Music Makers (radio): Swashbuckling for Beginners

📻BBC Schools Radio

companyBBC

started19th Sep 1983

ended28th Nov 1983

last rpt2nd Dec 1985

3 school years

episodes10

duration20 mins

subject 🎶MusicMusic

age rangeAge 10-12Age 9-11 & Age 11-13

languageenIn English

8 images from Swashbuckling for Beginners

Music Makers (radio)

Previous unit: Peregrine's Progress Next unit: Crossed Circuits

Swashbuckling for Beginners is a unit of the BBC schools radio series Music Makers from the 1980s, covering music for primary and secondary school pupils.

An absurd comedy about a group of proper British sailors with an old sea-dog captain, and a group of scurvy pirates with a very proper British captain. The groups meet, a ship sinks, and they all find themselves on an apparently deserted island searching for buried treasure, and finding reunions and mutual understanding.

The magazine features looked at music inspired by the sea.

Songs

Oh, Yo-Ho-Ho!
Pirate Patter
North, South, East, West
High and Dry
Robinson's Aria
Map Reading
That's Enough for Now!

Credits

Introduced by	Ian Humphris Jill Shilling
Written by	R. D. Ward
Music by	Peter Hutchings
Producer	Peter Hutchings

Resources

Pupils' pamphlet

A 28 page pamphlet containing the words and music to all the songs, with drawings by Alastair Graham telling the story in between, and a section of pictures to accompany the magazine features in the broadcasts.

The pamphlet was printed in blue-and-white in 1983, and then reprinted in black-and-white in 1985.

Teachers' notes

A 16 page booklet containing piano accompaniments to the songs and brief descriptions of the broadcasts.

Acting script

A version of the story script adapted for performance in schools, available free from the producer during the term of broadcast.

Melodic instrument parts

A set of accompaniments for each song for tuned percussion instruments, also available free to schools from the producer during the term of broadcast.

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