Joanne and Simon recently returned from three months in Kenya. Part of the time was spent volunteering at the Salvation Army church in Kibera, which is a slum on the outskirts of Nairobi. They were particular struck by the way that the people in the slums had very little, yet always approached life with gratitude and many with a strong faith. They were also struck with Nairobi being large and very noisy, with some stark contrasts between shiny new executive apartment buildings and the hovels that are living areas in the slums, which residents have to rent. The charity had originally been set up following a small group of families from the Chelmsford Salvation Army travelling to see an officer who had previously been in Chelmsford. Since then they have been involved in a number of projects. That latest is to assist in marketing wire and bead animals made by a group of mothers, Very kindly they gave Jonty an elephant and I had an ostrich. They are looking for events where they could set up a stall and sell these to raise money to be sent back. Simon commented on how amazed the mothers had been to set up a bank account.
Musically tonight we had a special feature on Bob Dylan. Continuing an exploration of the music of the Beach Boys, we played a 1996 collaboration with Status Quo that is not mentioned in any of the memoirs written by members of the band. We can see why! We had our own Harry & Megan, Harry Chapin and Megan O’Neill. Continuing the question of whether a new version of a song should be a copy or add something very different, we played Sunshine of your love. The jury was out on the jazz version! I loved it. Jonty felt it took away the essential character, the riff, of the original.
Tonight’s playlist
Toto – Africa
Lion King – Circle of life – chosen by Joanne & Simon
Chelmsford Songsters – Christ calls
Lion King 2 – He lives in you
America – A horse with no name – requested by Patrick
Pat Boone – Love letters in the sand – requested by Phyl
Leon Bridges – Bad bad news
Soweto String Quartet – Victory
Harry Chapin – Cats in the cradle
Megan O’Neill – Ghost of you – Megan is singing in Billericay next month
Years & Years – Desire – requested by Adrain for Deuwe and Kris who were supposedly working hard revising – actually they were listening to us and playing games.
Michael Schulte – You let me walk alone – Germany’s entry in last Saturday’s Eurovision Song contest and amazing the favourite song of mine and Jonty.
Lisa Harman – Don’t want to rock & roll
Bod Dylan – Blowing in the wind
Byrds – Mr Tambourine man – brought back memories of primary school to John.
Status Quo & Beach Boys – Fun, fun, fun – amazingly the only version of this classic Beach Boys song to chart in the UK, which was in 1996.
Cream – Sunshine of your love
Jenny Evans – Sunshine of your love
Mango Groove – Special star
We will not be with you next week. Join us on Friday 1st of June.
Bryan Adams – Everything I do, I do for you – requested by Patrick and one of the biggest selling singles ever, number one in numerous countries.
Ian Perryman joined us this evening and sang three original songs. He also sang a song by his inspiration, John Denver and two 1960s covers. He told us how he began singing publicly and writing his own material. Find our more about him on www.ianperrymanmusic.com. He can be heard regularly in The Rose and Crown in Wivenhoe and also around the Colchester and Clacton areas at open mike events. His music can be downloaded from soundcloud and iTunes. In the second hour we heard from Chris. She appeared on the show a few weeks back and talked about running the Brighton marathon last Sunday. This was her first marathon. She ran along with two teaching colleagues from her school. The children had decided they should run to raise money for the Red Cross. To date they have raised over two thousand pounds. Donations can be added by accessing the Red Cross page, then Brighton Marathon. She said that after the event her first reaction was “never again!” By Monday morning she was thinking about the next marathon. She felt that taking part may well be addictive.
Marina sang three songs live tonight Alfie Clark aged 10 sang live and talked about Easter at Ingatestone Junior School. Tim Lee told us about the celebrations for Good Friday held this morning in the town centre in Brentwood, with over four hundred people and a dramatized re-enactment of the first Good Friday. He also talked about the service he had taken at Mountnessing school about an empty Easter egg. Adrian, chaplain at Brentwood school, explained about the services for Easter that were held before the pupils had their Easter holidays, so this focussed on Palm Sunday. He also told us about last Friday being in Ypes in Belgium and how moving an experience that was for all concerned. Marina sang her three songs and talked about the importance of the resurrection in her own life. John spoke on the phone about an event happening at Emmanuel church Billericay on Easter Saturday afternoon, where they are having a Messy church for Easter. Apparently the tomb is a bread roll. Jesus is a jelly baby and the stone across the entrance to the tomb is a rich tea biscuit! Sue, who lives with husband Jim in Colorado Springs, but had worked for eight years in Cyprus, explained about the multicultural character of the church in Larnaca where she worshiped and about how they worked with refugees and others on the edge of the society. She also said the church back in Colorado Springs regularly has 7,000 attenders on a Sunday morning. We have never had such a packed show! Jonty was back as well. We had lots of e-mails saying that Alfie was a star.
Number 3 is Van Morrison with 55 million sales across a career of 46 years,
No 2 is Enya. Her career has been 27 years and she has sold over 80 million.
Way ahead at number one are U2. With a thirty seven year career they have sales of a staggering 170 million world wide. I asked listeners to guess how many were their sales. Rene came close with 200 million. Chris wrote, ‘no idea how many…zillions!’