“Leo McKern and Jack MacGowran in ‘ THE OCEAN’”. Adapted for radio from a novel by James Hanley. The radio script and production were by Donald McWhinnnie who wrote in the Radio Times “The attempt to re-interpret Hanley’s vision has been one of my most exciting radio experiences and I hope that the sound-complex you will hear on Monday evening (Home) may prove to be one of yours.
“If not, please don’t shoot the author, nor the cast, led by those fine actors, Leo McKern and Jack MacGowran, nor the wonderfully creative team of technicians who have spent hours in blending realistic and radiophonic effects. Don’t shoot me either; just switch off.”
McWhinnie’s excitement was still there in The Art Of Radio (1959) where he concludes his analysis of sound radio with a summary of the thought processes that went into The Ocean’s transfer to radio play.
Listening to the rhythmic tones conjured up by Desmond and Daphne for the main theme now next to Donald’s enthusiasm for the project just whets the appetite. It’s described by McWhinnie as “an almost musical rocking sound, strange, disturbing, mysterious.”. Indeed it is, and that list of adjectives encompasses so much of the RWS’s early output.
Stylism Over Realism
McWhinnie makes much of the stylisation of real sounds to work as a shorthand of and shortcut to setting the scene. You might in retrospect draw a parallel between the impressionistic sound of the sea with the famous and influential woodblock print The Great Wave off Kanagawa (1831) by Japanese artist Hokusai. The designers of the almost as famous Roland TR-808 drum machine have cited the great artwork as an inspiration in their modest attempts to the realistic sounds of drum with analogue circuitry. The solution, they realised, was to make aesthetically pleasing representations of the real sounds. In doing so they created their own style and one that gradually redefined the sound of drums in pop. The success of the 808 in popular and all kinds of electronic music to this day bears out this claim for stylism over realism.
https://genome.ch.bbc.co.uk/e07abcbfdb5660efd835d66ead781212
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