Boffin with a lot of bottle
QUESTION What instrument produced the distinctive sound that signalled the end of John Craven’s Newsround?
The short closing theme for John Craven’s Newsround was the ending of a longer piece entitled New Worlds, created by BBC Radiophonic Workshop composer John Baker.
The first six notes were produced by recording the sound of the top of an open bottle being slapped with the palm of the hand. The recording was played back at various speeds to alter the pitch then rerecorded on to another machine running at a constant speed.
The final six notes were produced by the release of a metal spring.
Baker was a prolific composer of theme and incidental music for radio and TV including Doctor Who and the Reading Your Letters section of Woman’s hour.
he studied composition at the Royal Academy Of Music and was a fine jazz pianist who combined live musicians with his Radiophonic productions.
John died in 1997 and the Radiophonic Workshop closed the following year.
Keith Sadler, Wolverhampton, W. Mids.
QUESTION Has a theatre understudy ever gone on to outshine the main star?
WHEN The Pajama Game opened on Broadway in 1954, for a run of 1,063 performances, the stars were John Raitt, Janis Paige and eddie Foy Jr.
however, it was the relatively unknown Carol haney who stole the show with her dancing in two numbers, Steam heat and Once A Year Day.
It was widely assumed she would be a future hollywood star. however, a month after the premiere, haney twisted her ankle. her understudy, the 20-year- old Shirley MacLaine, took over the role and became the proverbial talk of the town.
Top hollywood producer hal Wallis saw the show and was so impressed he signed up MacLaine to Paramount Pictures. The five-year contract started at $6,000 a picture, reaching $20,000 by the fifth year.
MacLaine starred in The Matchmaker, Can-Can, The Apartment, Irma La Douce, Sweet Charity and Terms Of endearment, for which she won the Best Actress Oscar in 1984. haney became a respected Broadway choreographer and died, aged just 39, from pneumonia.
Another famous understudy was Anthony hopkins.
In 1965, Laurence Olivier invited him to join the Royal National Theatre. When Olivier was struck with appendicitis during a production of Strindberg’s The Dance Of Death that same year, hopkins stepped in.
Olivier later wrote: ‘A new young actor . . . of exceptional promise named Anthony hopkins was understudying me and walked away with the part of edgar like a cat with a mouse between its teeth.’
Robert Sullivan, Nottingham.
QUESTION Why, in times past, was a cannon fired daily at 1pm in Liverpool? When did this practice end?
LIVeRPOOL Observatory was built at Waterloo Dock in 1845. One of its objectives was to establish and broadcast the accurate time, based on Greenwich Mean Time (GMT).
It was important for ports to have a precise time signal. Chronometers on ships had to be exact in order for a vessel’s position to be accurately known.
The marine chronometer is a timepiece accurate enough to be used as a portable time standard. It can be used to determine longitude by measuring the time of a known fixed location, e.g. GMT, and the time at the current location.
The expanding port resulted in the observatory being relocated across the Mersey at Bidston hill on the Wirral.
This was five miles from Liverpool Dock, so a loud audible signal was required. A cannon on the river wall at Morpeth Dock was fired at 1pm each working day. The original Crimean War cannon was triggered electrically by an adapted Robert Molyneux clock. It was loaded at 12.30pm, the connection to the observatory was tested and at one second to 1pm the switch would be thrown at the observatory, the firing being triggered by the next swing of the pendulum.
The cannon was fired from September 21, 1867 until July 18, 1969. It had been thought radio would render the firing unnecessary, but plans to end it in 1932 led to a public outcry.
In April 1933, the War Office provided a new cannon, a 32-pounder. The gun fell silent during World War II. It was replaced by a six-pounder naval ‘ack-ack’ hotchkiss gun, first fired on June 17, 1946.
Bidston hill observatory had a specialised construction to minimise vibrations. In 1929, it was amalgamated with the Tidal Institute.
It played a role of national importance during World War II by predicting the tides for the 1944 D-Day landings.
Gerry Welch, Birkenhead, Wirral.
QUESTION Are there any pop hits about snow that aren’t Christmas songs?
FURTHER to the earlier answer, the group Wigans Ovation had a UK No. 12 hit in March 1975 with Skiing In The Snow.
This uptempo dance record does not mention Christmas. It was a reworked version of an earlier release to cash in on the interest in Northern Soul music played at Wigan Casino.
Originally recorded in 1964 by American surf group The Beach Girls, it was the 1966 version by New York soul group The Invitations, on the Dynovoice label, that would see this song go on to be one of the best known Northern Soul tracks.
Paddy Grady, Duston, Northants.
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