It’s time to rock around the Aga
Radio legend Diddy David Hamilton has revealed that he is broadcasting his new show from a studio he has created in a shed at his home near Horsham.
Radio legend Diddy David Hamilton spent much of his childhood living on a farm near Horsham - but little did he realise that one day that same farm would become his own broadcasting studio.
In fact, it’s a shed on the farm where David broadcasts a music and chat show six days a week for Boom Radio - a newly-launched station aimed at golden oldie Baby Boomers.
And it’s already become a huge success.”We have been welcomed with open arms,” said David. “The response has been just fantastic. We are aimed at Baby Boomers but even young people seem to like it.”
David, who has been broadcasting since 1959, now thinks that - at 82 - he is “probably the oldest person to do a daily radio programme.”
“Last year, like an awful lot of people, I had a dreadful year. Everything was cancelled,” he said.
He admits to feeling ‘very down’ and thought that the pandemic had finally put an end to his long career.
But he then got a phone call from old friend and programme controller David Lloyd asking him to join the Boom station - aimed at those born between 1946 and 1964.
David broadcasts from his farmhouse studio on the edge of Horsham between 12 noon and 2pm, Monday to Friday, as well as a Saturday slot. At 1pm he airs his One O’Clock Rock and Roll spot wife Dreena’s favourite. She tunes in from the house and “dances round the Aga in the kitchen.” says David.
David’s love of radio first started when he was a boy, evacuated to his grandfather’s Horsham farmhouse with his mother. ”Radio was my window on the world,” he said. ”We had no television set. The radio was just magical.”
Years later, David bought the farm and has lived there ever since - only now it is not only his home but also his broadcasting studio.
“If it’s cold, I can now move my equipment from the shed to my office upstairs and broadcast from there. I can really just broadcast from anywhere.”
You can hear Boom Radio on DAB or online by phone, laptop, PC, or smart speaker.