Despite the duff ear, my love of Radio 3 is waxing. I may even have to get a t-shirt made.
Recently, the Beeb have improved their iPlayer site and now users can select their favourite shows so these shows are ready and waiting as soon as you enter the site. (Unfortunately, my overseas buddies might not be able to access the shows - which is a pity - but fair, I suppose, as BBC content is funded by UK taxpayers).
I have discovered another gem of theirs, Words & Music. I've avoided it until now because it sounded dry and up itself. Basically, it's a mix of spoken word and music selected for a theme. I feel a bit short changed on the music, it's often only a clip, but the words are the thing, a reading from a novel, or a piece of poetry. It's a wonderful way for a relative illiterate like me to hear poetry and I wonder how it would work on my mp3 player, randomly selected in shuffle mode. I might acquire a few clips and find out.
I was quite taken by the poem, Machines, by Michael Donaghy. It was read on the show by an actor from the Archers (a chronic radio soap where nothing discernible happens to a community of farrrmers) but I discovered that Donaghy was happy to perform his own work in his time and so here he is performing Machines.
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This is good stuff - I listened/read all 6 MD poems - touching, witty, unexpected..
ReplyDeleteI find even the most accessible poetry difficult to focus on, and a reading really helps concentration. Poems look easy cos they're short, but it's easy to miss the point, subtleties, richness and so on. After all that, I still need to hear them again...
My eyes act like teflon when presented with printed poetry - I'm just not educated enough. Reading it aloud helps but you feel self-conscious. Someone else reading it is the best option - I'll look out for some more sound bites on the web...
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