We’re all aware of the phrase Tempus fugit … I have just been listening to the Classic Comedy Hour on BBC Radio 4 Extra (8 a.m. for me, with other start-times available during any one day), in this case The Navy Lark and then Dad’s Army, the latter adapted for the wireless following television success.
What underlines my writing this blog-piece is that it scarcely seems a week since this comedic pairing was last aired, but it is, and it’s scary.
Still, I am enjoying myself and lockdown is not a problem, surrounded as I am by great music and with the means to scroll some words about it, and also in contact (if distantly) with good friends, but when I tune-in to R4X for such as The Goon Show, Hancock and Round the Horne (all surviving the decades with ease), the same feeling that a week is now three days’ long will again chill my blood!
Ah, The Navy Lark – Tommy Reilly playing the Trade Wind Hornpipe signature tune would be on the soundtrack of my childhood. Sadly, Heather Chasen (WRN Chasen and dozens of other characters) died ten days ago at the age of ninety-two. A great radio performer.
Indeed – thank goodness for Radio 4 Extra, slimmed down as it currently is, with repeats rolling round at least three times a day now. Bona to vada all those dolly old eeks in one’s mind’s eye.