Rosalind Plowright
Desert Island Discs
BBC
4.4 • 13.7K Ratings
🗓️ 5 May 1984
⏱️ 34 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
Rosalind Plowright, the soprano, began singing professionally with the Glyndebourne Touring Opera Company, but her career did not really take off until she won a competition in Sofia in 1979.
In conversation with Roy Plomley, she describes her rise to international recognition, she talks about her role in Verdi's The Sicilian Vespers for the English National Opera and she chooses the eight records she would take to the mythical island.
[Taken from the original programme material for this archive edition of Desert Island Discs]
Favourite track: The Lark Ascending by Ralph Vaughan Williams Book: The collected works by William Wordsworth Luxury: Windsurfer
Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | Hello I'm Kirstie Young and this is a podcast from the Desert Island Discs archive. |
| 0:05.0 | For Wright's reasons, we've had to shorten the music. |
| 0:08.0 | The program was originally broadcast in 1984 and the presenter was Roy Plumlee. This week our cast weighs the English opera singer Rosalen Plowwright. |
| 0:34.0 | Rosalen, there's a lot going on in your life at the moment. |
| 0:37.0 | It seems a bad time to send you to a desert island. |
| 0:40.0 | Yes, I'm very busy at the moment and actually I wouldn't mind a holiday. |
| 0:45.8 | Maybe a desert island would be nice for about three weeks. |
| 0:48.8 | Three weeks, not more. |
| 0:50.1 | Could you into your loneliness? |
| 0:51.4 | I mean, not just for three weeks weeks but for a long time if necessary. |
| 0:55.0 | It depends how long. I do enjoy being alone. |
| 0:58.0 | Have you ever experienced being lonely? |
| 1:00.0 | I mean if you ever been in dismal digs with nobody to talk to in a town where you don't know anybody? |
| 1:05.0 | Well, I was like that when I first came to London. I had a little flat in the east end, which wasn't actually very pleasant. |
| 1:11.0 | And I used to go back and spend lonely evenings there. I didn't enjoy |
| 1:16.5 | that I must confess I like being alone in beautiful places. You've got just |
| 1:21.3 | eight records to cheer you up did you find it hard to choose? |
| 1:24.6 | Very, very difficult, but I think I've come up with eight that I could probably live with. |
| 1:30.0 | What's the first one? |
| 1:31.0 | Vaughan Williams, The Lark Ascending? |
| 1:33.4 | Yes. This is because it has a beautiful violin oblegato and I'm very, very fond of the violin. |
| 1:39.6 | I studied it as a child. |
... |
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