Two of us were invited to visit broadcasting house Portland Place to see Radio One in full swing, plus visits to the other studios.

We arrived at the reception where we made contact with our friend Douglas Morgan who worked for the BBC. He invited us to the Langham Hotel for refreshments and explained who would be our guide for the afternoon which started at 2pm.

BBC Broadcasting HouseSure enough when we returned to the reception area we were introduced to Derek Chinnery who was the executive producer of Radio One (Later to become controller of Radio One).

Our first stop would be to visit some Radio Four Studios where we were amazed to walk into a very large area where all around the room were floor to ceiling curtains of very high quality and thickness, with carpet on the floor. It was explained to us about programs made here were high quality and needed good acoustics.

After visiting Radio Four our next stop was to see a program being transmitted live from Radio 3. This was in a small room consisting of reel-to-reel tape players. The one in use at the time we called in, was playing a concert with tapes running at 15rpm. There was just one lady monitoring the tapes.

From Radio 3 we were taken to the Radio 2 Studio where Terry Wogan was presenting his live afternoon show. We were allowed to enter as long as we didn’t make a sound.

When he had a few seconds after setting up his next record, he left his consul and came around to chat to us. He seemed very interested why we were there and explained a few things to us before returning to his seat.

We stayed for a while, and then moved onto the Radio 1 Studio where this time, we were only allowed into the continuity room. The DJ was in full swing with his program in the main studio viewed through a large soundproof window, but operators could hear the live program from a large speaker or headphones.

The continuity team were very alert to sound as I stood in front of one of the speakers. I was requested to step aside as the sound became muffled.

We spent quite a long time watching the DJ working, but then it was time to leave. But before departing we met Emperor Rosco who with Tony Blackburn and Ann Nightingale were just going to start on his Rosco Round Table program for the afternoon.

After chatting it was time to leave after having a very enjoyable and interesting afternoon.

73’s John Blissett & Tony Finch

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