Gloria Hunniford

Desert Island Discs: Archive 2005-2010

BBC

Society & Culture, Personal Journals

4.4 • 804 Ratings

🗓️ 24 December 2006

⏱️ 35 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

Kirsty Young's castaway this week is the broadcaster Gloria Hunniford. She's one of our most popular interviewers and presenters and for 40 years has been a warm, but always incisive, figure on our radio and television airwaves. She grew up in Northern Ireland and first of all thought her career lay in singing - as a young girl she would spend several evenings each week singing in local church halls. Although she moved in to broadcasting, those early years lay the foundation for the success and gave her a confidence performing in front of a crowd and a genuine interest in people and their lives.

She was among the vanguard of women who tried to have it all - to combine motherhood with a fulfilling career. Her eldest daughter, Caron Keating, followed her into the profession and shared Gloria's ready warmth and wit. But Caron was just 41 when she died from breast cancer and Gloria's moving account of her experiences has now touched tens of thousands of people.

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

Favourite track: Miss You Nights by Cliff Richard Book: War and Peace by Leo Tolstoy Luxury: Family photographs

Transcript

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0:00.0	You're about to listen to a BBC podcast, but this is about something else you might enjoy.
0:05.4	My name's Katie Lecky and I'm an assistant commissioner for on demand music on BBC Sounds.
0:10.7	The BBC has an incredible musical heritage and culture and as a music lover, I love being part of that.
0:17.4	With music on sounds, we offer collections and mixes for everything, from workouts to helping
0:22.7	you nod off, boogie in your kitchen, or even just a moment of calm. And they're all put together
0:28.7	by people who know their stuff. So if you want some expertly curated music in your life,
0:34.9	check out BBC Sounds. Hello, I'm Krista Young, and this is a podcast from the Desert Island Discs archive.
0:41.3	For rights reasons, we've had to shorten the music.
0:44.3	The program was originally broadcast in 2006.
0:48.3	Music My cast away this week is one of our most popular broadcasters, Gloria Hannaford.
1:09.9	Her warm, Ulster, brogue and easy charm on air
1:12.6	goes some way to explaining the success of a career in radio and television that has spanned
1:17.2	more than 40 years. What's less obvious is that her work ethic and determination to get the job done
1:23.2	started early. From the age of age, she was performing in church hall variety shows.
1:28.4	And after a spell of singing musical requests live on air, she became the first ever woman
1:33.9	to have a daily show on Radio 2, all this whilst being a wife and mum to three children.
1:40.1	More recently, it's in her role as a mother that the highly polished professional has made way in public for the personal.
1:46.4	Her daughter, the television presenter Karen Keating, fought determinedly against breast cancer for seven years.
1:52.1	And after she died, Gloria's moving account of her experience touched tens of thousands of people.
1:57.8	Glory, I want to talk to you about your family and indeed about Karen, of course, later on, but it strikes me, you must have been almost at the vanguard of women who tried
2:05.9	to have it all to combine both a proper career with hands-on motherhood. Were you always determined
2:12.3	to do that? I'd like to tell you it was always a plan, but it wasn't. The Elster work ethic,
	...

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