RADIO CHOICE

BACK in the last ice age, a chalk ridge acted as a dam, holding back the waters of a vast icy lake and connecting Britain to Europe. Then, the climate changed, the lake melted, and the ridge collapsed; the White Cliffs of Dover are part of what little remains. In the first programme of a week-long series, Sanjeev Gupta, a professor of Earth sciences, looks back to the time when it was possible for our ancestors to walk across what is now THE CHANNEL (RADIO 4, 9.45AM (FM), 12.30AM).

JUDAS (RADIO 4, 10.45AM, 7.45PM), a weeklong drama from the multiaward-winning writer Lucy Gannon, has Judas of Kerioth (Damien Molony) telling us about his first meeting with Jesus and explaining how he went from being a devoted disciple to being ‘the most hated man in the world’.

WHO’D have thought that Jeremy Paxman and Joan Baez (pictured) would have teamed up for a gig? Here they are, though, in THE LAST LEAF ON THE TREE (RADIO 2, 10PM), talking about politics, music and whatever is blowing in the wind. Joan, who has performed the world over, singing about freedom, civil rights and The Night They Drove Old Dixie Down, has decided that, after six decades of touring, she’s ready to put her feet up. She also talks about her new album, Whistle Down The Wind, which includes that Tom Waits song Last Leaf.