Out of My Head
Grace Cookey-Gam and Toby Jones & a binaural journey of intoxication, inspiration and loss of words & sanity. Music from Doris Day and Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan to Oliver Knussen.
Out of My Head is a binaural journey about intoxication and inspiration.
Like any good party we begin with an invitation from Kurt Weill as he staggers from bar to bar in Alabama Song. He’s joined by Baudelaire and Rimbaud but age and time are elastic and before long we are battering down Huxley’s Doors of Perception and entering the psychedelic realm of Jefferson Airplane. It will sound like it too, particularly if you put on headphones, as the programme is a binaural transmission. You will hear the sun moving across the stereo picture talking to Frank O’Hara and nightingales jamming with Clive Bell’s shakuhachi flute; you will hear rain and footsteps as you enter the upside down world of Thomas Traherne's great metaphysical poem, Shadows in the Water. Imagination is our vehicle – the imagination that leads Sasha Dugdale to conjure the grieving spirit of William Blake’s wife, Catherine: or allows us to leap with Anne Sexton into the heart and mind of an old woman stricken with Alzheimer’s but still able to recall a favourite tune as writers conjure different images of mental health.
The voices you’ll be hearing in your head are those of the actors Grace Cookey-Gam and Toby Jones.
Producers: Zahid Warley, Christopher Rouse and Georgia Mann Smith
READINGS:
Baudelaire - Be Drunk
Aldous Huxley - Doors of Perception
Rimbaud - Deregulation of the Senses
Lewis Carroll - The Hunting of the Snark
Emily Dickinson - The brain is wider than the sky
James Merrill - Voices from the Other World
Shakespeare - Ophelia's soliloquy from Hamlet
Sasha Dugdale - From Joy
Anne Sexton - Mister Wait
Rumi - The Turn
Clare Shaw - Tree
Frank O'Hara - A True Account of Talking to the Sun on Fire Island
Thomas Traherne - Shadows in the Water
Last on
Music Played
Timings (where shown) are from the start of the programme in hours and minutes
-
00:00
Kurt Weill
Alabama Song
Performer: Lotte Lenya.- 2011 Stage Door Records.
- Tr5.
-
00:00
Kurt Weill
Alabama Song
Performer: The Doors.- Rhino.
- Tr17.
-
00:00
Kurt Weill
Alabama Song
Performer: Ute Lemper.- Decca.
- Tr9.
-
Charles Baudelaire
Be Drunk read by Toby Jones.
00:02Kurt Weill
Alabama Song
Performer: Lotte Lenya.- 2011 Stage Door Records.
- Tr5.
00:02Kurt Weill
Alabama Song
Performer: The Doors.- Rhino.
- Tr17.
00:02Kurt Weill
Alabama Song
Performer: Ute Lemper.- Decca.
- Tr9.
Aldous Huxley
Extract from The Doors of Perception read by Toby Jones.
00:07Grace Slick
White Rabbit
Performer: Jefferson Airplane.- Castle.
- Tr6.
Arthur Rimbaud
Extract from letter – deregulation of the senses read by Grace Cookey-Gam.
00:10Cecil Taylor
Jitney No. 2
Performer: Cecil Taylor.- Freedom.
- Tr4.
Lewis Carroll
From The Hunting of the Snark read by Grace Cookey-Gam.
00:16Oliver Knussen
Fanfare 1-Overture from Higglety Pigglety Pop!
Performer: London Sinfonietta.- Deutsche Grammophon.
- Tr19.
Emily Dickinson
The Brain is wider than the sky read by Grace Cookey-Gam.
00:19Alvin Lucier
I am Sitting in a Room extract
Performer: Alvin Lucier.- Source.
- Tr1.
James Merrill
Voices from the Other World read by Toby Jones.
00:25Arnold Schoenberg
Verklarte Nacht- Breiter
Performer: Juilliard String Quartet.- Sony.
- Tr2.
Shakespeare
Hamlet Act IV scene 5 – Ophelia’s madness read by Grace Cookey-Gam.
00:33Hans Abrahamsen
Let me Tell you How it is
Performer: Barbara Hannigan. Performer: Bavarian Radio Symphony Orchestra.- Winter & Winter.
- Tr4.
Sasha Dugdale
From Joy read by Grace Cookey-Gam.
00:41Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan
Nothing without You (Tery Bina)
Performer: Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan.- Real World.
- Tr2.
Anne Sexton
Music Swims Back to Me read by Grace Cookey-Gam.
00:47Sammy Fain and Paul Francis Webster
Secret Love
Performer: Doris Day.- Past Classics.
- Tr10.
Rumi
The Turn read by Grace Cookey-Gam
00:51William Duckworth
Time Curve Prelude 7
Performer: Katia Labèque.- EMI.
- Tr2 CD 2.
00:53Nightingales from Slow Listening on 91Èȱ¬ Radio 3
Improvisation with nightingales
Performer: Clive Bell.- 91Èȱ¬ Radio 3.
- Tr1.
Clare Shaw
Tree read by Grace Cookey-Gam
Frank OÂ’Hara
A True Account of Talking to the Sun on Fire Island read by Toby Jones.
01:02Hildegard von Bingen
Ignis Spiritus
Performer: Gothic Voices.- Hyperion.
- Tr3.
01:07Arvo Pärt
Spiegel im Spiegel
Performer: Bournemouth Sinfonietta.- EMI.
- Tr4.
Thomas Traherne
Shadows in the Water read by Toby Jones.
01:12György Kurtág
fin fond de neant
Performer: György Kurtág.- ECM.
- Tr4.
Broadcast
- Sun 5 May 2019 17:3091Èȱ¬ Radio 3