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Lyt når som helst, hvor som helst 

BBC Radio 4


Eight tracks, a book and a luxury: what would you take to a desert island? Guests share the soundtrack of their lives.


Desert Island Discs

Tahra Zafar is a costume and creature effects designer. 

She designed the Paddington Bear puppet featured in the hit West End production Paddington: The Musical.

Born into a theatre family, she grew up with an Armenian American father who worked as a choreographer in the first West End production of West Side Story, and a mother who moved from a career as a ballerina to theatre work around the world. Her interest in making began early, helping her father with practical projects such as restoring their house, even learning to build walls and spending her spare time model making, with Airfix creations suspended from her bedroom ceiling.

After studying theatre design at Central Saint Martins, she began her career making theatre costumes. She spent some time at the Jim Henson creature workshop where she made some of the creatures for the first Harry Potter film including Hedwig the owl and Scabbers the rat.

After her daughter was born, Tahra worked on some of the characters for In the Night Garden with her daughter, a willing judge of what worked for toddlers. 
In 2012, Tahra was in charge of 23,000 costumes for the London 2012 Olympic opening and closing ceremonies. This role included an audience with the late Queen to ensure the wig and dress were correct for Her Majesty’s stunt double when that iconic skydive was performed at the Olympic opening ceremony. 

Tahra lives in London with her daughter.

DISC ONE: Thunderbirds (Main Theme) - The Barry Gray Orchestra 
DISC TWO: Gee, Officer Krupke. Composed by Leonard Bernstein and performed by Leo Kharibian, Norman Furber and Vince Logan 
DISC THREE: Beethoven: Symphony No. 9 In D Minor (movement six) Composed by Ludwig van Beethoven and performed by Berlin Philharmoniker, Wiener Singverein and conducted by Herbert von Karajan
DISC FOUR: Brazil – Geoff Muldaur
DISC FIVE: Sir Duke - Stevie Wonder 
DISC SIX: Groove Is in the Heart - Deee-Lite 
DISC SEVEN: Eclipse - Pink Floyd 
DISC EIGHT: Take Five - Dave Brubeck 
 
BOOK CHOICE: The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy Complete Books by Douglas Adams 
LUXURY ITEM: A set of art materials and a storage box
CASTAWAY'S FAVOURITE: Eclipse - Pink Floyd 

Presenter: Lauren Laverne
Producer: Sarah Taylor

Desert Island Discs has cast other costume designers away to the island over the years including Oscar winners Jenny Beavan and Sandy Powell. You can hear their programmes if you search through BBC Sounds or our own Desert Island Discs website.

Tahra Zafar, costume and effects designer

Professor Michele Dougherty is President of the Institute of Physics and Professor of Space Physics at Imperial College London. She was appointed Astronomer Royal last year – the first woman to hold the post in its 350-year history.

She was brought up in Durban in South Africa and studied for a Bachelor of Science degree in applied maths at Natal University. After completing a Master’s and PhD she took up a fellowship at the Max Planck Institute for Astronomy in Germany where she investigated solar wind and galactic wind outflows.

In 1991 she joined Imperial College London where she helped devise a magnetic field model for the Ulysses mission. In 1997 she became principal investigator for the magnetometer instrument on board the Cassini probe which was sent to study Saturn and its system.

She is currently lead investigator for the J-MAG magnetometer instrument on the European Space Agency's JUICE mission (Jupiter Icy Moons Explorer) which launched in 2023. It will reach Jupiter in 2031 and spend at least three years observing the planet and three of its largest moons, Ganymede, Callisto and Europa.

Michele was appointed CBE in the 2018 New Years Honours List for services to UK Physical Science Research.

DISC ONE: Puccini: Turandot, Act III: Nessun dorma! Performed by Luciano Pavarotti (tenor), John Alldis Choir, Wandsworth School Boys Choir and London Philharmonic Orchestra, conducted by Zubin Mehta
DISC TWO: Cello Concerto in E Minor, Op. 85: III. Adagio. Composed by Elgar. Performed by Jacqueline du Pré (cello) and London Symphony Orchestra, conducted by Sir John Barbirolli
DISC THREE: Violin Concerto No. 1 in D Major, Op. 19: III. Moderato. Composed by Tchaikovsky. Performed by Frank Peters Zimmerman (violin), and Berliner Philharmoniker, conducted by Lorin Maazel 
DISC FOUR: We Three Kings of Orient Are - Robert Shaw Chamber Singers 
DISC FIVE: Dancing Queen - ABBA 
DISC SIX: Dance With My Father - Luther Vandross 
DISC SEVEN: Franck: Panis Angelicus. Performed by Dame Kiri Te Kanawa (soprano), English Chamber Orchestra, conducted by Barry Rose 
DISC EIGHT: Pie Jesu (From Requiem) Composed by Andrew Lloyd Webber. Performed by Malakai Bayoh, Schola Cantorum of the Cardinal Vaughan Memorial School and London Mozart Players, directed by Scott Price
 
BOOK CHOICE: The Lord of The Rings by J. R. R. Tolkien
LUXURY ITEM: An assortment of wine 
CASTAWAY'S FAVOURITE: Cello Concerto in E Minor, Op. 85: III. Adagio. Composed by Elgar. Performed by Jacqueline du Pré (cello) and London Symphony Orchestra, conducted by Sir John Barbirolli 

Presenter: Lauren Laverne
Producer: Paula McGinley

Desert Island Discs has cast many space experts away to the island over the years including NASA's Dr Nicola Fox, the astronomer Carl Sagan and the astronauts Tim Peake and Chris Hadfield. You can hear their programmes if you search through BBC Sounds or our own Desert Island Discs website.

Professor Michele Dougherty, scientist

Kemi Badenoch is the Conservative MP for North West Essex and the Leader of the Opposition. 

Since winning her seat in 2017, she has held cabinet positions as Minister of State for Equalities under Boris Johnson and Secretary of State for International Trade under Liz Truss and Rishi Sunak. She became leader of the Conservative Party in 2024 after Rishi Sunak’s resignation and is the first black person to lead a political party in Britain. 

Her Nigerian parents came to Britain for medical treatment and Kemi was born in a private hospital in Wimbledon in January 1980. Her parents returned with their newborn daughter, and she was brought up in Nigeria in an affluent suburb of Lagos. 

After a series of military coups and economic downturns, her family, along with many other middle-class families in Nigeria saw their wealth decline and Kemi was sent to London to study for her A levels.

Instead of following her parents into medicine, she chose to pursue Computer Systems Engineering and went to Sussex University. A well-paid career in IT followed and she joined the Conservative Party aged twenty-five where she also met her husband, Hamish. 

Her first attempt at becoming an MP was in 2010 in Dame Tessa Jowell’s former constituency of Dulwich and West Norwood constituency in London. She finished third behind the Labour and Liberal Democrat candidates.

In 2017, she was selected for the Saffron Walden seat and became an MP.

She lives in London with her husband and three children and divides her time between Westminster and her constituency of North West Essex.

DISC ONE: The Story of Tonight - Lin-Manuel Miranda, Okieriete Onaodowan, Daveed Diggs, Original Broadway Cast of Hamilton 
DISC TWO: Don't Stop 'Til You Get Enough - Michael Jackson 
DISC THREE: Wonderful World - Sam Cooke 
DISC FOUR: Be Still - Aled Jones and English Session Orchestra 
DISC FIVE: Everybody’s Free (To Wear Sunscreen) - Baz Luhrmann 
DISC SIX: Love is All Around - Wet Wet Wet
DISC SEVEN: Carry You Home – Alex Warren 
DISC EIGHT: Dear Theodosia - Leslie Odom Jr., Lin-Manuel Miranda 
 
BOOK CHOICE: Vanity Fair by William Makepeace Thackeray
LUXURY ITEM: The Marvel Movie Collection with a solar-powered DVD player
CASTAWAY'S FAVOURITE: Don't Stop 'Til You Get Enough - Michael Jackson 

Presenter: Lauren Laverne
Producer: Sarah Taylor

Desert Island Discs has cast many politicians away to the island over the years including Sir Keir Starmer, Nicola Sturgeon, Sir Vince Cable, Theresa May, Ed Miliband, Boris Johnson and Margaret Thatcher.

Kemi Badenoch MP, leader of the opposition

Adeel Akhtar is an award-winning actor whose breakthrough role came in 2010 when he starred in Chris Morris’s black comedy Four Lions. 

He won his first BAFTA for Best Actor in 2017 for his role in the BBC drama Murdered by My Father. His second, for Best Supporting Actor, came in 2023 playing Andy Fisher in the BBC series Sherwood.

Adeel was born in Hounslow in West London and grew up in Buckinghamshire. He discovered a love of acting at school when he and a group of friends put on a production of Harold Pinter’s play The Homecoming. He read law at university but in 2002 followed his true passion and took a drama course at The Actors Studio in New York.

He got his first screen part playing one of the four hijackers of United Airlines Flight 93 in the television docudrama Let’s Roll: the Story of Flight 93. He has gone on to stretch his talents playing roles in the television series Fool Me Once, The Night Manager and Killing Eve. More recently he appeared on stage in The Cherry Orchard and a new play called The Estate.

Adeel lives in London with his wife, documentary maker Alexis Burke, and their two children.

DISC ONE: The Weight - Aretha Franklin 
DISC TWO: Jamaica Farewell - Harry Belafonte 
DISC THREE: Danny Nedelko - Idles 
DISC FOUR: First Big Weekend - Arab Strap 
DISC FIVE: After Hours - Velvet Underground 
DISC SIX: Time to Pretend - MGMT 
DISC SEVEN: People’s Faces - Kae Tempest 
DISC EIGHT: Do You Realize?? - The Flaming Lips 

BOOK CHOICE: A Swim in the Pond in the Rain by George Saunders
LUXURY ITEM: A solar-powered air fryer
CASTAWAY'S FAVOURITE: Do You Realize?? - The Flaming Lips 

Presenter: Lauren Laverne
Producer: Paula McGinley

Desert Island Discs has cast many actors away to the island over the years including Cillian Murphy, Stephen Graham, Lesley Manville and Helen McCrory. Adeel’s friend Meera Syall is in our archive too. You can hear their programmes if you search through BBC Sounds or our own Desert Island Discs website.

Adeel Akhtar, actor

Jojo Moyes is a British novelist and screenwriter. 

She began her writing career as a journalist and worked at the Egham and Staines News, Independent and South China Morning Post. 

Whilst working nightshifts on the Independent, she pursued her novel writing ambitions and wrote books by day. Her first few books were well received but did not topple the best seller lists. That all changed in 2012 when her novel You Before Me was published. Readers fell in love with the story of Louisa Clark, who takes a job looking after an angry young quadriplegic man. The book sold fifteen million copies, was made into a film and Jojo wrote two sequels. Her novels are beloved of book clubs and have sold in excess of fifty seven million copies and have been translated into forty-six languages. 

Jojo lives in London.

DISC ONE: Are You Lonesome Tonight? (Laughing Version) (Live) - Elvis Presley 
DISC TWO: Golden Slumbers - The Beatles 
DISC THREE: Silly Games - Janet Kay 
DISC FOUR: The Art Teacher - Rufus Wainwright 
DISC FIVE: Mozart: Vesperae solennes de confessore in C, K.339: 5. Laudate Dominum omnes gentes (Ps. 116/117) Composed by Mozart and performed by Edith Mathis (soprano), MDR Rundfunkchor Leipzig (choir), Staatskapelle Dresden (orchestra), conducted by Peter Schreier 
DISC SIX: Big Yellow Taxi by Joni Mitchell 
DISC SEVEN: A Better Time to Meet - Adrianne Lenker & Buck Meek 
DISC EIGHT: Je L’Aime à Mourir - Francis Cabrel 

BOOK CHOICE: The complete works of Fyodor Dostoyevsky 
LUXURY ITEM: A mechanical horse 
CASTAWAY'S FAVOURITE: Are You Lonesome Tonight? (Laughing Version - Live) - Elvis Presley 

Presenter Lauren Laverne
Producer Sarah Taylor

Desert Island Discs has cast many writers away to the island over the years including Helen Fielding, Marian Keyes and Dame Jilly Cooper. You can hear their programmes if you search through BBC Sounds or our own Desert Island Discs website.

Jojo Moyes, writer

Kate Winslet is an actor who achieved global fame playing Rose DeWitt Bukater, opposite Leonard DiCaprio as Jack Dawson, in the 1997 James Cameron epic Titanic. During her career she has won five BAFTAs, two Emmys, five Golden Globes and an Academy Award for her role in the Reader. 

Kate was born in Reading in 1975 and attended Redroofs School for the Performing Arts in Maidenhead, Berkshire. Her film debut came in 1994 when she played a teenage killer in Peter Jackson’s film Heavenly Creatures. The following year she played Marianne Dashwood opposite Emma Thompson’s Elinor in Sense and Sensibility, directed by Ang Lee. Kate’s performance earned her a BAFTA for Best Actress in a Supporting Role. 

She went on to consolidate her reputation as one of the most versatile actors of her generation by starring in a list of popular and critically acclaimed films including Hideous Kinky, Iris, Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind and The Holiday.

Last year Kate directed her first film, Goodbye June, starring Helen Mirren, Timothy Spall and Andrea Riseborough. 

Kate has three children and lives in West Sussex with her husband Ned and her family.

DISC ONE: Georgia on my Mind - Roger Winslet and Sophie Breakenridge 
DISC TWO: Matchstalk Men and Matchstalk Cats and Dogs - Brian and Michael 
DISC THREE: Kiss from a Rose - Seal 
DISC FOUR: Summertime - Ella Fitzgerald 
DISC FIVE: Nuvole Bianche - Ludovico Einaudi 
DISC SIX: Weird Fishes/ Arpeggi - Radiohead 
DISC SEVEN: Blue Ridge Mountains - Fleet Foxes 
DISC EIGHT: Pump up the Jam - Technotronic 
 
BOOK CHOICE: Outside: Recipes for a Wilder Way of Eating by Gill Meller 
LUXURY ITEM: Freshly ground coffee 
CASTAWAY'S FAVOURITE: Georgia on my Mind – Roger Winslet and Sophie Breakenridge 

Presenter: Lauren Laverne
Producer: Paula McGinley

Desert Island Discs has cast many actors away over the years including Dame Emma Thompson, Cate Blanchett and Dame Helen Mirren. You can hear their programmes if you search through BBC Sounds or our own Desert Island Discs website.

Kate Winslet, actor

Lee Child is a writer who is best known for his series of bestselling novels featuring Jack Reacher. Reacher is an enigmatic 6ft 5in, 17-stone ex-military police major who rights wrongs before disappearing off into the sunset. The books have sold in their millions around the world and have inspired two films starring Tom Cruise and a television series.

Lee Child was born James - Jim - Grant in 1954 and grew up in Birmingham. He studied Law at the University of Sheffield and then joined the presentation department at Granada Television where he was a shop steward and became a thorn in the side of the management. 

At 40 he was made redundant and sat down to write his first Reacher novel Killing Floor. He found himself an agent and the novel was published in March 1997 - the franchise was up and running. In the UK Lee outsells both Stephen King and John Grisham and worldwide he sells between 12 and 15 million copies a year.

In 2020 Lee announced that he was handing over the Reacher franchise to his younger brother Andrew Grant. The two brothers have worked on several novels since then and the thirtieth Reacher title features both brothers’ names on the cover.

Lee Child was appointed CBE in the 2019 Queen’s Birthday Honours. 

He lives in the Lake District with his wife Jane. They have one daughter.

DISC ONE: She Loves You - The Beatles 
DISC TWO: (I Can't Get No) Satisfaction - The Rolling Stones 
DISC THREE: So What - Miles Davis 
DISC FOUR: Tchaikovsky: Piano Concerto No. 1 in B-Flat Minor, Op. 23: I. Allegro non troppo e molto maestoso – Allegro con spirito. Performed by Stephen Hough (piano) and Minnesota Orchestra, conducted by Osmo Vänskä
DISC FIVE: Joe’s Blues - Joe Pass 
DISC SIX: The Lemon Song - Led Zeppelin 
DISC SEVEN: Für Elise (Bagatelle No. 25 in A minor) Composed by Ludwig Beethoven and performed by Lang Lang 
DISC EIGHT: Delibes: Lakmé / Act 1: \"Sous le dôme épais\" (Flower Duet) Performed by Renée Fleming (soprano), Susan Graham (mezzo soprano), Philharmonia Orchestra, conducted by Sebastian Lang-Lessing 

BOOK CHOICE: Killing Floor by Lee Child
LUXURY ITEM: A mechanical wind-up watch 
CASTAWAY'S FAVOURITE: So What - Miles Davis 

Presenter: Lauren Laverne
Producer: Paula McGinley

Lee Child, writer

Jesse Armstrong is a British author, screenwriter, and producer.

He has written several award-winning TV comedies and satirical dramas and won many accolades for his work including two BAFTA TV Awards, three Golden Globe Awards, and three Writers Guild of America Awards. His hit HBO series Succession has won nineteen Emmys. 

Jesse was born and educated in Oswestry, Shropshire, and attended Manchester University where he studied American Studies as an undergraduate and American History for his Masters. After university, he worked as a researcher for a Labour Member of Parliament for a couple of years it was an experience that would later inform his time as a writer on The Thick of It. 

He met his writing partner, Sam Bain, at Manchester University and together they created and co-wrote 9 seasons of Channel 4’s BAFTA-winning comedy Peep Show and 4 seasons of the student comedy Fresh Meat. 
 
During this time, he also wrote for the political satire series The Thick of It and co-wrote the film In the Loop, the latter of which earned him Oscar and BAFTA nominations for Best Adapted Screenplay. He also co-wrote the films Four Lions and Downhill and wrote and directed the television film, Mountainhead.

He was the creator and show-runner of the hit HBO TV show Succession, a drama about a fictional powerful media family with the plot centring around which child would succeed the father played by Brian Cox. Succession won a total of 19 Emmys including Outstanding Writing for a Drama Series for each of Succession’s four seasons.

He lives in London with his wife and has two children in their twenties.

DISC ONE: A Day in the Life - The Beatles
DISC TWO: Love Will Tear Us Apart - Joy Division 
DISC THREE: Debaser - Pixies 
DISC FOUR: Georgia on my Mind - Billie Holiday
DISC FIVE: The Magic Number - De La Soul
DISC SIX: New York, I Love You but You’re Bringing Me Down - LCD Sound System 
DISC SEVEN: Dream Song 28: Snow Line. Written and read by John Berryman 
DISC EIGHT: Violin Concerto in D Major, RV 234 “L’inquietudine” 1: Allegro. Composed by Antonio Vivaldi and performed by Walter Gallozzi and I Musici 

BOOK CHOICE: The Norton Anthology of Poetry 
LUXURY ITEM: A football 
CASTAWAY'S FAVOURITE: Georgia on my Mind - Billie Holiday 

Presenter Lauren Laverne
Producer Sarah Taylor

Desert Island Discs has cast many TV writers away to the island over the years including Russell T Davies, Sally Wainwright and Abi Morgan. You’ll also find the stars of Peep Show, Robert Webb and David Mitchell in there too along with the actor Brian Cox who played the patriarch, Logan Roy, in Jesse’s hit TV series, Succession. You can hear their programmes if you search through BBC Sounds or our own Desert Island Discs website.

Jesse Armstrong, writer

Margaret Atwood is a Canadian writer. She has published more than sixty books spanning novels, poetry, short stories, non-fiction, children’s literature, and graphic novels, and has been called “one of the sharpest and most imaginative novelists writing in English”. She is one of only four writers to have won the Booker Prize twice: for The Blind Assassin in 2000 and for her 2019 follow-up to The Handmaid’s Tale, The Testaments.

Margaret was born in Ottawa in November 1939, shortly after the outbreak of World War II, the second of three children to Carl Atwood, an entomologist. During her early life, she would spend the warmer months in the remote forests of northern Quebec and Ontario where her father tracked insect infestations, and the winters in the city (first Ottawa, later Toronto). She didn’t attend school for a full year until the age of twelve.

Her childhood scribblings – a “novel” about an ant called Annie, a volume of rhyming poems about cats, and a play about a giant – turned into a more serious ambition to become a writer when Margaret was sixteen. 

After studying English at the University of Toronto, where she began publishing poems in the college magazine, her first novel, The Edible Woman, came out in 1969, following five collections of poetry. 

Her most famous work, The Handmaid’s Tale, was published in 1985 and depicted a dystopian vision of the United States as a patriarchal and totalitarian place called Gilead. Although it was written during the Reagan era, it has become eerily relevant again in the wake of the election of Donald Trump. 

Margaret lost her life partner, the writer Graeme Gibson, in 2019. She lives in Toronto.

DISC ONE: Anchors Aweigh - US Navy Band 
DISC TWO: Hearts of Stone - The Charms 
DISC THREE: Offenbach: Les contes d'Hoffmann, Giulietta Act: Barcarolle. Belle nuit, ô nuit d'amour. Performed by Joan Sutherland (soprano) Huguette Tourangeau (soprano), Plácido Domingo (tenor), Andre Neury (bass), Pro Arte Choir, Lausanne, Choeur Du Brassus, Choeur de la Radio Suisse Romande, Orchestre de la Suisse Romande, conducted by Richard Bonynge 
DISC FOUR: Four Strong Winds - Ian & Sylvia 
DISC FIVE: Barrett’s Privateers - Stan Rogers 
DISC SIX: The Handmaid's Tale, Act I Scene 6: The Doctor. Composed by Poul Ruders and performed by Marianne Rorholm, Hanne Fischer (Mezzo-sopranos), Royal Danish Opera Chorus and Royal Danish Orchestra, conducted by Michael Schønwandt 
DISC SEVEN: We Praise the Tiny Perfect Moles - Orville Stoeber 
DISC EIGHT: Symphony No. 6 in F Major, Op. 68 "Pastoral": II. Scene am Bach. Andante molto moto. Composed by Beethoven and performed by Philharmonia Orchestra, conducted by Otto Klemperer 

BOOK CHOICE: How to Survive on a Desert Island by Samantha Bell
LUXURY ITEM: A knife and matchbox 
CASTAWAY'S FAVOURITE: Hearts of Stone - The Charms 

Presenter: Lauren Laverne
Producer: Sarah Taylor

Margaret Atwood, writer

Gordon Buchanan is a wildlife cameraman and TV presenter. He is best known for the Animal Family & Me series of BBC documentaries in which he gets up close to wild bears, Arctic wolves, elephants and reindeer among other species.

Gordon was brought up in Tobermory on the Isle of Mull where he spent his days exploring the island and developed his lifelong love of the outdoors. In 1988, when he was 17, he met the charismatic wildlife cameraman Nick Gordon who invited him to become his assistant for a project to film primates on the island of Tiwai in Sierra Leone. 

Gordon spent 18 months in Sierra Leone working with Nick and after that the two of them worked in West Africa and South America. At 22 Gordon set up on his own – his first job was a year-long assignment to make three half-hour programmes for a 14-part wildlife series called Wild Islands. 

In 2001 he made his debut as a presenter on the BBC’s Natural World strand. He was appointed an MBE for services to conservation and wildlife filmmaking in 2020. 

Gordon lives in Glasgow with his wife Wendy. They have two children. 

DISC ONE: Take Me Home, Country Roads - John Denver 
DISC TWO: Brandy in the Airidh - Peat & Diesel 
DISC THREE: Purple Haze – The Jimi Hendrix Experience
DISC FOUR: Heart-Shaped Box - Nirvana
DISC FIVE: High and Dry - Radiohead
DISC SIX: Last Nite - The Strokes
DISC SEVEN: Electrical Storm - U2 
DISC EIGHT: Single Ladies (Put a Ring on It) - Beyoncé 

BOOK CHOICE: Teach Yourself Tap Dancing by Derek Hartley
LUXURY ITEM: A mask, snorkel and fins
CASTAWAY'S FAVOURITE: High and Dry - Radiohead

Presenter: Lauren Laverne
Producer: Paula McGinley

Desert Island Discs has cast many wildlife experts and broadcasters away including Dr George McGavin, Professor Carl Jones, Sir David Attenborough and Dr Jane Goodall. You can hear their programmes if you search through BBC Sounds or our own Desert Island Discs website.

Gordon Buchanan, cameraman and presenter

Sue Lawley's castaway is Pulitzer prize-winning writer Frank McCourt.

Favourite track: The Kyrie from St Cecilia Mass by Charles Gounod
Book: Oxford Anthology of English Verse
Luxury: A pair of binoculars

Frank McCourt

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