Today The Times ran a piece by Sarah Vine (wife of education secretary Michael Gove) criticising the BBC’s ‘Wonders of the Universe’ and its apparently egocentric presenter Brian Cox.

To be fair to Cox it’s probably not his fault that the show is put together in such an over-the-top way. Not even Narcissus himself would have had the brass neck to stipulate this kind of treatment in his contract: long, lingering shots of the handsome professor silhouetted against a night sky, or languid close-ups of him gazing manfully into the middle distance, flashing his white teeth in a carefree yet attractively wistful smile. No, Cox is not the problem; he’s the symptom of a dreary and predictable strand of programme-making: the “sexing up” of fusty subjects.

Of course, physics and astronomy is a subject only for people with beards, elbow patches and monocles!

Has Sarah Vine never heard of Carl Sagan’s series Cosmos, which is essentially the programme that ‘Wonders…’ is modelled on? That program was hugely successful in educating American youngsters in the early 1980s about the wonders of the universe, and may even be one reason why science and technology is in better shape in the US than it is here.

It does seem that Brian Cox is getting unfair stick for being young, dashing and clever. I’m reminded of Douglas Adams’ Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy where the inventor of the Infinite Improbability Drive gets “lynched by a rampaging mob of respectable physicists who had finally realized that the one thing they really couldn’t stand was a smart ass”.

Just as Sagan’s Cosmos was a beautiful and – literally – wonderful series that opened peoples’ eyes to the Universe we live in, Brian Cox’s series aims to do the same 30 years later. So let’s turn the soundtrack back up, listen to what he has to say and be thankful that our TV license money is being spent on fantastic, eye-opening programming such as ‘Wonders…’.

Here’s how it goes …

John and Greg are the only physical members of the production crew. The entire programme is conceived, produced and edited by some kind of monstrous autonomous machine that kidnaps members of the public (some of which it refers to as celebrities) and puts them, bewildered, into a large kitchen.

It then threatens them with something off-screen and unspeakable unless they cook food while they blather on about how much this competition means to them, how disappointed they’ll be if they lose, and how much they enjoy cooking.

It gets John and Greg to pull a few confused expressions at cookware, then say a few positive and negative things about food to camera, like ‘it’s crispy on the outside, soft in the middle’ and ‘it needs more seasoning’.

Then, with footage recorded and an emotionally manipulative soundtrack thrown into the pot, this dreadful automaton puts the programme together using a strictly defined sequence of shots and edits, churning out series after series in a matter of hours.

… in case you were wondering.

Following up my response to yesterdays comment in the Pinball Song thread, Walt Kraemer has been kind enough to email me with some information about the song. So here it is, definitive and from the person who composed and produced it, everything you ever wanted to know about the Sesame Street Pinball Number Count.

As composer and producer of Sesame Street’s Pinball Music I was flattered to find interest in something I created over a quarter of a century ago. Our company, Imagination, Inc in San Francisco produced a great number of animation pieces for Children’s Television Workshop at that time so forgive me if I’m a bit hazy as to some of the particulars.

Those were indeed the Pointer Sisters. All four of them. At the time only three were performing regularly and I recall budgeting for just the three when June showed up at the session with the rest. It was a bonus. The basic track was performed by San Francisco Bay Area musicians and since there were to be eleven pieces of animation I had the track structured to accomodate three different lead instrument overdubs to give the pieces some variety. On some numbers Andy Narell plays a steel drums solo, on others Mel Martin plays a soprano sax solo, on the rest… I forget. Much credit should go to Ed Bogas for interpreting my melody ideas and for the musical arrangements.

The concept and design was devised by our animation director, Jeff Hale. It was his idea that I create basic tracks then record as ‘wild-lines’ the Pointers shouting the various 2-11 numbers in different intensities and different compliments of voices. Then, each time the pin ball hit a selected number he would drop in these (off-key—couldn’t be helped) wild lines. While I have retained first or second generation masters (quarter inch tape now converted to DAT and CD) of 99% my audio productions over the years it is for above reason there was never a ‘master’ track. This news came as a dissapointment to the folks back at Sesame Street who were planning the current CD release. Unfortunately, I have retained nothing from this session. Matter of fact, I haven’t heard the piece in years.

On the techinal side, we recorded at Richard Beggs’ (Francis Ford Coppola’s) studio in the Columbus Towers Building, 24 track, analog—of course. Mag transfers were made at Imagination, Inc. which is long out of business. And, again unfortunately, there is nothing left of either the animation cells nor audio elements for any of that beautiful work.

Personally, I am honored to be thought of in the same company as Herbie Hancock and Frank Zappa. My approach was to write the piece in 12-4 or 12-8 time but that didn’t quite work out. And it wasn’t until we had completed the project that I realized I may have stolen the first five notes of the Woody Woodpecker Song. Something I’m sure neither Hancock nor Zappa would be guilty of.

Cordially,

Walt Kraemer