A colourful nugget of pop mined from the BBC's archive, as Helen Shapiro performs Walking Back to Happiness.
Fantasy adventure series. Black-hearted Shame has cow-napped four Black Angus breeding bulls. The Dynamic Duo escape the stampede but Robin gets shot.
Documentary series telling the story of the birth of Venice, one of the most beautiful and romantic cities in the world, presented by Francesco da Mosto. The golden age of art and architecture arrived and it was the moment the Venice we know today emerged - when wooden houses transformed into stone and marble palaces covered in gold and jewel-encrusted palaces lined the Grand Canal.
The fishermen of early Venice were changing, turning into princely merchants who traded throughout the east and west to become some of the richest patrons of art. Fine paintings and sculpture came to adorn every home as Venetians vied to impress.
This was the age of Venice producing the world's most famous artists and most heroic buildings as Titian and Palladio transformed the look and reputation of the city.
Meanwhile, a calamity hovered over the city, threatening to engulf it and ultimately take Venice to the very brink of disaster - the plague. No one, rich or poor would escape and the city would be left in ruins.
Documentary series about the importance and nature of friendship among children. Shot over eight months and told entirely from their perspective, it is an intimate and moving insight into how children think and feel as they journey into a new world.
Four 11-year-old girls leave the familiarity of their prep schools to join one of the most prestigious girls' schools in the country, Cheltenham Ladies' College. For the three new boarders and one day girl, a new school is as daunting as it is exciting.
Documentary focusing on Shillong, North India, where each year the village comes together to celebrate the birthday of their musical hero - Bob Dylan. At the heart of the celebrations is Lou Majaw, a local celebrity who tours India performing Dylan's songs to rapturous crowds. This film takes a behind-the-scenes look at Majaw's life, seeing how the rock and roll lifestyle seems to be tearing him apart.
Documentary charting rival attempts to reach absolute zero, the ultimate limit of cold, by scientists in London and Leiden. A second race unfolded 100 years later, towards the end of the 20th century, as scientists attempted to produce a Bose Einstein Condensate, a new state of matter predicted by Einstein.
With the winner of each scientific race going on to win the Nobel Prize for their work, ultra-cold research has proved to be one of the most competitive fields of modern science.
THURSDAY 22 MAY 2008
THU 19:00 World News Today (b00bfm49)
The latest news from around the world.
THU 19:30 Terry Jones' Medieval Lives (b0078pgj)
The Knight
Monty Python star and medieval enthusiast Terry Jones takes us on a tour of the Middle Ages. Knights were more interested in the fine art of killing people and profiting from war than romantic notions of chivalry.
THU 20:00 Child of Our Time (b00b8vm5)
Series 8
The Divide of the Sexes
New series of Professor Robert Winston's project documenting the lives of 25 British children until the age of 20. Now eight, the kids are struggling to make sense of gender roles. In the home they see their parents striving for equality. But increasingly they are looking to the outside world for their role models. So in a culture dominated by sex, celebrity and consumerism, what are they learning? And is the divide of the sexes growing?
THU 21:00 Ian Hislop's Scouting for Boys (b007hfx3)
Robert Baden-Powell's handbook Scouting for Boys, written in 1908, may be largely forgotten today, but it is one of the most influential and best-selling books of all time. In the 20th century, only the Bible, the Koran and the Thoughts of Chairman Mao sold more. But they had fewer jokes, no pictures and were useless at important stuff like tying knots.
In this entertaining and affectionate film, Ian Hislop uncovers the story behind the book which kick-started the Scout Movement - a work which is very eccentric, very Edwardian and very British.
Ian discovers that the book is actually very radical and addresses all sorts of issues that we think of as modern, such as citizenship, disaffected youth and social responsibility. He explores the maverick brilliance of Baden-Powell, a national celebrity after his heroism in the Boer War, and considers the book's candid focus on health and wellbeing - from the importance of what Baden-Powell called a 'daily rear' to his infamous warning on the dangers of masturbation.
Contributors include his grandson Lord Baden-Powell, minister for culture and former cub scout David Lammy, biographer Tim Jeal and Elleke Boehmer, editor of the re-issue of the original Scouting for Boys.
THU 22:00 Hold Me Tight, Let Me Go (b00bfmf5)
Documentary which explores the remarkable relationships which are formed between the staff and pupils at Mulberry Bush, a private school where local authorities send children with such extreme behavioural and emotional problems that they have been rejected by other schools, their families and care homes.
THU 23:40 Mad Men (b00bfkjw)
[Repeat of broadcast at
22:10 on Sunday]
THU 00:25 Monsoon Railway (b007rv05)
Part 2
Second of two films by director Gerry Troyna, painting an affectionate portrait of the Indian railway culture.
Indian Railways is a vast organisation, employing 1,500,000 people and catering for every aspect of their lives from cradle to grave. The documentary follows three typical employees as they face the annual battle to keep trains running during the monsoon season.
THU 01:15 Ian Hislop's Scouting for Boys (b007hfx3)
[Repeat of broadcast at
21:00 today]
THU 02:15 Hold Me Tight, Let Me Go (b00bfmf5)
[Repeat of broadcast at
22:00 today]
FRIDAY 23 MAY 2008
FRI 19:00 World News Today (b00bfmt2)
The latest news from around the world.
FRI 19:30 Transatlantic Sessions (b00pdx3d)
Series 2
Episode 3
Folk musicians come together to make music in what have been called 'the greatest backporch shows ever'.
FRI 20:00 The Passions of Vaughan Williams (b00bfmt4)
Fifty years after his death, this musical and psychological portrait of Ralph Vaughan Williams explores the passions that drove a giant of 20th-century English music. It explores the enormous musical range of an energetic, red-blooded composer whose output extends well beyond the delicate pastoralism of his perhaps most famous piece, The Lark Ascending.
The film tells the story of his long marriage to his increasingly disabled wife Adeline and his long affair with the woman who eventually became his second wife, Ursula. The effect of these complicated relationships on his music is demonstrated in performances of orchestral and choral works, specially filmed at Cadogan Hall, London by the Philharmonia Orchestra conducted by Richard Hickox and by the singers of Schola Cantorum of Oxford.
Among the contributors is the late Ursula Vaughan Williams, who was interviewed shortly before she died at the age of 96.
FRI 21:30 The Pink Floyd Story: Which One's Pink? (b008hs1m)
Over 40 years after Britain's foremost 'underground' band released their debut album Piper at the Gates of Dawn, Pink Floyd remain one of the biggest brand names and best-loved bands in the world.
This film features extended archive, some of it rarely or never seen before, alongside original interviews with four members of Pink Floyd - David Gilmour, Roger Waters, Nick Mason and the late Richard Wright - and traces the journey of a band that has only ever had five members, three of whom have led the band at different stages of its evolution.
Tracing the band's history from psychedelic 60s London to their reunion appearance at Live 8 in 2005, this is the story of a succession of musical and commercial peaks separated by a succession of struggles around the creative leadership of the band. Their story was given added poignancy by the 2006 death of their estranged frontman, Syd Barrett.
Pink Floyd spearheaded the concept album, never sold themselves as personalities and expanded rock way beyond its three minute pop song beginnings. Pink Floyd has made the four members very rich and has consumed their creative lives, but it hasn't always made them friends. When first meeting their American record company, one of the executives apocryphally asked, "Which one's Pink?". This film traces the reverberations of that question throughout the band's history.
First led by the innovative singer, songwriter and guitarist Syd Barrett, Pink Floyd were at the forefront of Britain's psychedelic era. After putting the band on the map with hits like Arnold Layne and See Emily Play, Barrett drifted out of the band after experimenting with LSD.
The three remaining members added Barrett's old Cambridge friend David Gilmour to the band on guitar and functioned as a communal unit while creating extended sonic explorations on albums like Atom Heart Mother and Echoes. While creating ever larger and more visually ambitious stage shows, the band personally shunned the limelight, taking the stage as four shadowy figures and never appearing on their album covers.
Gradually Roger Waters emerged as the band's key songwriter, creating those massive selling concept albums of the mid-70s, Dark Side of the Moon and The Wall, two of the biggest-selling and boldest albums of all time. But Waters's desire to control the band and the increasing passivity of the others eventually left to him leaving the band and the name after 1983's The Final Cut album.
David Gilmour eventually assumed control of the band, producing two globally-successful Pink Floyd albums, A Momentary Lapse of Reason (1987) and The Division Bell (1994), with the help of Nick Mason and Rick Wright. Meanwhile, Waters conducted a less commercially-successful solo career.
As a result of Bob Geldof's pleading, David Gilmour, Rick Wright and Nick Mason reunited with Roger Waters for one time only for 2005's Live 8, playing together for the first time in approximately 25 years.
Whether Pink Floyd will ever record or perform again with or without Roger Waters remains unclear.
FRI 22:30 Classic Albums (b0074sf2)
Pink Floyd: Dark Side of the Moon
Series looking at the creation of some classic rock albums. This edition looks at the legendary Pink Floyd album Dark Side of the Moon with interviews with Roger Waters, David Gilmour, Richard Wright and Nick Mason.
FRI 23:20 Omnibus (b00788mh)
Syd Barrett - Crazy Diamond
The arts documentary series looks at the life of Syd Barrett, the creative genius behind the early successes of pioneering rock band Pink Floyd. His departure after a drug-induced breakdown was a bitter blow, and members of the group describe the ways in which he still haunts their lives and their music.
FRI 00:10 The Avengers (b0074s2f)
Series 5
The Hidden Tiger
Fantasy drama series. Emma gets scratched when Steed hunts a big cat.
FRI 01:00 The Avengers (b0074s36)
Series 5
The Correct Way to Kill
Spy drama series. Suspicion falls on Steed and Mrs Peel when two top enemy agents are found dead. They join forces with the enemy to find the murderer.
FRI 01:50 The Passions of Vaughan Williams (b00bfmt4)
[Repeat of broadcast at
20:00 today]
FRI 03:20 Transatlantic Sessions (b00pdx3d)
[Repeat of broadcast at
19:30 today]