Â鶹Éç

For many years the Â鶹Éç rehearsed ‘ordinary’ people’s answers to questions when broadcasting an interview from a studio. Answers were largely scripted and spontaneity was rare. ‘Free’ responses only started to be featured toward the end of the 1930s. This slow liberalisation of output coincided with the invention of mobile recording units when whole programmes could be made in ‘real’ settings; people’s homes, factories, or in the countryside. Quick to take up the new technical possibilities was Olive Shapley whose main career aim was to record the lives of working people in the north of England.