VITRUVIUS AND DE ARCHITECTURA on Radio 4

Melvyn Bragg and his guests discuss Vitruvius' De Architectura. Written almost exactly two thousand years ago, Vitruvius' work is a ten-volume treatise on engineering and architecture, the only surviving work on the subject from the ancient world. This fascinating book offers unique insights into Roman technology and contains discussion of the general principles of architecture, the training of architects and the design of temples, houses and public buildings.

The rediscovery of this seminal treatise in the 15th century provided the impetus for the neoclassical architectural movement, and Vitruvius exerted a significant influence on the work of Renaissance architects including Palladio, Brunelleschi and Alberti. It remains a hugely important text today, two millennia after it was written.
With:
Serafina Cuomo
Reader in Roman History at Birkbeck, University of London
Robert Tavernor
Emeritus Professor of Architecture and Urban Design at the London School of Economics
Alice Koenig
Lecturer in Latin and Classical Studies at the University of St Andrews.
Producer: Thomas Morris.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b01d2kzx

Picture; from In Our Time page

1848 the Year of Revolutions, France, Germany, Austria-Hungary and Chorlton

We had our own revolution in Chorlton in 1848, but that is a story for later.

In the meantime, another fine In Our Time, today on Radio 4, well worth listening. This and past programmes are available at http://www.bbc.co.uk/radio4/features/in-our-time/podcasts/


“Melvyn Bragg and his guests discuss 1848, the year that saw Europe engulfed in revolution. Across the continent, from Paris to Palermo, liberals rose against conservative governments. The first stirrings of rebellion came in January, in Sicily; in February the French monarchy fell; and within a few months Germany, Austria, Hungary and Italy had all been overtaken by revolutionary fervour. Only a few countries, notably Britain and Russia, were spared.
The rebels were fighting for nationalism, social justice and civil rights, and were prepared to fight in the streets down to the last man. Tens of thousands of people lost their lives; but little of lasting value was achieved, and by the end of the year the liberal revolutions had been soundly beaten.
With:
Tim Blanning
Emeritus Professor of History at the University of Cambridge
Lucy Riall
Professor of History at Birkbeck, University of London
Mike Rapport
Senior Lecturer in History at the University “

BBC sleeve notes

Picture; March 19 1848, Berlin

Wonderful radio

I am always impressed by Radio 4’s In Our Time, hosted by Melvyn Bragg. It is as the blurb says “the history of ideas discussed by Melvyn Bragg and guests including philosophy, science, literature, religion and the influence these ideas have on us today.” Which can be reached at http://www.bbc.co.uk/radio4/features/in-our-time/


And now all this week he investigates how the written word, a technology originally used for accountancy, gave rise to all of human literature. He charts the emergence of poetry and history writing in the ancient world, inspects an ancient Egyptian precursor to Hamlet, and discovers how Greek literary traditions reached this country in the Middle Ages at http://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/console/b018xw60


And if that wasn’t enough there was also yesterday Black is a Country, a series exploring the extraordinary underground music generated by the Black Power and Black Arts movement of the late Sixties, which can be listened to all week at at http://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/console/bbc_radio_fourfm


Picture; from the BBC Radio 4 listings

How Folk Songs Should Be Sung , Ewan McColl, Peggy Seeger and the Critics Group

For many of my generation the journey from listening to Bob Dylan, and Pete Seeger through to Tom Paxton and Phil Ochs led to traditional English folk music.

During the late 1966 in to ’67 my Friday nights were spent in one of the upstairs rooms of the Old Turk’s Head on Lee Road where I listened and sang along with other young people not much older than me to traditional folk songs. Not that it was exclusively the music of the past. It was here that I saw a young Gordan Giltrap perform. I was just 17 and he perhaps a year older.

These were magical nights and even now over 45 years later I can remember that sense of belonging to something which was not only exciting but put me in touch with a tradition and a history which has never lost me.

From there it was just a short hop via LPs from the local library to Martin Carthy, and Ewan MacColl and along the way to performances of the Critics Group. I saw the Critics Group perform once in the basement of the English Folk and Dance Society and bought three of their records.

So it was with some pleasure that I came across a BBC 4 radio programme presented by Martin Carthy which sought to describe the relationship between Ewan MacColl and the group in the late 1960s and early 70s.
They were selected by MacColl who tutored them to “sing folk songs the way they should be sung and think about the origins of what they were singing.

BBC producer Charles Parker recorded these sessions to aid group analysis. 40 years on, the tapes have come to light. For the first time, a clear sound picture can be constructed of this influential group in action. Former group members Peggy Seeger, Sandra Kerr, Frankie Armstrong, Richard Snell, Brian Pearson and Phil Colclough recount six frantic years of rehearsing, performing and criticising each other. They recall the powerful hold that Ewan MacColl exerted which was eventually to lead to the collapse of the group in acrimony and blame." *


How Folk Songs Should Be Sung can be heard at http://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/console/b018wy4j for the next five days.

Picture; cover from the LP, Waterloo to Peterloo, a collection od traditional songs from the period, Argo
ZFB 68 1968. It still sits along side A Merry Progress To London 1966, Argo ZDA 46 and Sweet Thames Flow Softly, Argo ZDA 47 1967 in my collection

* Notes from the introduction to the programme