Multicultural Programmes from BBC Birmingham

Photo by Lynda Kettle, described as 'Asian Music and Dance

Photo by Lynda Kettle, described as ‘Asian Music and Dance

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Here is a list of some of the multicultural programmes produced at BBC Birmingham, from before and during the Pebble Mill period. The list is included in a document housed in the BBC Written Archives at Caversham.

Apna Hi Ghar Samajhiye

(Make Yourself at Home) Radio – Home Service 1965

http://genome.ch.bbc.co.uk/0d248bbb13934a6293989ac1744ede8b

Made at Gosta Green and introduced by Aley Hasan

 

Nai Zindagi-Naya Jeevan

http://genome.ch.bbc.co.uk/799760c890544c27a9f408fafcd77784

BBC1 Sunday morning programme (late 1960s-early 1970s) which is roughly translated as ‘New Life’ (ran for 14 years)

 

Gharbar

http://genome.ch.bbc.co.uk/17f97d1ad04e484e9d403bfb27004555

BBC1&2, Women’s magazine show, transmitted on Wednesday mornings from 1977-87

 

Asian Magazine

BBC1 Sunday mornings 1983-87

http://genome.ch.bbc.co.uk/f3b01c62804743388df183a729484ef3

New Life and Gharbar then became one programme in the early 1980s, called Asian Magazine, which then became Network East

 

Network East

BBC1&2 Saturday afternoons and Sunday mornings (1987-2003)

http://genome.ch.bbc.co.uk/c0918d9079d8460488d012c3c1d7e000

 

Ebony

http://genome.ch.bbc.co.uk/34a20f1624ad4a57bc6873ca1f0c3c6b

BBC2, 1983-1990, Afro-Carribean Magazine

 

Behind the Beat

http://genome.ch.bbc.co.uk/a05e0e41e87c4754a00599de8a0c3fba

BBC2, 1988-9, Music Programme

The following comments were left on the Pebble Mill Facebook page:

Keith Brook (aka Scouse):”‘Nai Zindagi-Naya Jeevan’ was the Urdu and Hindi for ‘New Way -New Life’ but was generically called ‘New Life’. It wasn’t renamed, it stayed like that into the 80s.

I worked on it as a cameraman, of course, but I also did a year or so directing it.

It was great fun, if a little disorganised. Getting everyone from our side into the studio was a little like herding cats.

Still, the real upside was that Ashok Rampal, Saleem Shahed and Mahendra Kaul and I were frequently invited to Indian and Pakistani houses for ‘real’ curries. Absolutely delicious!!

The best one was Madhur Jaffrey’s rather swish place. Best food of all!!

Still, I got a lot of pleasure out of it because it was a programme FOR Asians rather than about. At that time there were many elderly relatives who couldn’t speak English and it was their half hour of entertainment. For that reason alone, it was a delight.

I had the same feeling of fulfillment when I did a stretch on Open University. There wasn’t a big audience for each course, but every programme had an RI of 100%.

Still, every programme we did in Pebble Ill was fulfilling and it was a joy to work with such talented people.”

Terry Barker: “I worked for Nahrendra Morar as his PA from 92 to 94 and remember the diversity of programmes that came out of the multicultural department then. Charles Bruce and Farah Durrani made some terrific documentaries. Had a great time.”

Bridget Catherine Vaughan: “My first staff post, after 2 years of “temping” was in Asian Unit with Lisa Sommerville, Chris Hardman, Jayne Savage…..fab time”

Simon Edwards: “I recall working as camera assistant on the titles (on 16mm) for a programme called “All Black”. Not sure if that was a working title but it would have been early 90’s. We shot some of it in the studio at the Mill and then locations in London. Chris Weaver was the lighting cameraman and Wilfred E-J directed it.”

Keith Brook: “‘Nai Zindagi-Naya Jeevan’ was the Urdu and Hindi for ‘New Way -New Life’ but was generically called ‘New Life’. It wasn’t renamed, it stayed like that into the 80s.

I worked on it as a cameraman, of course, but I also did a year or so directing it.

It was great fun, if a little disorganised. Getting everyone from our side into the studio was a little like herding cats.

Still, the real upside was that Ashok Rampal, Saleem Shahed and Mahendra Kaul and I were frequently invited to Indian and Pakistani houses for ‘real’ curries. Absolutely delicious!!

The best one was Madhur Jaffrey’s rather swish place. Best food of all!!

Still, I got a lot of pleasure out of it because it was a programme FOR Asians rather than about. At that time there were many elderly relatives who couldn’t speak English and it was their half hour of entertainment. For that reason alone, it was a delight.

I had the same feeling of fulfillment when I did a stretch on Open University. There wasn’t a big audience for each course, but every programme had an RI of 100%.

Every programme we did in Pebble Milll was fulfilling and it was a joy to work with such talented people.”

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Studio Operations (part 6) – Ray Lee

All Creatures Great and Small, Studio A. Photo by Tim Savage

All Creatures Great and Small, Studio A. Photo by Tim Savage

Saturday Night at the Mill, 1977. Photo by John Burkill

Saturday Night at the Mill, 1977. Pebble Mill courtyard. Photo by John Burkill

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The Programmes

Studio A had a lot of drama series, and one off plays, as in those days drama was more often than not recorded in a studio. Exterior shots were done on film for the most part, and played in from TK during the recording session.

One of the early drama series was The Brothers  which was a fairly dire soap opera about a set of brothers who owned a lorry transport business. I remember virtually nothing about the series apart from the lovely Lisa Goddard, but it was a regular booking and kept us all in employment. Rather more interesting were the Dickens classics – Martin Chuzzlewit and Nicholas Nickleby. Then there were several series of  All Creatures Great and Small adapted from the James Herriot books. The first few with Carol Drinkwater, and the later series with Linda Bellingham, as James’ wife Helen. Then there was Gangsters which was I think the first studio production to use a “handheld” camera. The camera was a Bosch Fernseh, which had a quite large camera on a shoulder pad, connected to a back pack by a short cable, then the cable from the backpack went to a further CCU which was rigged in TAR. The Camera / backpack combination was pretty heavy, so the cameraman tended to put it all down as soon as the required shots had been taken.

There were a number of plays for today, and several series of The Basil Brush Show. The latter was recorded on a Saturday evening with a live audience, but for the afternoon dress rehearsal, several staff members and their children formed and audience so that “Basil” had someone to perform to. My wife and children came on several occasions when I was working in the gallery or TAR.

We hosted Playschool for at least one series, possibly two. This may have been around the time when there was a union dispute regarding who was to start the clock! As I remember, electricians said it should be them as it was electrical, and scene hands said it should be them as it was a prop. I don’t remember how it was resolved, but it was that kind of union silliness that set Margaret Thatcher on her crusade against the unions.

Studio A hosted Young Scientist of the Year at least twice, and also The Great Egg Race  with professor Heinz Wolff. There were several series of  Angels a kind of forerunner to Casualty. Then there was the great Pot Black which really put snooker onto the map for the first time. This was recorded over four intensive days after Christmas (27th – 30th Dec) and then shown one game per week. The quote of note being “For those of you watching in black and white, the red ball is next to the green ball, just beyond the black” or something like that. The problem was there was little difference in the grey level of red and green balls, so identifying them virtually impossible. It really was a game that had been waiting for colour. There were just so many programmes that came out of Studio A, the place buzzed with activity.

In addition to that there were all the Pebble Mill at One programmes which came from both studio A and studio B gallery, with the cameras in the foyer area or outside both at the back and front of the building, and occasionally on the roof! From the camera rigging point of view it was like an outside broadcast, but with the fixed infrastructure of a proper studio gallery.

In early 1975 a pilot programme Pebble Mill at Night was produced. It eventually materialised as Saturday Night at the Mill but not until 1976. This likewise used the foyer area, and depending on whether Studio A had a drama booked in used either Studio A or Studio B gallery.

Saturday Night at the Mill had the dubious honour of causing 2 of the big windows to be replaced. I think it was the night that a parachute jump landed on the front lawn, and in order to get some additional lighting, the lighting director (TM) had 2 big lights shining through the long gallery windows onto the lawn. The lights were well back from the windows and he checked that the windows were not getting hot. However they would have warmed slightly. That night after the show we had one of the hardest frosts in a long while, and the thermal stress on the windows caused them both to crack (several hours after the lights had been switched off). The replacement of the windows subsequently featured on a Pebble Mill at One, although what may not have been seen was that the new ones were about 3/4 inch too short! The gap was filled with mastic.

Studio B progammes in addition to the regular Midlands Today, hosted the Asian unit New Life programme on Sundays, and Farming, (the forerunner of Countryfile). Pebble Mill at One on any days when Studio A was in use for drama, and several programmes that could be squeezed into the small space, including incredibly some with an audience. Sadly I cannot remember all of them but The Clothes Show certainly started off in Studio B. There was rarely any slack days, and Studio B (or its gallery at least) may well have seen at least 2 and often 3 different programmes during the course of 24 hours! The presentation annex was arranged as a self operated area, and close down was done from there every night, with just a couple of engineers manning the TAR end of things. David Stevens was one of the regulars, and used a series of colour slides for his close down sequence. Sometimes the slides jammed in the slide scanner, resulting in a somewhat curtailed sequence. One of the slide scanners took a pair of slide boxes from which the slides were pushed up into the scanner gate by a metal plunger known as the Sprod. Unfortunately this required consistent slide mounts to work properly, and David’s assorted slides were not quite as regular as required, so sometime it spat out a slide altogether, just leaving a blank white screen. When possible the other slide scanner was used for this as the slides were pre slotted into place in a pair of discs which rotated into the scanner gate. The disadvantage of that being that changing the order of the slides took much longer if they needed to be changed.  As there were only the 2 slide scanners, and both studios might need to use slides there was a lot of pressure on the engineers to keep them both in working order.

Ray Lee

 

Studio Operations (part 3) – Ray Lee

'All Creatures Great and Small' set in Studio A. Photo by Tim Savage

‘All Creatures Great and Small’ set in Studio A. Photo by Tim Savage

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Studio and camera usage

Studio A was the main drama studio, and at least initially had network drama bookings most of the time. The main drama booking days were Sun/Mon and Wed/Thurs  for usually Rehearse day 1 and Record day 2, allowing for set and light on Tuesday and Saturday and sometimes a quick booking on a Friday. Studio B was used every weekday evening for Midlands Today, and briefly on a Saturday for the sport report, and on a Sunday for either Farming (the forerunner of Countryfile) and/or the Asian network programme “New Life”. Farming went out at lunchtime on a Sunday, and “New Life” was recorded on a Sunday afternoon/early evening.

Pebble Mill at One used the cameras from Studio B on  Mondays, Wednesdays and Thursdays, as normally Studio A was in use for Drama. Studio A cameras were used on Tuesdays and Fridays when there were not normally drama bookings. If there were gaps in the bookings Studio A cameras were used in preference, as there was then an extra camera available. At that time Studio A had a complement of 4 cameras and a hot spare, whereas Studio B had just 3 cameras. In the earliest days the camera control unit (CCU) for one of the cameras was shared between Studio B and Studio A, which involved major re-cabling after Pebble Mill at One. By the time I moved to Studio ops, an additional CCU had been acquired, so this chore was no longer necessary. There was one additional camera and CCU in the back room of TAR, this was the “maintenance channel” and was used to repair faulty modules, and circuit boards. It was rare for it to be fully functional, and occasionally it was a case of checking whether the module or circuit board that had gone faulty in one of the studio cameras was better or worse than the one in the maintenance channel, or which might be quicker to repair! The cameras needed constant cosseting to get the best out of them, but when working well produced pictures that even against today’s cameras were very good.

Later on a further camera was obtained for Studio B which was permanently rigged in the presentation annex, meaning that there were always 3 cameras available in the studio area, and the practise of wheeling one into presentation for the end of Midlands Today was no longer needed.

Ray Lee

 

Asian Programmes Unit – ‘New Life’

These photos are probably by Willoughby Gullachsen, and have been given by Maggie Humphries from Film Unit.  No reproduction of the photos without permission.

BBC Pebble Mill was home of the BBC’s multicultural programmes.

The photos show a location shoot for the Asian magazine strand: ‘New Life’. They date from the 1980s, when the inserts were still shot on film.  The sound recordist shown is Alex Christison, and cameraman Steve Saunderson, the camera assistant Ian Churchill, and the PA Jayne Savage.  Standing on the stairs in the tie is the director/producer, Waseem Mahmood. The programme was a documentary on the first Asian model, Safira.  Nigel Pardoe-Matthews was the film editor.

The documentary was an occasional 30min special as part of the New Life strand. Waseem made three in the six years that he was at Pebble Mill: “Safira” about the model, a film about Asian Ballerina Nicola Katrak and a special where Marion Foster interviewed Ravi Shankar… the latter got a prime time slot on BBC2.

‘New Life’ from 1981 was called ‘Asian Magazine ‘- this must have been when Ashok Rampal took over as Executive Producer.

Please add a comment if you can identify other people in the stills, or can add more information.

 

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