Thursday 1 January 2015

HIT THE HEIGHTS!

Back in 1990, I was commissioned to create an imagined retro revue as part of a BBC Radio 4 drama season devoted to the 1920s.

I decided to call it Hit the Heights and the numbers and sketches were compiled from contemporary revues and shows using the original (often unexpurgated) scripts and songs taken from the Lord Chancellor's copies lodged at the Westminster Library but ignoring the ubiquitous blue pencil markings!

Songs included are by Cole Porter, Ivor Novello, George Gershwin, Rogers & Hart and Noel Coward whose 'Poor Little Rich Girl' heard within the context of its framing drama takes on an entirely different resonance to what we might have thought...

Starring John Moffatt Una Stubbs, Charles Kay and Nikolas Grace with Nicholas Bolton, Cathy Sayer, Rachel Atkins, Peter Whitman, Michael Onslow and the legendary Elisabeth Welch, Hit the Heights was recorded before an equally starry audience and directed by Glyn Dearman.

Not heard for almost 25 years, here's a chance to slip back to the roaring, sparkling 'twenties and hear the songs and jokes that entertained and amused your grand- (or great-grand-) parents...


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