Desert Island Discs

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Felicity Lott Jul 13, 2008

Show notes

Kirsty Young's castaway this week is the soprano, Dame Felicity Lott. She is one of Britain's best known and best loved singers and has given performances in opera houses the world over under the batons of such notable conductors as Bernard Haitink, Carlos Kleiber and Georg Solti.

As a child, she had always loved singing, but was, she says, a shy, gawky girl who didn't have sharp enough elbows to get to the top. She tried her hand at teaching, but found she was so crippled with nerves that she had to abandon the idea. By good fortune she was delivered to a singing teacher who spotted her talent and gave her encouragement. It was exactly what she needed - she has enjoyed a career spanning more than 30 years and over that time has won a large and loyal army of fans.

[Taken from the original programme material for this archive edition of Desert Island Discs]

Favourite track: Moonlight Music - the prelude to the final scene of Capriccio by Richard Strauss Book: Les Miserables by Victor Hugo Luxury: Lots of champagne and pistachio nuts.

Antonio Carluccio Jul 06, 2008

Show notes

Kirsty Young's castaway this week is the cook Antonio Carluccio. He's been hailed as perhaps the best Italian cook in Britain today and the flavours and methods he holds dear are the ones he learnt at his mother's knee, growing up in Northern Italy. The food he ate then was high quality, locally produced and carefully prepared - now, that's every chefs mantra, but when he arrived in Britain in the 1970s it was ground-breaking. Within a few years he'd taken over the Neal Street Restaurant in London's Covent Garden and turned it into an institution and now his highly successful cafes are scattered throughout Britain.

For him preparing and cooking food is a sensual act, so perhaps it's no surprise that in his spare time he whittles wood into intricately-patterned walking sticks and tries his hand at clay modelling too. It's all part of a life that, at its best, is a tactile, sensual experience.

[Taken from the original programme material for this archive edition of Desert Island Discs]

Favourite track: The Finale to The Carnival of the Animals by Camille Saint-Saëns Book: His Dark Materials trilogy by Philip Pullman Luxury: White truffles.

Posy Simmonds Jun 29, 2008

Show notes

Kirsty Young's castaway this week the cartoonist, writer and illustrator Posy Simmonds. Her social observation and sharp wit gained a loyal following in The Guardian where - among their stripped pine, lentils and patchwork - she depicted the lives of prototype woolly liberals Wendy and George Weber. Since then she's gone on to create highly acclaimed children's books and also graphic novels Gemma Bovary and Tamara Drew.

Posy says she started drawing as soon as she could pick up a pencil and as a child was making magazines and little comics with titles like How to Turn Yourself Into an Up-to-Date Ted and How to Make Love and Be Loved in Four Easy Lessons. She remembers drawing as the perfect thing to do, because she could sit on her own and talk to herself.

[Taken from the original programme material for this archive edition of Desert Island Discs]

Favourite track: The opening of the prelude from Cello Suite No 1 in G Major by Johann Sebastian Bach Book: Four volumes of the London Telephone Directory Luxury: The Crown Jewels.

Ara Darzi Jun 22, 2008

Show notes

Kirsty Young's castaway this week is the pioneering surgeon Professor Ara Darzi. He was born in Iraq and brought up in Baghdad but he moved to Ireland when he was 17 to study medicine. He came to England to finish his training and, highly talented and ambitious, was made a consultant when he was barely out of his 20s. Since then he's been nick-named 'Robo-doc' for spearheading the use of keyhole surgery in Britain and for introducing robotics to the operating theatre.

For the past year he has combined his surgical work with a position in government - he is a health minister and, on the eve of the NHS's 60th birthday, he is charged with reshaping the NHS in England. It is, he says, the greatest challenge he has yet faced.

Favourite track: Seven Seconds by Youssou N’Dour and Neneh Cherry Book: Yes, Minister by Jonathan Lynn Luxury: Pencil and paper

Peter Carey Jun 20, 2008

Show notes

Kirsty Young's castaway this week is the author Peter Carey. He says he grew up in his homeland "thinking that Australian history was dull and Australian literature was dull" and that he developed a strong passion to make it new and fresh. In this he has surely succeeded - he is one of only two novelists to have been awarded the Booker Prize twice.

Yet he came to writing relatively late. The son of a car salesman he started off studying science but he abandoned his university career and ended up, in his 20s, drifting into advertising. It was only then that his literary awakening began. "I announced with great confidence one day, 'I’m going to be a writer',' he says, 'I’m an obsessive fool, I was determined to do it!"

Favourite track: The Hallelujah Chorus from Messiah by George Frideric Handel Book: Austerlitz by W G Sebald Luxury: A ‘magic’ pudding and a drink

Bill Bailey Jun 08, 2008

Show notes

Kirsty's castaway this week is the comedian and actor, Bill Bailey. Lauded for his hugely inventive stand up, he has carved out a highly successful career with an altogether atypical approach. He's a familiar face on television from his regular appearances on quiz shows Have I Got News for You, QI and Never Mind the Buzzcocks.

At school he was a gifted pupil who gave up on his education and a pitch-perfect piano student who flunked his music school entrance. He started drifting as a teenager and gave up on university within days of arrival - he says he was looking for the next challenge, and that turned out to be stand-up comedy. He loved having to think on his feet and found the laughter of strangers intoxicating.

[Taken from the original programme material for this archive edition of Desert Island Discs]

Favourite track: Once in a Lifetime by Talking Heads Book: The collected works by W. Somerset Maugham Luxury: A pack of cards.

Lord Woolf Jun 01, 2008

Show notes

Kirsty Young's castaway this week is the former Lord Chief Justice of England and Wales Lord Woolf. Throughout his career, he has been at the forefront of shaping our justice system. Following the Strangeways riots in 1990 he issued far-reaching reports on penal reform and his part in authorizing the release of James Bulger's killers attracted huge attention. As Master of the Rolls he made an historic judgement allowing Diane Blood to use her dead husband's sperm to have a child.

Lord Woolf's appetite to see justice done was sharpened as a wartime school boy and the only Jew at Fettes College in Edinburgh - he developed an early antipathy towards any perceived unfairness. His school master's contention that being a barrister wasn't the profession for a boy with a stutter only made him more determined to succeed.

[Taken from the original programme material for this archive edition of Desert Island Discs]

Favourite track: The Prisoner's Chorus from Fidelio by Ludwig van Beethoven Book: The Koran Luxury: A happy photograph of the whole family including the latest grandchildren.

Howard Goodall May 25, 2008

Show notes

Kirsty Young's castaway this week is the composer Howard Goodall. He's a man of eclectic musical tastes and talents creating choral works, popular TV show themes like Black Adder and The Vicar of Dibley and movie scores and musicals. His enthusiasm and deep-rooted commitment to his life's work has regularly propelled him away from the score and onto our television screens where he's presented award winning documentaries like How Music Works. In January 2007 he was appointed as England's first ever National Ambassador for Singing, leading a £40 million scheme to improve group singing in primary schools.

Howard says he hears music in his head all the time - and can't imagine life without it.

[Taken from the original programme material for this archive edition of Desert Island Discs]

Favourite track: The first movement of Introitus from the Durufle Requiem by Maurice Durufle Book: The Diary of Anne Frank by Anne Frank Luxury: Ice-cold vanilla vodka and tonics.

Diane Abbott May 18, 2008

Show notes

Kirsty Young's castaway this week is the MP Diane Abbott. She was the first black woman to become a Member of Parliament and, after her election in 1987, she said she would find herself sitting on the green benches of the House of Commons wondering whether she was really entitled to be there.

It was not the first British institution she'd cracked - she had already propelled herself through Cambridge and then into the Civil Service. But she has not always sat comfortably inside these great bastions of the establishment; she says Gordon Brown booted her off an influential committee because she asked too many questions; she was a vocal opponent of the war in Iraq and she attracted a good deal of controversy when she decided to send her son to private school.

After more than 20 years in the House of Commons, she is, she says, happy for people to judge her on what she has done and what she has stood up for.

[Taken from the original programme material for this archive edition of Desert Island Discs]

Favourite track: Nkosi Sikelel 'Iafrika by Ladysmith Black Mambazo Book: Volumes of architectural and historical surveys of London Luxury: A nice bed with comfortable mattress, sheets & mosquito net.

Annie Lennox May 11, 2008

Show notes

Kirsty Young's castaway this week is one of our most successful singer-songwriters, Annie Lennox. Her extraordinary voice has captivated us for more than a quarter of a century and, as one half of the group Eurythmics and as a solo artist, she's sold tens of millions of records and won fistfuls of awards. As a teenager, her musical ability was her passport out of her home town of Aberdeen. At that point, a career as a flautist beckoned: but, after studying in London, she felt she could never make her mark as a classical musician. It was a chance encounter with aspiring pop-star Dave Stewart that set her on an entirely different path.

For much of the 1980s, all her creative energy went into making music. But when her children were born, she says, her priorities shifted. Now she devotes much of her time and energy to supporting different humanitarian causes. She says: "I need to find meaning in my life to make me happy; and that's been an ongoing struggle."

[Taken from the original programme material for this archive edition of Desert Island Discs]

Favourite track: I Say A Little Prayer by Aretha Franklin Book: Power of Now by Eckhart Tolle Luxury: Suncream.

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