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Humphrey Lyttelton

Kirsty Young's castaway is jazz trumpeter Humphrey Lyttelton.

Kirsty Young's castaway this week is the veteran jazz musician and radio presenter Humphrey Lyttelton. To Radio 4 listeners, he's best known as Chairman Humph who has spent more than 30 years picking his bewildered way through the innuendo and mayhem of I'm Sorry I Haven't a Clue.

But his first love is jazz - as a child, he was always fascinated by music and when he was a teenager it was Louis Armstrong who inspired him to take up the trumpet. Fittingly, Armstrong went on to hail Humph as 'Britain's top trumpetman'. Now aged 85, Humph is still recording and touring with his band and says that he finds he's kept awake at night by new ideas for music they can play together.

[Taken from the original programme material for this archive edition of Desert Island Discs]

Favourite track: That's My Home by Louis Armstrong
Book: Collected works by James Thurber
Luxury: A keyboard

Available now

45 minutes

Last on

Sun 15 Jun 2008 11:15
麻豆社 Radio 4

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Music Played

  • Band of HM Royal Marines

    Colonel Bogey

    • The Music of Kenneth Alford: The Band of the Royal Marines.
    • Chandos.

  • Arthur Marshall

    Nature Walk - Archive

  • George Frideric Handel

    Ombra mai fu (Largo) (from Xerxes)

    Soloist: Beniamino Gigli

    • Beniamino Gigli: In Opera and Song.
    • Conifer.

  • Marion Williams and the Stars of Faith

    It Is Well

    • God and Me - Marion Williams & the Stars of Faith.
    • Stateside.

  • Humphrey Lyttelton and His Band

    Big Bill Blues

    • More of the Best of Dixieland.
    • Philips.

  • Castaway's Favourite

    • Louis Armstrong

      That's My Home

      • Satchmo: A musical autobiography.
      • Verve Music.

  • Kenneth Horne and Betty Marsden

    Master Spy

    • Around the Horne - vol 15.
    • 麻豆社.

  • Fats Waller

    It's a Sin to Tell a Lie

    • The Cream of Fats Waller.
    • Flapper.

  • Book Choice

    • Collected works - James Thurber

  • Luxury Choice

    • A keyboard

Credits

Presenter Kirsty Young
Interviewed Guest Humphrey Lyttelton

Broadcasts

  • Sun 5 Nov 2006 11:15
    麻豆社 Radio 4
  • Fri 10 Nov 2006 09:00
    麻豆社 Radio 4
  • Sun 15 Jun 2008 11:15
    麻豆社 Radio 4

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