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Pebble Mill Magazine 1978 – Alastair Yates

Pebble Mill Magazine 1978

This article in the Pebble Mill Magazine is from 1978. Alastair Yates presented his own show on Radio Birmingham on weekday mornings from July 1978. The show included guests as well as discussing topical issues. The article talks about how the show dealt with the Whooping Cough vaccine scare, presenting all sides of the argument: parents from children affected by Whooping Cough, or damaged by the vaccine, as well as doctors.

Wulfrun Echo – Chris Phipps

(Copyright resides with the original holder, no reproduction without permission)

‘That photo! How NOT to dress appropriately for a Quarry Bank chain shop. The man behind me is Sam Bloomer, one of the last hand chain makers -and I still have that interview, along with many others recorded over the 7 years I compiled and presented “Wulfrun Echo” in the Black Country for BBC Radio Birmingham. Many of these interviews have been hailed by Professor Carl Chinn as being as important as the BBC RADIO BALLADS for their verbal depiction of working class life and times – it makes me very proud to have this legacy for my 40 years in broadcasting. I had spent nearly a decade capturing memories of individuals who had never been in front of a microphone -I then spent 5 years on Channel 4 ‘s “The Tube” capturing people who couldn’t wait to get in front of the camera [when they had something to sell, of course] .

The photo was used in a Radio Times article following me out and and about in the patch, likening me to a human whippet. It was written by Booker Prize contender, Jim Crace. The powder blue jacket? Destroyed by oil spray and soot when I recorded a ride on a traction engine in Wolverhampton – the price of vanity. When it comes to clothes I have never learnt my lesson.’

Chris Phipps

‘Chris was the first full time Wolverhampton reporter based in his own studio in the town and among his regular productions was the ‘Wulfrun Echo’, weekly news magazine on Radio Birmingham. He was followed by Mike Henfield and then the late Barry Lankester. I took over for the year of 1984.’

Pete Simpkin

Trials of Live Radio OBs – Pete Simpkin

I was recalling for somebody else the other day one of my more hysterical broadcasts and thought you might like to hear it too!

I can recall a story involving stereo transmissions, when in the mid ‘80s Radio WM along with several other stations finally ‘went stereo’. To celebrate we broadcast each evening a particular style of music to demonstrate to local musicians the possibilities stereo would bring to their ‘on air’ experiences. …Folk, Country, Asian etc.

My duty turned out to be the below stage concert broadcast announcer for a relay of the City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra and I spent ages boning up on the works to be played and the musicians involved. I discovered for instance that there was no agreed pronunciation of the conductor’s name Neeme Jerve. Anyway the time arrived for me to announce the arrival on stage of the Leader and the Conductor and in true BBC Proms tradition I had my script marked so that I could physically cue them to walk from their position beside me, below stage and arrive in front of the audience at precisely the moment I said their name on air. The first two worked well but when I got to the name of the solo pianist for the evening, Peter Donohoe, he did not arrive on stage and my announcement of his name was greeted with an unexpected silence from the audience. I put down the microphone and rushed to the steps leading to the stage to discover what mishap had befallen him, at the same time attempting to assemble some words in my mind to explain to the listeners what had happened. I could see that he had got halfway to the stage but had turned back to collect a small canister of muscle spray which pianists keep close at hand and which he had passed by where he had left it at rehearsal at the foot of the steps to the stage. At that moment he reached the stage and the applause resulting gave me the time to get back on air and introduce the music.

At the end of the first half I handed back to Ken Dudeney in the studio for a pre-recorded 20 minute interval feature only to discover to my horror that the said piano soloist had decided to give the audience an impromptu encore which went on for some 6 minutes meaning that not only were the players of the CBSO being denied their interval lubrication but I was faced with an impromptu session of my own as the orchestra had decided to stick to their scheduled 20 minutes sherry consumption. Luckily Ken had a variety of trailers to help fill the gap, but I too had lots of fascinating facts about the second half programme and the history of the Town Hall with which to regale the mystified listeners until the Orchestra got back on stage and the rest of the concert continued without more heart stopping moments!

Pete Simpkin

Joan Collins on Radio Birmingham

Press cutting from May 23, 1979, about Joan Collins storming out of a Radio Birmingham interview. The copy is rather hard to read, so here is a transcript:

Sexy, film star Joan Collins burst into tears and stormed out of a radio station in Birmingham today after a record by her ex-husband was played.

The 42-year-old star of films including The Stud was talking on BBC Radio Birmingham’s Alastair Yates show when she objected to the strong line of questioning from presenter Yates.

Producer George Mitchell said: “Alastair suggested to her that her book, Past Imperfect was a jumping into-bed book, just a catalogue of sexual encounters.

She accused him of not having even read the book, which was just not true. Alastair has read the book from cover to cover and so have I.

Then we played the record What Kind Of Fool Am I by her ex-husband, Anthony Newley, and she burst into tears and left.

I set the questions for Alastair to ask and I don’t regret any of them.

She asked to come on the show and I don’t see why any author should simply by able to sit there and plug a book.

We are not afraid of asking searching questions. The book is one long sexual romp so we asked about that. She seems very bitter about the men in her life so we asked about that too.

But she was on the air for only about 10 minutes before she started crying and refused to go on.”

(Thanks to Alastair Yates for sharing this cutting).

Farming sig tune & Radio Birmingham jingles

Here is the BBC Farming signature tune, from the early 1980s. Farming was the predecessor of the current Countryfile series.

Also included here are some Radio Birmingham jingles, which probably date from the 1970s.

Thanks to Peter Poole for sharing these.

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

Stuart Gandy: ‘Flippin, ek! that recalls memories from a long time ago, from 1980 when I was doing racks in Studio B. The racks job for Farming was usually very simple. Apart from the opening introduction to camera and the goodbyes, almost all of the rest of the programme was on film. It was the telecine operator who had the much more to do, from the ops perspective.’

Lynn Cullimore: ‘Music always evokes memories…the Top Gear sig tune does it for me having worked there…it gives me goose bumps.’

Pete Simpkin: ‘Actually Lynn the Radio sig. tune version of the Farming programme always does that for me, I can still hear David Stevens announcing and then the strains of ‘I wish I were plough-boy’ took us into Tony Parkin’s introduction.’

Peter Poole: ‘I used to work on Farming with Peter Mellors. After a few weeks he asked if I would like to mix the programme . In my excitement I almost forgot to mic up the presenter. This was probably my first live TV programme. Great days.’