Posted by Robert Thompson on June 04, 1999 at 19:26:57 from tenor1.demon.co.uk:
In Reply to: Re: The BBC tv series 1965 posted by Robert Hill on June 04, 1999 at 12:42:42:
I would split the difference and say it was 1963/4! The theme tune, as David describes, was very definitely Vaughan Williams-ish in style, particularly in the use of modal tonality (in other words, a major scale with the 7th note played flat!)
The tune for Hills of the North that Robert Hill mentions was written by Martin Shaw, an almost exact contemporary of VW but certainly no match for the great man's genius. I don't think that whoever wrote the theme for the BBC Swallows and Amazons took inspiration from this hymn tune (not one of my favourites anyway), but they did come up with a cracking good tune of which I can only remember the first two phrases.
I shall be emailing both David and Robert a scanned version of both tunes for comparison - I don't know how to do this on Tarboard so if anyone else would like to see them please email me. (If I had voice-mail I could sing you both tunes)!
Robert