Desert Island Discs

Latest Episodes:

Lily Allen Jun 29, 2014

Show notes

Kirsty Young's castaway this week is the singer and songwriter Lily Allen.

Less than a decade ago she dipped her toe in musical waters by releasing her demos on social media, this summer she's one of the headline acts at Glastonbury. It's 29 years since she first appeared at the festival; back then she was a new-born being carried through the crowd in swaddling. Indeed, she was as good as baptised at the font of celebrity culture - her dad, Keith, is an actor and writer, her mum, Alison, is an award-winning film producer - for a time her step-dad was Harry Enfield. So, it seems almost inevitable that she's ended up at the centre of a media-saturated life.

Except that in all likelihood she would have been propelled there entirely by her own endeavours: her lyrics are witty and wise-ass and capture concisely what it is to be a savvy, young woman today.

She says, "the only thing I can do really is write lyrics and the only way I know how to do that is by being honest and doing it with integrity because otherwise there's no point".

Producer: Cathy Drysdale.

Judy Murray Jun 22, 2014

Show notes

Kirsty Young's castaway this week is Judy Murray.

A tennis coach since she was 17, she's the current British captain of the Fed Cup, the premier team competition in women's tennis, and was herself at one time ranked 8th in Britain - achievements worth celebrating.

But what she's best known for is being the ultimate tennis mum. Both her sons have reached the top flight of the game - one as Wimbledon mixed doubles champion, the other becoming the first Brit to win the men's singles in 77 years. In the moments after Andy Murray's heroic win on Centre Court last year it was to her he turned pumping his fists and roaring - as if to say 'we have done it'.

Judy's many followers on social media know how she spends her time - countless hours travelling up and down the country coaching and working to inspire children to take up the game.

She says, 'I've always been competitive. I'm like Andy, or maybe he's like me - I wear my heart on my sleeve. And when something is great, then yep, I am right into it'.

Producer: Cathy Drysdale.

Raja Shehadeh Jun 15, 2014

Show notes

Kirsty Young's castaway this week is the Palestinian author and human rights activist, Raja Shehadeh.

Born in Ramallah in the West Bank, his life and writing has been dominated by displacement, struggle and a search for justice. His father was murdered in 1985 and aside from chronicling the unhappy history of his family and his homeland, he's also co-founded the Palestinian human rights organisation Al-Haq - which monitors and documents violations by all sides in the Middle East conflict, publishing reports and detailed legal analysis on its findings.

Amid the heavy weight of his work he somehow finds time to nurture a glorious garden growing grapevines and pomegranates.

He says of his work, "When you write your thoughts and feelings and emotions ... then you can move on to new ones. Otherwise, they will keep rotating in your mind and you will go in circles".

Tamara Rojo Jun 08, 2014

Show notes

Kirsty Young's castaway this week is the ballerina Tamara Rojo.

On stage she is a principal dancer for the English National Ballet and when the curtain comes down she performs the role of the company's artistic director. World-renowned as a stunning, emotional and dramatic performer, it must surely be a very different set of characteristics she employs off stage, marshalling her company of dancers and propelling the organisation's creative journey.

She was just five years old when, sheltering from the rain she found herself in the school gym, instantly beguiled by the peace and order of a dance class. Despite her father's attempts to widen her horizons with music, sport and art lessons - her path in life was set.

She says, "Life on stage is like nothing else. I've never done heroin but I'm sure that's what it's like. Every feeling and sense exploding. Every nerve in your body complete awake".

Producer: Cathy Drysdale.

Biddy Baxter Jun 01, 2014

Show notes

Kirsty Young's castaway this week is the TV producer and former Blue Peter editor Biddy Baxter.

In charge of Blue Peter for 23 highly successful years, she was responsible for the coveted Blue Peter badges, the multi-million pound charity fundraising appeals and a nationwide lust for something called sticky-backed plastic. Her masterstroke was getting the young audience involved; although the programme's weekly postbag of around seven thousand letters must have given her a few headaches.

In spite of some early careers advice that, "no one from Durham has ever got into the BBC", her determination to make a career in broadcasting won out and across the decades her steely reputation kept the show at the top of the ratings and steered it through quite a few mishaps and the odd spot of 'scandal'.

She says simply, "It was an exercise in trying to make children feel as if they belonged.".

Rene Redzepi May 25, 2014

Show notes

Rene Redzepi, Danish chef, is interviewed by Kirsty Young for Desert Island Discs.

His restaurant, Noma, in Copenhagen has been named 'best in the world' for a fourth time, and holds two Michelin stars. His cooking captures not just the essence of his homeland - using ingredients like reindeer tongue, sea buckthorn or fish scales - but also a strong flavour of 'now'. He believes traditional notions of luxury are outdated. A sense of 'time and place' are his kitchen's guiding principles.

His childhood was split between Denmark and Macedonia, where he spent his summers foraging in the woods. He as good as stumbled into catering, because he couldn't think of anything better to do, but pretty quickly realised that cooking allowed him to dream.

He says, "The day when there is no more to do is the day when you're burned out. There are endless possibilities - it's just whether you can see them or not ... and right now I see plenty.".

Alison Moyet May 18, 2014

Show notes

Kirsty Young's castaway is the singer, Alison Moyet.

She's won three Brit awards, sold tens of millions in record sales and her career has spanned over 30 years. It all kicked off in 1981; just three months after forming her first band "Yazoo" she was on Top of The Pops performing her first hit.

Given that remarkably smooth start it might be tempting to think her achievements have come easy - they haven't. She found growing up tough, had prolonged agoraphobia and depression and weight problems cast their shadow.

Now in her early fifties she says, "I was always an odd girl, I managed to alienate a lot of people. I felt like a square peg in a round hole in the music industry and created a lot of neurosis for myself."

Producer: Cathy Drysdale.

Jack Dee May 11, 2014

Show notes

Kirsty Young's castaway this week is the comedian, Jack Dee.

Comedian, actor and writer, his persona is that of the laconic miserabilist - his hit sit-com was called "Lead Balloon" and his autobiography entitled "Thanks For Nothing". That is only part of the picture: even though show business was in the family - his great grandparents were in music hall - his early working life ranged all over the place. From grafting in the kitchens of The Ritz to working in an artificial leg factory - at one point he even seriously considered the priesthood.

He says his caustic, ironic, sarcastic comedy comes from "a sort of realism. You can't escape the dark stuff in life ... and my way of dealing with that is to absorb it into my life so that it's no longer worrying for me."

Producer: Cathy Drysdale.

Sir Andre Geim Mar 30, 2014

Show notes

Kirsty Young's castaway is the Nobel Prize-winning physicist, Professor Sir Andre Geim.

Born in the Soviet Union, his early years were spent in Sochi with his grandmother, a meteorologist. And it was perhaps her small weather station on the beach that sparked an early interest in science. As a student his intellect was rigorous but his timing was also spot on:"glasnost", the political movement that swept open the Iron Curtain, enabled him to travel and study throughout Europe, finally settling at Manchester University.

It was his work developing the substance graphene that won him science's highest prize. Graphene has many exciting properties: it is the thinnest and strongest material ever discovered; using it, electricity can travel a million meters a second; it has unique levels of light absorption and is flexible and stretchable.

Of his research he says, "It's like being Sherlock Holmes but being a detective of science. It's trying to find things out using very limited information ... like a hair on your coat, or dirt on your shoes, or some lipstick - the winner is the one who needs the fewest hints to get the answer".

Producer: Cathy Drysdale.

Dame Claire Bertschinger Mar 23, 2014

Show notes

Kirsty Young's castaway is the nurse & humanitarian Dame Claire Bertschinger.

She's worked for The Red Cross in over a dozen countries including Sudan, Sierra Leone, Kenya, Afghanistan, Lebanon and Liberia amid the sort of raw human suffering that most of us find - even on the TV - almost unbearable to witness. It was through Michael Buerk's landmark news reports of the Ethiopian famine 30 years ago that she first grabbed our attention. We saw her as a young nurse surrounded by thousands of starving people and forced, daily, to make the truly terrible decision of choosing who to feed.

Throughout the years she's won numerous plaudits and awards: her Florence Nightingale Medal is given "to honour those "who've distinguished themselves in times of war by exceptional courage and devotion to the wounded, sick or disabled."

She says, "I don't live just to eat and sleep and get money to have a nice house ... I have to create value - I have to do something in life."

Producer: Cathy Drysdale.