ITV: The South Bank Show - The Mersey Sound
Sunday 7 October 2007 10:45pm - 11:45pm on ITV1.

On stage at the Liverpool Everyman, Melvyn Bragg talks to Roger and Brian and discuss memories of Jimi Hendrix, John Lennon and Paul McCartney, of Allan Ginsberg asleep in the bath – and, of course, the poetry that made their names, from The Mersey Sound to their writing for children.
The South Bank Show celebrates the publication forty years ago of The Mersey Sound, the book of poetry which shifted poetry from the dusty shelves of acadame into thousands of sitting rooms and onto thousands of stages.

The poets involved, Roger McGough, Adrian Henri and Brian Patten have been speaking to us through poetry ever since.

The film paints a vivid picture of an extraordinary English city, Liverpool, and an extraordinary time when the Arts led the way in a cultural and social breakout which energized the Nation, changed the shape of behaviour for generations to come, and made life fun!

Forty years on, Roger McGough and Brian Patten (and the memory of Adrian Henri) give a special reading at the Queen Elizabeth Hall of The Mersey Sound.

They then re-visit their favourite haunts with a tour of "their" Liverpool, the Bohemian enclave that was Liverpool 8 in the '60s, now Toxteth.

On stage at the Liverpool Everyman, Melvyn Bragg talks to Roger and Brian and discuss memories of Jimi Hendrix, John Lennon and Paul McCartney, of Allan Ginsberg asleep in the bath – and, of course, the poetry that made their names, from The Mersey Sound to their writing for children.

Contributors include: Catherine Marcangeli – Art Historian & partner to the late-Adrian Henri; Mike McCartney – Musician, formerly a member off the Scaffold; Willie Russell – playwright; John Gorman – Musician, formerly a member off the Scaffold; Andy Roberts – Composer & Musician; Adrian Mitchell – Poet & Dramatist.

With some classic archive footage and music, this South Bank Show evokes the zest and irreverence of the sixties and the upcoming Summer Of Love. This was The Mersey Sound.

Still leading the way, The South Bank Show is the first ITV1 programme to be available on the internet in both podcast (audio) and vodcast (video) format at www.itv.com/southbank.

Presented and edited by Melvyn Bragg.
Produced and directed by Bob Bee.

-------------

The Mersey poetry scene is alive and well, just not in the media eye as in former times. The likes of Andrew Taylor keep our tradition of excellent contemporary poets alive!

Cheers for the heads up on this - I would have missed it otherwise. Watched the first part, taped the rest - it was shaping up really well with plenty of very evocative old footage. Good stuff, thanks.

Yeah, I recorded it, too and I haven't had time to watch it yet. People who have seen it say that there are some great atmospheric shots of Liverpool.

Some great stuff coming out of Dave Kirby and Peter Etherington as well at the moment.

Watched it all now - it was a pretty good programme with some tremendous city shots. Would love to see a ginormous flourescent pink heart sculpture in the middle of the city somewhere, to the memory of the magnificent Adrian Henri.

I must confess that I am a bigger fan of the city itself than its inhabitants. I respect the view that Liverpool is all about its people, I know what people are getting at when they say that and, of course, I'm a big fan of (most of) the people, too. It's just that when I think about Liverpool, it's the city itself - ithe built environment juxtaposed with the natural environment (the clouds, the river, the hills, the light) that moves me.

Anyway, that's an explanatory spiel to introduce Eleanor Rees, born in Birkenhead, living in Liverpool

From the blurb on the jacket of her new collection of poems:

'The poems in Andraste's Hair draw on myth, memory, folksong and murder ballad. Often set in a mythical Liverpool, a city of metamorphosis and magic, grotesque and beautiful, its buildings are a backdrop for visions and apprehensions of the past. Liverpool at night is a place where boundaries are crossed in search of knowledge - sexual, historical, and emotional, between life and death ... her poems seem to come from a lyric country where they do things differently. Instinctive, elemental, limber and ready for anything they twist and coil marvellously between inner and outer worlds...'

Just watched it. Chocolate box shots of the river front and the area between Upper Parliament Street and the Metropolitan Cathedral - good enough to eat. Honest responses from McGough and Patten. Adrian Henri, though dead full of life to camera. Even Eleanor Rees (mentioned above) got a sentence in about how poetry in Liverpool lives on.