Product Description

'A BBC Radio 4 tribute to the legendary broadcaster, jazz trumpeter and chairman of I'm Sorry I Haven't A Clue 'Hooray for Humph" - "The Times". BBC Radio 4 celebrates the remarkable life of Humphrey Lyttelton, jazz genius, radio legend and master of the breathtaking double entendre, as friends and admirers recall Humph's highlights as chairman of I'm Sorry I Haven't A Clue. Presented by Stephen Fry, this programme features clips from 36 years of Clue, plus specially recorded contributions from Barry Cryer, Graeme Garden, Andy Hamilton, Jeremy Hardy, Sandi Toksvig, Tim Brooke-Taylor, Germaine Greer, and Dame Judi Dench, plus "I'm Sorry I Haven't A Clue" producer Jon Naismith, and Humph's link writer Iain Pattinson. 'He was a colossally good broadcaster possessed of a fantastic sense of timing' - Mark Damazer, Radio 4 Controller. 'A unique, irreplaceable talent' - Mark Thompson, BBC Director-General.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #30125 in Books
• Published on: 2008-11-13
• Released on: 2008-11-13
• Format: Audiobook
• Original language: English
• Binding: Audio CD

Customer Reviews

Humph - He died while he was still tall
I imagined it would be extremely difficult to write a brief, glowing review about something that is linked to the death of one of my favourite presenters/performers.....but this programme, originally broadcast in June 2008, and splendidly hosted by Stephen Fry, is a glowing tribute to Humph. Excellent, funny and emotional contributions from Graeme Garden (who uses the quote in my title for this review.....and how right!), Tim Brook-Taylor, Barry Cryer, Jeremy Hardy, Sandi Toksvig, and many more, make for a really great 50 minutes of listening that you can come back to again and again. Humph was such an unassuming & charming man with a remarkable (aristocratic!) background - friend of Loius Armstrong, cartoonist for the Daily Mail after WWII, jazz legend, and the ultimate chairman of panel games. This Radio 4 programme is a really fitting tribute to a great, great man. You will laugh and you will shed a tear.....an excellent tribute. Highly recommended

I'm Sorry I Haven't a lot more of Humph.
I fear some other people reviewing this item may actually be reviewing the life of the great man. Humph, it goes without saying, deserves five stars all the way. The three stars that I give this CD should in no way be seen as a slight to Mr Lyttelton. The fact is though that this is a one-time listen. Various friends and colleagues are assembled to give praise, which is all very fine, but what would have been better would have been less tribute talk and more excerpts of Humph being Humph. There is no better tribute to the man than his glorious music, his superb wit and peerless comic timing.

A highlight though was the recording from the VE day celebrations in London. The typical BBC announcer described the scene including reference to a trumpeter playing for the crowds below him. Wafting up over the decades you can make out the tune of Roll out the Barrel drifting up from the throng as the announcer falls silent. It was of course Humph, as ever the life and soul of the party.

Better to remember him through his own work I think, than through other people's reminiscences. Its very right that this programme was made and broadcast in the wake of his passing, but that doesn't make it a CD you will necessarily feel the need to own. Personally I will remember Humph without it, as I remember also Lionel Blair on Give Us a Clue, his hands a blur, trying to pull off twelve angry men in under two minutes.

Innocent Innuendoes
When Humphrey Lyttelton died in April of this year my immediate thoughts were of loss of a great jazz trumpeter and band leader. In the late 1940's he was one of Britain's first revivalist musicians, his number `Bad Penny Blues' (a few bars are played on this CD) being the first jazz recording to get into the hit parade, and he remained involved up to a few weeks before his death. By this time he had been presenter of BBC's `Best of Jazz' for 40 years, and his initial success with the programme led him to becoming, in 1972, host to the BBC radio comedy panel game `I'm Sorry I Haven't a Clue'. Many will feel his loss from this slot more deeply than from jazz - but perhaps it was his jazz talent that underpinned his terrific sense of timing. Humph, as he was known, became famed for his style of delivery where deadpan pauses were as important as words.

The long running series (36 years!) of `I'm Sorry I Haven't a Clue' was introduced as "the antidote to panel games" and was a hilariously funny send up of celebrity shows with panellists playing ridiculous games and contributing to repartee. Humph was a genius for witty execution of script interspersed with ad-libbing. The show's `near the knuckle humour' was not merely ribaldry - it was a wordsmith's delight with ongoing puns, one-liners and double entendres that was always fun and not overtly offensive. This CD of a BBC Radio 4 broadcast in June 2008 is presented by Stephen Fry as a tribute to Humphrey Lyttelton with numerous contributions from previous participants, contributors and writers. The duration is 52 minutes and it is divided into 17 sections. Snippets from actual programmes including examples of games, and brief references to Humph's supporters (a surreal Samantha and a punch-bag pianist) are introduced with explanations on production of radio presentations. Until I listened to this tribute CD I gave greater credence to Humphrey Lyttelton's ripostes whereas the dialogue by writer Graeme Garden and others appears to give more credit to prepared scripts.

The CD makes a wonderful and well deserved tribute to Humphrey Lyttelton, but from my point of view the accolades and reminiscences take up too much of the time and become somewhat repetitive - leaving not enough time for excerpts from `I'm Sorry I Haven't a Clue'. Attention to earlier complete recordings (of which many are available via BBC Audio) will demonstrate better Humph's relaxed manner enhanced by his own flourishes - and clearly his own double-edged interventions. I could replay and find something new in almost any programme repeat, but this CD is unlikely to be played more than once.