Fairport/Cropredy BBC4??

[RobertD]

Not the medley of their hit?!  

[Dad Volt]

Not bad effort,an hour was not long enough though.

[YaBB Master (Colin)]

Well in an hour it's difficult to see how that could have been bettered.

[Barry]

A few inaccuracies in the narration, but still pretty good.  Surprised they glossed over the Maart line up quite so much.

[YaBB Master (Colin)]

A few inaccuracies in the narration, but still pretty good.  Surprised they glossed over the Maart line up quite so much.

And the 'Nine' lineup, but maybe the important stuff was early on and Cropredy, even that misses out the second and third best albums.

[delfini (Diane)]

Pretty good...smiled all the way through

[Angela]

Very big smile...........

[Steve with the black dog]

I enjoyed it a lot

I particularly liked Peggy's "I can't believe it's 45 years - it seems much longer" line.

[Brendan]

It's good that the BBC woke up to what we all are aware of, and with such a long history they are not going to please us all (and they didn't) but fair play to them for having a go, as someone has already said, it's as good as you could expect in and hour. I don't think it was for me but if it makes more poeple aware of the vast catalogue of fantastic music, more power to them.

[davidmjs]

On the positive side: An hour long documentary about Fairport on mainstream free to air tv.  This is a good thing.

On the negative: riddled with inaccuracies (and plain falsehoods)...it glossed over vast sections of the history of the band: the second longest lineup in what, 30 seconds?; the Nine lineup barely featured, the RftM lineup in an aside.  It was ok on the first few years and good about the current lineup....everything else...mumble mumble.  An average introduction...nothing more.  A pity - there won't be many more opportunities.

I think the Thomo documentary narrated by Peel (on now) is a much better documentary with virtually the same early footage.

[Nick]

I thought it was a very good attempt to present a detailed story with virtually no source material. Probably the closest they can get to a silk purse given a sows ear.

Though I was puzzled why the Bouton Rouge footage was black and white, when the RT film had the same footage in colour.

And did Frank really say John Lee was "sentenced to life by hanging"?!!

Cheers

Nick

[Dan O.]

I'm with David, the RT doc is a slightly better telling of the early FC story (with the notable exception that Jude's in the new doc, Iain M's in the RT doc). And the song they chose to represent the Maart era - Travelling By Steam ? Not sure about that one...
I can understand glossing over details to fit into an hour, and that they couldn't bring up everyone on the roll call, but no mention at all of Jerry D, Trevor or Bruce ?
The Union Chapel concert, however, was superb even with a lack of MOTL, and a very nice mention for the Red Shoes of this parish too.
Seeing the RT doc again was very welcome and the much-missed Peel's narration gave it more cred than Mr Skinner. Still alarms me that the programme editors didn't spot Carthy's misquoting of MOTL "too many friends who DIED", especially when 20 seconds previously it cuts from RT himself singing the correct line "too many friends who TRIED" !
Overall, though, an evening of FC-related entertainment is a rare occurrence and a very good thing  

[Jules Gray]

Quite enjoyed the Fairport documentary - I wept whenever Sandy sang (how does she still manage to do that to me?!).  I thought the recent concert was OK, though I'd got it into my head that it was to be a Croppers gig, so felt a bit deflated that the likes of Jerry D, Swarb and RT weren't popping up all over the place.  I thought the band all played well (especially Peggy and Simon), but that it was somehow a little flat.  Once again I thought that they're badly in need of a strong and vibrant lead singer.  But some of the playing was absolutely first rate and spine tingling.  And the RT programme was fab, but I remembered a bit too much of it from the previous time I'd seen it.

God but I'm hard to please.  

Jules

PS  Lovely to see our Jude on telly!

[Jim]

not a lotwe didnt already know, quite a lot was glossed over or not mentioned
the nice thing for me was the "the man they coudnt hang" footage in pristine condition, so now we know its out there lets have it released

[Jules Gray]

the nice thing for me was the "the man they coudnt hang" footage in pristine condition, so now we know its out there lets have it released

Amen!

Jules

[gower flower (Shirl)]

Well, that was all very enjoyable.  . Such a pleasure to see footage of Sandy. The concert was good, although I couldn't help feeling that the singing voices were not in tip top condition......

My favourite bits of the concert were John Gaudie and Danny Jack's Reward. A bit of a Ric fan? Moi?  

I loved the Richard Thompson prog, because I had never seen it before. Slightly weird to listen to the dulcet tones of John Peel though.  

I also watched the programme which followed. This contained clips of Pentangle, Steeleye Span, and Bert Jansch, among others. The best bit was a clip of Richard Thompson. It followed a clip of Donovan singing "Hurdy Gurdy Man". Talk about chalk and cheese............

[KascadeDan]

Well BBC, you've done it, and now I find myself wondering more than ever why BBC don't do the Cropredy TV coverage. I noticed they even remixed the sound from the Sky footage of Cropredy '11. It did seem a bit odd that an awful lot of history was skimmed over, but the footage used in this program, both new and archive, made it all so worth it.

Am I right in saying that the union chapel was the last night of the tour? I agree that the voices, particularly Chris', were a little bit flat, but then when I saw the chaps at Milton Keynes just a couple of weeks before Simon, Peggy and Kieran were all suffering from the sniffles, so it probably also caught up with Chris, hence why he was avoiding the high notes. Overall the concert footage was also enjoyable.

I stayed for the RT program, which I also found very informative and entertaining.  

[YaBB Master (Colin)]

I'll risk saying that I do have a direct recording of the digital transmission. (That is the data as broadcast on satellite). However it is 3.5GB.
It looks like it was transmitted at 4Mb/s, which is quite good.

I could encode that to a smaller file, but with a big loss in quality.  

[Amethyst (Jenny)]

That was the best Friday night's telly ever...

I thought the first programme was fab..  Though wished they had said more about the Maart era,
And that they had chosen one of the rockier songs of Maart's time (I never Did like Travelling by Steam).

The Union Chapel gig was fab, I was very pleased for Red Shoes too that they included Celtic Moon. Made me want to rush out and buy Wintour tix .

Hearing the sainted Mr Peel was lovely.. His voice is very much missed.  A great RT hour.

I had to sleep then.. But the last programme can be watched later today.  All recorded and will be ready to be seen again.

Thanks BBC!

[Jules Gray]

The best bit was a clip of Richard Thompson. It followed a clip of Donovan singing "Hurdy Gurdy Man". Talk about chalk and cheese............

I very much enjoyed both songs!

Jules