Nestling within a curve of the River Waveney in Suffolk, Bungay is an archetypal East Anglian market town where life used to have its own regular rhythm. “If I was to go back in time, I think I could tell what day of the week it was immediately. Monday mornings the town was deserted because, traditionally, that was when the women did their weekly washing. Wednesday was half-day closing, Thursday was market day and on Saturdays, the town was packed with families,” says Christopher Reeve, curator of Bungay Museum and one of ten local people who share their memories of the town with us.
This documentary programme contrasts the recorded sounds of modern Bungay with insightful, touching and humorous recollections of a bygone era as told by some great town characters. One of these is Gordon Knowles who takes us on a dawn journey to feed his friends on the famous “Chicken Roundabout,” and treats us to his immensely entertaining memories of the last seven decades.
The CD is for sale in Bungay at Lodge Cordell, the Chocolate Box, the Toy Emporium in Bungay as well as the Bookthrift bookshop, Beccles.
Bungay: Our Town in Sound costs £6.50 including postage and packing. You can order it securely online below. Don't panic when you check out and are asked for your Paypal login. Simply select the "Don't have a paypal account" option which allows you to pay safely by credit card.
Reactions to Bungay: Our Town In Sound
"I delighted in your tour of this old town, the voices, the stories, the sound colours. Like listening to old apples and soft winds and slow flowing water. Very well put together too I thought with gentle and smooth mixes and a sense of a journey [...] I loved the way, though, changes in time and attitude were so neatly shown in small ways: the story of the boy who was simple, the real poverty of some of the children, the men drinking their pay away at the pubs,the giving of free fish in same to stimulate thirst, the coming of the war, the compassionate buying from the old woman who had so little, the clout round the ear from the local bobby, and the closer about people no longer whistling. Anyway, a wooing enticing listen, with those wonderful voices preserved for all our delights."
Piers Plowright, former head of documentary features at BBC Radio 4
I bought the Bungay CD from you at the Fisher Theatre on Sunday. I feel I must write to thank you so very much for your production, which I think could not have been bettered. I know all of the contributors and listening to your production has made me smile, laugh out loud and cry at different times.
Iain Huggin