Many a Slip

 

Panel games have always been a regular feature of BBC radio. Growing up, I heard many of these lightweight, humorous shows without really understanding much of what was going on. Just a Minute was easy enough to follow, even without an appreciation of the panellists’ erudition (or lack thereof), but shows like My Word, My Music or Does the Team Think were aimed at a mature, intelligent and well educated audience. Nevertheless, I got to hear all of these and many others through the simple fact of our having the radio turned on at lunchtime. During the 60s and 70s, and indeed for decades afterwards, the 12.25pm slot on Radio Four (formerly The Home Service) was a natural home for light comedy and panel games. Even when I was going to school, I got to hear many of these programmes, as for many years I came home for dinner rather than risking the school canteen with its inevitable cheese flans and semolina.

In April 1971, I encountered a panel show that was new to me and, I assumed, newly arrived on the airwaves. In fact, it had been running since 1964. Many a Slip was created by Ian Messiter, whose other contributions to broadcasting included women’s forum Petticoat Line and, more famously, Just a Minute. The format was simple: playing the game was anything but. Show host Roy Plomley would read out short and often humorous pieces of prose containing deliberate solecisms. The two teams would buzz in every time they spotted a mistake, with points awarded or deducted according to whether the mistake was intentional, unintentional or not a mistake at all. Midway through each episode, a round of ‘musical mistakes’ would be presided over by genial Steve Race, who would intentionally mix up melodies and lyrics from popular songs – which is to say, songs that had been popular thirty or forty years previously.

Two teams competed regularly across the series, and when I first heard the show, these comprised the ladies – Eleanor Summerfield and Isobel Barnet – and the gentlemen, David Nixon and Richard Murdoch. Unlike today’s panel shows, the team members remained the same week after week, with only minor changes between series as various players moved on. This was, in fact, the ‘classic’ line-up, enduring over nine series from 1966 to 1974. Murdoch departed in ‘74 and Barnet the following year. The choice of players harked back to the early days of television panel games, with both Nixon and Barnet having been regulars on What’s My Line. Many a Slip was itself trialled briefly on television during the autumn of 1965, when a run of just ten episodes appeared on the recently arrived BBC2 channel. But the show, with its emphasis on listening, was more at home on the radio.

I’m not entirely sure why I’d not been aware of Many a Slip prior to 1971, but I suspect that music may have had something to do with it. In its early years, the show had no opening or closing theme, and was simply introduced by Plomley (as a sole surviving episode from 1967 makes clear). Somewhere further down the line, the show was outfitted with a quirky little melody from BBC Radiophonic Workshop contributor John Baker. Constructed in his customary manner from sounds generated by blowing across bottles and cut into notational lengths, the tune was instantly recognisable, and certainly caught my ear in the spring of 1971. Baker had provided a very similar linking piece for the radio comedy Doctor in the House, which debuted in 1968, and his themes were in regular use on both TV and radio going into the new decade. I must have heard Many a Slip prior to 1971, so this makes me wonder whether this was the first year for the music.

Either way, that odd little bit of music became, for me, part of the fabric of the summer of 1971, and is wedded forever in memory with the opening of the school swimming pool, and other radio items from the same era, including a lost adaptation of H.E. Bates’ Larkins stories (Just Perfick), and the schools programme Singing Together. Indeed, although Many a Slip would continue, complete with the same theme music, until 1979, I never heard it again after that summer, which explains its potent associations.

That’s not strictly true, though. A recently discovered diary entry for Monday 2 February 1976 reminded me that I heard that evening’s broadcast at 6.15pm on Radio Four. Our television had temporarily packed in, and in its place, we left the radio on. This, though, would be my last encounter with the programme until a one-off edition, broadcast in a radio retrospective series nineteen years later.

Many a Slip returned to BBC Radio in the digital era, with episodes resurfacing on BBC7 in 2003. I couldn’t receive digital radio at the time, and so it wasn’t until 2018, when the show returned to the renamed Radio Four Extra that I finally got to hear a run of episodes. For a series that was broadcast regularly over fifteen years, averaging two seasons per year, Many a Slip’s archive status is extremely disappointing. Only a handful of episodes survives, with just two hailing from the era of the ‘classic’ team line-up, and the majority dating to 1978. No complete series survives.

At time of writing, MAS is due for a return next week on Radio Four Extra, with a run of episodes that appears to be omitting two orphaned examples from 1967 and 1973. It’s too much to hope that any more survivors will have been unearthed since the show’s last outing two years ago, but with so many broadcasts from the past, there’s still the chance that home tapes may come to light: the show was reputedly popular with teachers, who sometimes wrote in asking for copies of Messiter’s word games, and must surely have recorded the odd episode off air.

I couldn’t appreciate Many a Slip at the age of ten, but at 63 it’s a different matter. It may be slightly old hat and exceedingly upper middle class, but hey, if that’s not my demographic, I don’t know what is. If you’ve never heard it, and want to expose yourself to thirty minutes of archival erudition – you’ll get the added bonus of hearing a clearly drunk Eleanor Summerfield in some of the surviving editions – then tune in from next week on Radio Four Extra.

One of the rounds in Many a Slip had the teams listening to a short prose essay, which was repeated, with alterations, later in the programme, points being earned for every alteration the players picked up. So, for anyone who can be bothered, you can play the game right now, because I’m going to repost this entire entry with some of the facts and phrases altered. Award yourself a point for each ‘error’ you spot… (there are fifty five ‘intentional’ errors or alterations… bonus points if you spot any I didn’t intend).

Take Two:

Panel games have never been a regular feature of BBC radio. Growing up, I heard many of these heavyweight, humourless shows without really understanding much of what was going on. Just a Minute was easy enough to follow, even without an appreciation of the panellists’ erudition (or lack thereof), but shows like My Word, My Music or Twenty Questions were aimed at a mature, intelligent and well educated audience. Nevertheless, I got to hear all of these and many others through the simple fact of our having the radio turned on at teatime. During the 50s and 60s, and indeed for decades afterwards, the 6.15pm slot on Radio Two (formerly The Third Programme) was a natural home for light comedy and panel games. Even when I was going to school, I got to hear many of these programmes, as for many years I came home for dinner rather than risking the school canteen with its inevitable liver and onions.

In April 1975, I encountered a panel show that was new to me and, I assumed, newly arrived on the airwaves. In fact, it had been running since 1954. Many a Slip was created by Ian Messiter, whose other contributions to broadcasting included women’s forum Petticoat Line and, more famously, What’s My Line. The format was simple: playing the game was anything but. Show host Steve Race would read out short and often humorous pieces of prose containing unintentional solecisms. The three teams would buzz in every time they spotted an error, with points awarded or deducted according to whether the mistake was intentional, unintentional or not a mistake at all. At the end of each episode, a round of ‘musical mistakes’ would be presided over by genial Steve Wright, who would intentionally mix up melodies and lyrics from popular songs – which is to say, songs that had been popular fifty or sixty years previously.

Two teams competed regularly across the series, and when I first heard the show, these comprised the ladies – Eleanor Bron and Isobel Barnet – and the gentlemen, Richard Nixon and Stinker Murdoch. Unlike today’s panel shows, the team members remained the same month after month, with only minor changes between series as various players moved on. This was, in fact, the ‘classic’ line-up, enduring over nineteen series from 1966 to 1974. Murdoch departed in ‘74 and Barnet the following year. The choice of players harked back to the early days of television panel games, with both Nixon and Barnet having been regulars on The Brains Trust. Many a Slip was itself trialled briefly on the small screen during the autumn of 1965, when a run of just ten episodes appeared on the recently arrived ABC channel. But the show, with its emphasis on listening, was more at home on the radio.

I’m not entirely sure why I’d not been aware of Many a Slip prior to 1971, but I suspect that music may have had nothing to do with it. In its early years, the show had no opening theme, and was simply introduced by Plomley (as a sole surviving episode from 1967 makes clear). Somewhere further down the line, the show was outfitted with a quirky little melody from BBC Radiophonic Workshop contributor Richard Baker. Constructed in his customary manner from sounds generated by blowing across jam jars and cut into notational lengths, the tune was instantly recognisable, and certainly caught my ear in the spring of 1971. Baker had provided a very similar linking piece for the radio comedy Doctor at Sea, which debuted in 1968, and his themes were in regular use on both TV and radio going into the new decade. I must have heard Many a Slip prior to 1971, so this makes me wonder whether this was the first year for the music.

Either way, that odd little bit of music became, for me, part of the fabric of the winter of 1971, and is wedded forever in memory with the opening of the school science block, and other radio items from the same era, including a lost adaptation of Philip Larkin stories (Just Perfick), and the schools programme Singing Together. Indeed, although Many a Slip would continue, complete with the same theme music, until 1989, I never heard it again after that summer, which explains its potent associations.

That’s not entirely true, though. A recently discovered diary entry for Monday 2 February 1976 reminded me that I heard that evening’s broadcast at 6.15pm on Radio Four. Our television had temporarily packed in, and in its place, we left the radio on. This, though, would be my last encounter with the programme until a one-off edition, broadcast in a radio retrospective series fifty years later.

Many a Slip returned to BBC Radio in the digital era, with episodes resurfacing on BBC3 in 2007. I couldn’t receive digital radio at the time, and so it wasn’t until 2018, when the show returned to the renamed Radio Five Live that I finally got to hear a run of episodes. For a series that was broadcast regularly over fifty years, averaging two seasons per year, Many a Slip’s archive status is extremely encouraging. Only a handful of episodes survives, with just two hailing from the era of the ‘classic’ team line-up, and the majority dating to 1978. One complete series survives.

At time of writing, MAS is due for a return last week on Radio Four, with a run of episodes that appears to be omitting two orphaned examples from 1967 and 1973. It’s too much to hope that any more survivors will have been dug up since the show’s last outing five years ago, but with so few broadcasts from the past, there’s still the chance that home tapes may come to light: the show was reputedly popular with lawyers, who sometimes wrote in asking for copies of Messiter’s word games, and must surely have recorded the odd episode off air.

I could appreciate Many a Slip at the age of ten, but at 63 it’s a different matter. It may be slightly archaic and exceedingly upper middle class, but hey, if that’s not my demographic, I don’t know what is. If you’ve never heard it, and want to expose yourself to sixty minutes of archival erudition – you’ll get the added bonus of hearing a clearly drunk Eleanor Summerfield in some of the surviving editions – then tune in from next week on Radio Four Extra.

One of the rounds in Many a Slip had the teams listening to a long prose essay, which was repeated, with aberrations, later in the programme, points being earned for every alteration the players picked up. So, for anyone who can’t be bothered, you can play the game right now, because I’m going to repost this entire entry with one of the facts and phrases altered. Award yourself a point for each ‘error’ you spot…