Sound Towns 

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)

Sound Towns

Documentaries

Factual: Arts, Culture & the Media

This series explores the origin stories of some of the UK's most vital musical movements.

Great music is born from a collision of societal and political change. This series explores the origin stories of some of the UK's most vital musical movements.

Great music is born from a collision of societal and political change. This series explores the origin stories of some of the UK's most vital musical movements.

The UK's turbulent societal and political changes sparked the most electrifying moments in modern music history. These aren't the stories you know. They're the moments that came before. Each episode is a world in and of itself, and it'll get as close to the music as possible.

BBC Radio 4 LW

Sound Towns: East Neuk of Fife

East Neuk of Fife

BBC Radio 4 - Sound Towns, East Neuk of Fife

Origin stories of the UK's most vital musical moments. Now, East Neuk in Fife...

Great music can come from great change. These are the origin stories of some of the UK's most vital musical movements. In this episode, Fife's East Neuk...

Great music is born from a collision of societal and political change. This series explores the origin stories of some of the UK's most vital musical movements.

In this episode, we visit Fife's East Neuk, for a sound rooted in tradition and landscape. 

The East Neuk of Fife is the most unlikely place for a musical revolution. It's a string of picturesque fishing villages set between the sea and rolling fields. St Andrews is well known, but the other towns and villages are far quieter, particularly in winter. The big-city energy of Edinburgh feels far away. 

According to acclaimed singer-songwriter James Yorkston, the East Neuk's proximity to the sea and lack of gig venues provided musicians in the early and mid-1990s with the space and motivation to create their own voice, even if only to break the peace and quiet.

And it was in this environment of empty houses and cheap rents that a small community of gifted musicians gathered. Echoing the new folk revolution of the 1960s, the place created the sound. The sound in this case included the psychedelic troubadours The Beta Band, multi-million-selling KT Tunstall, the aforementioned James Yorkston and the reigning monarch and lynchpin of the Fence Collective, King Creosote. 

Producer: Victoria McArthur
Narrated by: Nicola Meighan
Researcher: Juliet Conway
Sound mix: Lee McPhail

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

Accessibility links

Programme Index

Sound Towns

East Neuk of Fife

Genres

Brand

BBC Radio 4 FM

About BBC Radio 4