Soul Music

Original version

BBC Radio 4 FM

BBC Radio 4 is a radio channel that started transmitting on the 30th September 1967. It replaced BBC Home Service.

BBC Radio 4

Radio 4

Radio 4 (FM)

Documentaries

Factual: Life Stories

Music

Series about pieces of music with a powerful emotional impact

BBC Radio 4 Extra

BBC Radio 4 LW

Soul Music: Series 16: Don't Leave Me This Way

Don't Leave Me This Way

Series 16

BBC Radio 4 - Soul Music, Series 16, Don't Leave Me This Way

Exploration of the disco anthem of yearning, pain and loss.

The impact of the soul classic 'Don't Leave Me This Way', written by Huff, Gamble and Gilbert. With Richard Coles. From July 2013.

Don't Leave Me This Way was written in the early 1970s by songwriters Huff, Gamble and Gilbert who were the composers behind the famous black American Philadelphia Sound. 

It was first performed by Harold Melvin and the Blue Notes, featuring Teddy Pendergrass on lead vocals, and later became a hit for Thelma Houston and The Communards. As the title suggests, the song is all about longing, yearning and loss. 

Remarkable stories reflect the pain expressed in this soul classic, including one told by Dr Dan Gottlieb, a quadriplegic therapist who befriended Teddy Pendergrass after he became paralysed in a car accident. 

Sharon Wachsler recalls dancing to the version made famous by The Communards in 1986 before a devastating illness left her housebound and reliant on her beloved service dog Gadget, who gave her a reason to keep going. When he died, the song was the only way she could express her grief over his loss. 

The Reverend Richard Coles, formerly of The Communards, talks about the significance of Don't Leave Me This Way as a dancefloor anthem for young gay men in the 1980s that was later to become associated with the AIDS epidemic that took so many of their lives.

Series about pieces of music with a powerful emotional impact.

Producer: Maggie Ayre

First broadcast on BBC Radio 4 in July 2013.

Soul Music: Series 16

Intelligent speech, the most insightful journalism, the wittiest comedy, the most fascinating features and the most compelling drama and readings anywhere in UK radio.

Series exploring famous pieces of music and their emotional appeal

Accessibility links

Programme Index

Soul Music

Series 16

Don't Leave Me This Way

Genres

Brand

Series

BBC Radio 4 FM

About BBC Radio 4