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jaceyIn a reply to brownnicky's reply to my reply to heleninwales' post about introverts and extroverts I ended up recalling an Artisan memory from the time we were asked to sing live on the Ned Sherrin Show, Loose Ends, live on Radio 4
Unfortunately due to the rush of getting there from rehearsals we didn't have the opportunity to set up a recording, so we never got to hear it ourselves, however this is the song we had to relearn very fast: Left Right, Right Left
brownnicky's reply to my reply to heleninwales' post about introverts and extroverts I ended up recalling an Artisan memory from the time we were asked to sing live on the Ned Sherrin Show, Loose Ends, live on Radio 4 It was fairly scary because we only had about three days notice and they asked us to sing a specific song from our new CD that wasn't in our regular repertoire (then) and it was a tongue-twister. We could have guessed that they'd ask for that, I suppose because of the political slant to the show and that the song was called Left Right Right Left. It is - as far as I am aware - the only song with 'swingometer' in the lyrics.
That particular song had been a bastard to record. We'd rehearsed it and arranged it verse by verse but because of the tongue twister element to it had never quite got around to singing it all the way through. In the studio we made a couple of false starts and then glared at each other and said, 'One take... Now!. Then we took a deep breath, sang it through without a fluff and nailed it in one. Until the BBC called and asked us to do it on Loose Ends that was the one and only time we'd done it sans cock-up. However when the BBC call, you don't say no. (And they're right, it's NOT for the money, believe me.)
But to add to the complications... when the BBC called we were in rehearsals for a full week for a play we were doing at the RSC (Swan) in Stratford with the Kaleidoscope Theatre Company - a company of Downs Syndrome actors, which meant we were away from home and had nothing with us except rehearsal clothes. We didn't even have the relevant song words... however...
On Friday afternoon we found a photocopy shop and enlarged the words form a copy of the album booklet. Then very early Saturday morning we drove from the Midlands to arrive in London early. By 8.00 a.m. we were sitting on a parking meter outside Broadcasting House, singing through the damn song. At nine we went in, as instructed, and were taken down into the depths to the studios (yes you can hear the underground trains - but we'd worked there before so we knew that). Everyone appearing on the show got to meet each other first, which meant we were introduced to Mark Radcliffe, Sister Wendy (the toothy art-critic nun) and Sylvester McCoy who was opening in a new play in the West End that week. Ned does not socialise before the show lest you ask him what he's going to spring on you. We did a sound check with the very accommodating and able studio engineers and then at two minutes to ten the great man arrived in the studio like a galleon in full sail and we were off, live.
So the live Radio4 broadcast was only the second time we'd ever sung 'Left Right Right Left' through from beginning to end without a fluff. Talk about living dangerously. Luckily the other song that we sang was one we'd been doing for years, 'Snakes and Ladders', and while we were singing it Ned pulled a pair of spoons out of his back pocket and gave them to Sylvester who, being Irish, played them magnificently.
And that's the story of how we appeared live on Radio4 accompanied by Doctor Who playing spoons.
I have to say that after the show Ned Sherrin was not in any was stand-offish. We all went round the pub together, except - for some strange reason - the nun.
That particular song had been a bastard to record. We'd rehearsed it and arranged it verse by verse but because of the tongue twister element to it had never quite got around to singing it all the way through. In the studio we made a couple of false starts and then glared at each other and said, 'One take... Now!. Then we took a deep breath, sang it through without a fluff and nailed it in one. Until the BBC called and asked us to do it on Loose Ends that was the one and only time we'd done it sans cock-up. However when the BBC call, you don't say no. (And they're right, it's NOT for the money, believe me.)
But to add to the complications... when the BBC called we were in rehearsals for a full week for a play we were doing at the RSC (Swan) in Stratford with the Kaleidoscope Theatre Company - a company of Downs Syndrome actors, which meant we were away from home and had nothing with us except rehearsal clothes. We didn't even have the relevant song words... however...
On Friday afternoon we found a photocopy shop and enlarged the words form a copy of the album booklet. Then very early Saturday morning we drove from the Midlands to arrive in London early. By 8.00 a.m. we were sitting on a parking meter outside Broadcasting House, singing through the damn song. At nine we went in, as instructed, and were taken down into the depths to the studios (yes you can hear the underground trains - but we'd worked there before so we knew that). Everyone appearing on the show got to meet each other first, which meant we were introduced to Mark Radcliffe, Sister Wendy (the toothy art-critic nun) and Sylvester McCoy who was opening in a new play in the West End that week. Ned does not socialise before the show lest you ask him what he's going to spring on you. We did a sound check with the very accommodating and able studio engineers and then at two minutes to ten the great man arrived in the studio like a galleon in full sail and we were off, live.
So the live Radio4 broadcast was only the second time we'd ever sung 'Left Right Right Left' through from beginning to end without a fluff. Talk about living dangerously. Luckily the other song that we sang was one we'd been doing for years, 'Snakes and Ladders', and while we were singing it Ned pulled a pair of spoons out of his back pocket and gave them to Sylvester who, being Irish, played them magnificently.
And that's the story of how we appeared live on Radio4 accompanied by Doctor Who playing spoons.
I have to say that after the show Ned Sherrin was not in any was stand-offish. We all went round the pub together, except - for some strange reason - the nun.
Unfortunately due to the rush of getting there from rehearsals we didn't have the opportunity to set up a recording, so we never got to hear it ourselves, however this is the song we had to relearn very fast: Left Right, Right Left
