Behind the Brel: the Story of a Musical Genius
Radio 2
A documentary about the singer Jacques Brel (16 March, 11.30pm) turned into a straight fight between the English and the French contributors as to who could sound more confident. Almost immediately, the English threw in the towel.
“Where we've traditionally in the English language been fairly happy with 'I love you' and 'moon' and 'June' and what have you, in the French there's much more of a literary tradition. I mean, Shirley B may well do a very lively emotional performance of a song, but the identification between her and the song is not close." This was followed by a French contributor going straight in with: "Brel's up there. He's a human man. He's a human being. He wins." And then: "He use all his physical capability - arms, leg, body, ead, mouse, eyes, to show what he wants to share with the audience."
By way of a quick breather, the presenter, Marc Almond (excellently neutral), then dropped some useful biographical details - that Brel was in fact Belgian, and not remotely handsome (Brel: "I look like a horse"). But soon it was back to the scrap. Said Brel's daughter: "My farzer - he made movements, he needs to conjugate the verb [on Radio 2? Are you sure, chérie?]. He's . . . a caged animal!"
She was followed by an Englishman actually speaking the following: "The, erm, song is really basically that the devil comes down to earth and he looks around him and sees everything that fits in with his life really, and it's really, it's a . . . really, you know, it's a place he likes very much and it's a place that he kind of feels an empathy with, and he kind of does his job that mankind has really done and all the things that he's kind of watched, so he's kind of, you know, he's really kind of, erm, that kind of thing."
What was going on here? This wasn't radio! This was one side stepping forward, raising its arms, and having the announcer repeatedly call it the champion! Did we actually need to hear that "French is a wonderful language. I mean, all the nouns and pronouns and . . . everything being a verb"? Did we need to be reminded, at length, of Brel's lyric, from "Ne me quitte pas" - "If you go, I'll be like the shadow of your dog"? Which is pretty good as lyrics go, I guess - sure, sure, OK, I'll give you that, Jacques, but try fooling around with "Father McKenzie, wiping the dirt/From his hands as he walks from the grave" in your next "narrative chanson"!
Elsewhere, the most memorable exchanges of the week occurred during a short Radio 4 documentary (7 March, 2.45pm) about galanthophiles - aka snowdrop fanciers - the least honourable of whom are now scouring the countryside ripping up the spring bulbs of rare examples of that little flower, first brought to this country in the pockets of soldiers returning from the Crimean war. Presenter: "What's driving this madness?" Head of the Snowdrop Society: "I don't know, to be perfectly honest. They're just little green and white blobs."
Then, later, at a horticultural show: "I came from Japan for the snowdrops." "Just for snowdrops?" "Yes. By bus." And finally, over to a man so paranoid about his snowdrops that he hires a sitter to watch through his windows when he leaves the house. "I'm secretive. I can't let anybody in. I won't let anybody." "That's obsessive, that. Seriously obsessive." "I know. It's a terrible disease. Look - that lady's got five pots in her arms already! The passion grows." "Can I come and visit your garden?" "No."
