but I could not listen to Bach’
Six years ago, on Good Friday, the journalist Melanie Reid was thrown off her horse while on a cross-country ride…
Supporting Assad against the ‘invaders’
Four programmes, four very different kinds of radio, from a classically made drama to weird sonic ramblings, via the best…
Radio comedy still misses Kenneth Williams
It’s tempting to believe that somewhere in the bowels of Broadcasting House in London the voice of Kenneth Williams is…
Is Radio 4 encouraging us to overshare?
Much ado about Radio 4’s latest venture into the new smart world of aural selfies. Reaction Time, on Thursday mornings,…
Long before Twitter, Wogan offered continuous conversation
For once, the superlatives that have greeted Terry Wogan’s death from cancer have been entirely in keeping with the man.…
Serial returns with a story of loyalty, resilience and punishment
The new season of the Serial podcast (produced by the same team who make This American Life) was launched last…
Stephen Hawking shows that all is not lost if by mischance you fall into a black hole
You don’t expect to be brought close to tears by the Reith Lectures, which are after all at the most…
Corbyn’s turn on Today was as graceful and twinkle-toed as Bowie himself
Some might say that Jeremy Corbyn is cloth-eared, tone-deaf, socially inept but on Monday morning, as the death of the…
The best - and worst - podcasts
My resolution this New Year is to get to grips with podcasts, to brace up and embrace this new aural…
Radio is flowering because it’s so much more potent than TV
Who would have thought in this visually obsessed age of YouTube, selfies and Instagram that radio, pure audio, no images…
Glenda Jackson is brilliant in Radio 4’s Zola adaptation - and terrifying
It was a stroke of genius to invite Glenda Jackson to make her return to acting as the star of…
You can’t forget what Will Self says - even if you wish you could
It lasted for just a few seconds but was such a graphic illustration of the statistics behind the bombing campaign…
A gripping Start the Week from a Paris on the edge
It was as if Andrew Marr and his guests on Start the Week on Monday morning were standing on the…
Was Bach really a ‘tasteless and chaotic composer’?
It’s just not what you expect to hear on Radio 3 but I happened upon Music Matters on Saturday morning…
Agincourt was neither necessary, nor great. We’re mad to celebrate it
Can anyone explain this sudden enthusiasm for Agincourt, that unexpected victory over the French, now being celebrated, or rather commemorated,…
National Poetry Day's mistake: letting normal people do the reading
Imagine what Brennig Davies must have felt like just before 11 o’clock last Tuesday evening. The 15-year-old was about to…
Why we should embrace being average
Maybe what we love about radio is the way that most of its programming allows us the luxury of staying…
How The Archers tried to derail the launch of ITV
Two significant anniversaries, each very different but both reflecting the BBC’s mission and the reasons for its continued success. From…
The Baroque composer who was a world music pioneer
On Private Passions this week the writer Amitav Ghosh gave us a refreshingly different version of what has become a…
Late Night Woman’s Hour assumes that all women think about is dating, desire and drinking
Late Night Woman’s Hour has created a Twitter storm with its twice-weekly (Thursdays and Fridays) doses of ‘mischievous and unbridled…
