Classic BBC Radio Theme ~ Radio Newsreel (Imperial Echoes)
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- Опубліковано 4 жов 2024
- This is "Imperial Echoes" by Arnold Safroni. Which was used as the theme to the BBC radio news programmes.
Radio Newsreel was a news programme produced by the British Broadcasting Corporation between 1940 and 1988. The programme, which eventually had four 15-minute international editions as well as a nightly 30-minute domestic version ("The News and Radio Newsreel"), broadcast in the BBC Light Programme, was composed of taped dispatches from correspondents in the field, live and recorded actuality and such other features, borrowed from the format of the film newsreel, as interviews with people currently in the news.
Outside the United Kingdom, the programme was also carried weekly on the Mutual Broadcasting System in the United States during World War II and as part of the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation's radio programming in the 1970s. Until 1987, American Public Radio also carried the programme in the United States.
I used to listen to BBC Radio Newsreel as a child in British East Africa, and I have very fond memories of that time. Now, I am one of the few remaining individuals to have a real-time memory of our Imperial Echoes.
I used to work on Radio Newsreel in the late 60's, RNR as we called it. I was there on the last night of transmission. We shared out the spare 45 rpm copies of "Imperial Echoes" between us. I still have mine. Great days.
What's an Imperial Echo?
music
Feonid
ha, I'm not used to hearing these as anything other than gimmicks in video games, intros on British tv/radio/etc.
Forgot it was actually music at one point.
Did it really vanish in 1988? It seems only yesterday...
It went on for a long time from Bvsh on World Service. My dad cut his teeth on RNR in Egton, a 7 inch 33rpm exists somewhere round here
My grandfather was the founder and the first editor of the BBC's radio newsreel.
It started in the Overseas Service in 1940, and moved to the Home Service during the war. By 1945 there were four editions of Radio Newsreel every day.
A fixture of the old BBC Light Programme at 7pm every night.
You must be very proud of him. It only seems like yesterday to me. As a child during the war I can remember all these faces that went in and out of my life and it's amazing to realise how far back in time it is now.
Brings back memories from when we were stationed in the bush in Nigeria from the fifties to the seventies. My poor old Dad would turn in his grave to see what has become of the BBC and our world since then:-(
Your poor old dad saw the 50s and the start of the decline, he already knows
This vividly reminds me of marching up and down (aged about 6 or 7) when my Auntie Dorothy tuned in to Newsreel on the BBC at 7 pm. She always played with me from 7 til 8 in the evenings so this brings back very happy memories of the fun we always had.
From a time when the BBC spoke with Authority .... it often sent a shiver down my spine as I listened in South Africa, etc.
How I loved to hear this rousing march when I was a little girl listening to the Radio Newsreel on the Home Service
Pretty certain 'Radio Newsreel' went out on the Light Programme.
In fact Radio Times & Wiki confirm that it was a staple of the old Light Programme on 1500m LW & what was then known as VHF !
Me too! On shortwave and also on AM in India.
If memory serves Radio Newsreel was on the Light Programme.
Can see me old mum and dad and little me sitting in front of the "wireless" the BBC news about to begin and read by a plummy voiced newsreader no doubt wearing and evening suit & black tie. Ah those were the days!!
Oh How I miss the old World Service and the announcement "BBC World Service Presents Radio Newsreel". After the intro, today we have reports from our correspondents in Paris, Nairobi, Singapore and Moscow. The Snap Crackle and Pop or Radio static during the reports with voices fading in and out as Radio Tirana's ever wayward transmitters tried mostly unsuccessfully to Block out the BBC WS Signal and then if we were lucky most of the end of the march. Oh World Service Radio, what has become of you.
This tune was used for the speedway riders' parade at Middlesbrough's Cleveland Park Stadium between 1968 - 1996 followed by the national anthem.
I listen again and again in Africa,superb music !!!!!
If one could wake up to the strains of Imperial Echoes introducing Radio 4's "Today" programme with Jim Naughtie & Evan Davis, just think how much better mornings would be. It'd put a real spring in the step. Come on BBC.
Or even just Fritz Spiegl's "Radio 4 UK" theme.
Dad , who was a CPO in the RN in WW2, worked overtime (in the 1950's) so when I heard this from our old Ekco AC 74 introducing Radio Newsreel on the BBC Home Service at 7pm Monday to Friday it usually meant Dad was in the drive, home from work - that was 57 years ago ....
Never heard this before. What a stirring tune!
This is the Central Band of the Royal Air force 1938 -well done!
To get the full effect, it ought to have severe fading distortion, and bursts of Morse code interference - and, of course, be followed by a voice saying "This" - pause - "is London". Probably with a GTS of six _equal_ pips.
Makes me feel I should be standing to attention and saluting - even though I was never in the military.
Absolutely it should have all of those short-wave trimmings, the way I used to hear it while stationed in the Peace Corps in Guatemala '66 to '68. I miss the old BBC General Overseas Service, World Service, and North American Service.
@@reecenewton3097 For most of those, other than it has the long pip and the _other_ tune: ua-cam.com/video/ssw7cn2TbF0/v-deo.html . It has the pause though!
Exactly!
Chuck in that very loud Deutsche Welle interval signal with the thunderous piano stings blasting over the top. Or that station that played nothing but Swiss "Oompa" mountain music continuously.
@@sambda This one, you mean:
ua-cam.com/video/troQMC_g6AQ/v-deo.html
For absolute nostalgia, complete with fading distortion and "This …": ua-cam.com/video/ssw7cn2TbF0/v-deo.html
Brings back great memories of when I first arrived in Israel in the 1970's. This was the intro to an excellent review of world news on the BBC which was really high quality reporting back then which seems to be have been lost these days. I always looked forward to hearing this stirring music, which also reminds me of an American college football fight song. Thanks for posting this.
if a martian heard this piece,he would know it could only be British.
I loved to hear Reginald Dixon play this piece on the organ of the tower ballroom Blackpool,
I can't help hearing the crunch of Blakey's on gravel, the slap of hands on the stocks of Lee-Enfield rifles, the flutter of a union flag and some RSM screaming at the top of his voice when I hear this music.
this is the theme I recall from the opening of news broadcasts I heard while traveling in the early 1970's...
Makes you feel like joining up again,----doesn't it !!.
Radio Newsreel may have been broadcast in Canada in the 1970s, but I remember the theme music from much earlier - a BBC news programme carried weekday evenings on Radio-Canada (the French network) in the late 1940s and 1950s. The news was read in slightly accented but excellent French by Nina Epton.
Makes you stand up straight!
Arnold Safroni will be seated at God's right hand,for having written this patriotic piece of music.
I remember radio newsreel on the Home Service
Actually it was always on the Light programme pre 1967.
@@paulputnam8211 : My mistake, thanks for the info.
I actually have the version of the signature tune the BBC used on an HMV (78 rpm) record - "Imperial Echoes" played by the 'Royal Air force Band' which was recorded in the mid 1930's.
@@blackpoolbarmpot Yes that's the correct version. Sounded fine on AM radio back in the day !
Should be played on the beach at Dover....often. hearing it again brings me to tears, and makes me shake my head in disbelief.
Someone at the Beeb did an edited version of this which surfaced on some of the tapes that used to circulate among sound technicians. It was preceded by a doctored announcement for 'The British Broadcorping Castration'
Sounds like a BBC staff Christmas tape to me
David X -
You asked the name of the band. It's the Central Band of the RAF in a 1938 recording. An excerpt was on a BBC album released in 1982, celebrating the Corporation's 60th anniversary.
Regards,
LS
At 1:30 if you were very lucky and there wasn't too much coming in to the BBC in London from around the world, sometimes the final report of the fifteen minute programme would come to an end. We would hear the full ending of the march.
The presenter would say (without comment about the correspondents report just broadcast), " and with that report from Gerald Monkshabit in Antarctica we come to the end of this edition of Rudial Nosewheel. This is Cecil Snaith in London". Wonderful memories of Listening to the BBC World Service when it hadn't been Americanised as it is these days. Wonderful Music - Excellent memories
From a time when the WS meant something! Now, sounds just like any old commercial station :(
Hearing this stirring piece of music ,it makes one realise what a priviledge it is to be English.
AMAN after my own heart.
☕️👍
@@paulkersey7564 You ridiculous idiot. Perhaps you should learn to spell the English language before you take it upon yourself to criticise "an old wog [.......]yodelling from a [...] mosque". And of course you're not a racist you bigoted prat.
Golden memories
@foden123 We still play this all the time in our school band, and to hell with the haters! :)
That's quite wrong, I'm afraid, psd. The News and Radio Newsreel were most definitely broadcast in the BBC Light Programme, at 7.00 pm each evening, and on weekdays followed the 6.45 pm broadcast of "The Archers". For the Light Programme was not at all "purely for light music" -- it included drama, such speech programmes as "Woman's Hour" and "Any Questions?", even some classical music concerts. Equally, the Home Service included such popular music programmes as "Music While You Work".
Definately the Light Programme. On 1500LW naturally !
The Radio Times Genome Project confirms my recollections from the 1950s. At 7pm on the Light Programme there was "The News and Radio Newsreel".
Trying to draw equivalences between the Light Programme and Radio 2 and between the Home Service and Radio Four is misleading. The old stations were more eclectic. Radio was not as ghettoised as it is today.
Yep, remember it well. The Old Light Programme on 1500m LW and this at 7pm weekdays. A time of continuity & security.
The BBCs version of Preußens Gloria. Beautiful.
Love this!
Thanks LondonScot1 for the info, appreciated
''SIGH'' when England felt like England we had more respect in ourselves and in society
The Great British Monkey er. a bit confused about your comment
yup totally agree there a few old uns as well
montgomery15 ok then we'll just have to agree to disagree
I'm NOT condemning todays younger generation.. some of them have a far better view on life than the older generation that I admit... I never mean to imply anything of a derogatory nature .. I meant the pace was slower and graffiti artists and such like were not tolerated and neighbours were neighbours not like today you can die in your own home and no one would know or care
AHEM.. yes you are right there to a point … but only to a point.. people DID have more respect in society than today.. people used to communicate more .. if a neighbour was stuck I know and have seen other neighbours help out .. not seen that happen in many a year.. screw you I'm alright sod off
excellent march!
The glory days of the BBC!!!!
Make you proud to be British :D
Also the Regimental Quick March of the Royal Army Pay Corps. Fide et Fuducia.
Memories of Waller Barracks Devizes 1956
@foden123 Great melody - takes me back 2 my youth in new Zealand when the only news on NZ radio came from the BBC and to get the live news report it had to be via shortwave, which was then relayed over the NZ national network, so it often faded in and out or was accompanied by strange whistling and buzzing sounds. Our household had to be dead quiet at 6pm each night for Lillibulero and the BBC news and News About Britian and then Radio Newsreel with its catchy tune. Wish they still played it
this always meant bedtime as kids
The last half of this tune is similar to Sousa's Liberty Bell (the first half was used as the Monty Python theme).
@Cinesound01 Absoloutely !
well that took me back !! when a map of the world had lots of Pink on it !!!
maszerować! Piękne!
Oh well its bed time :-)
For me also :-)
You wouldn't get this on the BBC these days
Zoe Ball now ends the Radio 2 breakfast show with it every morning as background music to her "Ken o'clock news" before handing over to Ken Bruce at 9.30am. It's probably the best part of her show!
This is the best version of this piece of music that I've listened to....and I've listened to very many! Does anyone know who it's by?
Central Band of the RAF. This stirring tune was the quick march of the Royal Army Pay Corps.
God save the queen...
I have this recording, it's from Boosey & Hawkes.
Markh5682 - If you read this, could you make an amendment? The News and Radio Newsreel were broadcast on the Home Service, with other 'speech' programmes and some classical music. The Light Programme (which became Radio 2) was purely for 'light' music.
However, thanks for bringing back memories of childhood. Even in the late 1960s, the BBC still occasionally used 'stirring', patriotic-sounding marches as theme-tunes, e.g. the original Match of the Day theme.
Both Wikipedia & the Radio Times confirm that Radio Newsreel was always on the old Light Programme. (1500m LW & vhf !) It ended in 1970 but continued for some years on the World Service.
1:10 to 1:29 is the part used for Radio Newsreel.
Of course, I recall hearing "Radio Newsreel" on BBC World Service during the 1970's. The "Imperial Echoes" portion from 2:17 to 2:47 was the closing music.
Widnes RLFC , as the teams come out .
Love to know what band is playing this march
Is this piece royalty free?
this meant bedtime when we were tiny nippers
1:09-1:29.
Sigh, BBC before it was taken over by the lentils and sandals crowd.
@BrokenneckYgor And all the rest followed,who didn't convert,now these islands are saturated with them.
Enough to make Harriet Harperson, David Camoron and Ed Millipede run a mile LOL.
Sounds like a German Military band.
Same thing most of the time.
Haha! made me Laugh Out Loud oooft! My sentiments too so that makes 2 'old racists!!' @ Shegelu (and probably plenty more who wouldn't admit it methinks)
@foden123 To hell with 'em.
I was a 9 year old at the 1956 SSAFA Searchight Tattoo. at the White City when I first witnessed this. I later listened to the BBC newsreels in Kenya in the 1960s. I last heard it as part of a record collection of a BBC Producer in South Africa in the 1970s.
Cmon the Dee's
And then christian motorist take over the car
Rule Britania.
And we all know why the sun never set on the British empire?
Because none of her colonial subjects could be trusted in the dark :-)
A typical scotch calumny. They hate everything about the English but our money.