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Al Murray and The Why Workshop

Al Murray tells Zoe about narrating 成人快手 Radio 4's Vanity Fair. Plus it's the Wednesday Why Workshop, where Zoe quizzes the QI Elves with more of your questions.

Wake up and embrace the day with Zoe Ball! Pub landlord Al Murray chats to Zoe about narrating 成人快手 Radio 4's adaptation of Vanity Fair.

It鈥檚 The Why Workshop, and Zoe quizzes the QI Elves with more of your wonders and ponders. Today, James Social Elf and Alex Elf answer: why do fish have scales, why are men's and women's buttons on different sides and why you don't sound like how you talk when you sing?

Plus Zoe reveals that Kelsea Ballerini and Westlife will be playing our Festival in a Day in Hyde Park.

Along with Tina Daheley on news, Jules Lang on travel and Mike Williams on sport, Zoe and the team have the best start to your morning. With celeb guests, quizzes, headlines, tunes chosen by listeners and more music than you can shake a glitterball at!

There's also weather with Carol Kirkwood who's live from Southwick House for the anniversary of the D-day landings, Steve Bunce previews the weekend's boxing, a Pause For Thought from Art Historian Dr Jim Harris and listeners on the line as Zoe entertains the nation with fun for the family!

2 hours, 59 minutes

Last on

Wed 5 Jun 2019 06:30

Music Played

  • Tavares

    Heaven Must Be Missing An Angel

    • 20 Songs Of Love From The 70's (Vario.
    • MFP.
  • Jess Glynne & Jax Jones

    One Touch

    • Now That's What I Call Music! 103 (Various Artists).
    • Now.
  • The Divine Comedy

    National Express

    • New Hits 99 (Various Artists).
    • Sony Music TV.
  • Sam Smith & Normani

    Dancing With A Stranger

    • (CD Single).
    • Capitol.
  • LeAnn Rimes

    Can't Fight The Moonlight

    • (CD Single).
    • London/Curb Records.
  • New Order

    True Faith '94

    • (CD Single).
    • London.
  • Ed Sheeran & Justin Bieber

    I Don't Care

    • No.6 Collaborations Project.
    • Atlantic.
  • Sheryl Crow

    Soak Up The Sun

    • (CD Single).
    • A&M.
  • Calvin Harris & Rag鈥檔鈥橞one Man

    Giant

    • (CD Single).
    • Columbia.
  • 补鈥恏补

    The Living Daylights

    • The Best Of James Bond 30th Anniversa.
    • EMI.
    • 11.
  • Elton John & Taron Egerton

    (I'm Gonna) Love Me Again

    • Rocketman O.S.T. (Various Artists).
    • Virgin EMI.
  • Keala Settle & The Greatest Showman Ensemble

    This Is Me

    • The Greatest Showman: Original Motion Picture Soundtrack.
    • Atlantic.
    • 7.
  • P!nk

    Can We Pretend (feat. Cash Cash)

    • Hurts 2B Human.
    • RCA Records.
  • Fleetwood Mac

    You And I, Part II

    • Fleetwood Mac - Tango In The Night.
    • Warner Bros.
  • Eurythmics

    There Must Be An Angel (Playing With My Heart)

    • The Female Touch 2 (Various Artists).
    • Global Television.
  • Westlife

    World of Our Own

    • (CD Single).
    • BMG/RCA.
  • Bastille

    Joy

    • (CD Single).
    • Virgin Records.
  • Bob Seger & The Silver Bullet Band

    Hollywood Nights

    • (CD Single).
    • Capitol.
  • Taylor Swift

    ME! (feat. Brendon Urie)

    • (CD Single).
    • Republic Records.
  • Backstreet Boys

    Quit Playing Games (With My Heart)

    • Now That's What I Call Music 37 (Various Artists).
    • Now.
    • 2.
  • Anne-Marie

    2002

    • (CD Single).
    • Atlantic.
  • Luther Vandross

    Never Too Much

    • The Love Album (CD 1) (Various Artist.
    • Virgin.
  • Sunshine Anderson

    Heard It All Before

    • (CD Single).
    • Atlantic.
  • Modjo

    Lady (Hear Me Tonight)

    • Now 47 (Various Artists).
    • Now.
  • LP

    Girls Go Wild

    • Heart To Mouth.
    • BMG.
  • Janet Jackson

    Whoops Now

    • Now 30 (Various Artists).
    • Now.

Pause For Thought

Pause For Thought
From Dr Jim Harris, Art Historian: Some families are born of Kings:
Danny Dyer鈥檚, for example. Some are born of D-Day heroes. Mine, on the other hand, is born of ditch-diggers and shoemakers. Nevertheless, even ordinary families have their legends. And there's a legend in our family that I ruined my brother鈥檚 life. But this isn't a story about me tying him up naked on his stag night and making him miss his wedding. It's not a story about me blaming him for some heinous misdeed of my own and seeing him locked up in my place. My crime was simply to be conceived too early.听
We're very close in age, Bill, and me. He's only 16 months my senior and, according to my sainted Grandma Harris, my arrival thrust him immediately and untimely into the role of Responsible Older Brother, thereby (and I quote) "Robbing Him Of His Childhood". The thoughtlessness of my birth whilst Bill, the first and therefore Golden Grandchild, was still barely able to stand burned with Grandma Harris right to the end. Almost her last words to me, as she pondered our equally undistinguished lives were, 'I can only think that you were born too soon'.听
Thanks, Grandma. In the bible, Matthew's Gospel, weirdly, starts with a long list of Jesus' ancestors. It seems an odd way to begin his story - why not the Angel and the stable and the donkey? The thing is, in those names - the Aminadabs, Jehoshaphats and Zerubbabels - are all the stories that made Jesus who he is - the heroes, the doting grandparents, the jealous siblings, the kings and the refugees. Families are like that. The generations gaze across history with a mix of fascinated incredulity and mutual incomprehension, and they tell stories.听
They report; they embroider and embellish; they make things up. And in their truths and their wild inaccuracies we find the shared narratives that sustain and nurture us, the histories we cherish and the jokes we laugh at; the things that make us who we are. So maybe whether or not I ruined Bill's life isn't for me, or Grandma or even for him to decide. Maybe it's one of those stories that our family will keep, those stories that I reckon all families keep and give to one another and which, in the telling and retelling, keep us alive from generation to generation.

Broadcast

  • Wed 5 Jun 2019 06:30