If you live in a town and have ever indulged a dream of rural living, this week's On Your Farm (Radio 4, Sunday, 18 October) was made to wallow in. Alex James and Chris Haskins went to Lincolnshire to meet Andrew Dennis, the first of three nominees for the 2009 BBC Farmer of the Year award. To say the programme made his organic farm sound idyllic would be an understatement. Turkeys squawked and piglets snuffled as Dennis showed them his rare-breed cows, free-range poultry and biodynamic brassicas. There were even visiting schoolchildren, merrily picking strawberries. James and Haskins are a good double act – when Dennis confessed to a regret at having to kill the turkeys at Christmas ("they're inquisitive, rather friendly and intelligent"), James sympathised, admitting he'd raised a pig but couldn't bear to have it slaughtered. Haskins is the business brain, asking questions about viability and profit, all of which Dennis answered easily. James was audibly won over. "You're the coolest-looking farmer I've ever seen," he said. "You've got trainers, low-slung jeans and cooler hair than me."
Frank Skinner doesn't sound too concerned about being cool on his Saturday morning show (Absolute, Saturday, 17 October) – this week he happily described his worst childhood fear: the wardrobe in his parents' bedroom ("the wood grain looked like monsters' faces in the moonlight"). He creates an easygoing atmosphere with his sidekicks Emily and Gareth – comedian Ed Byrne was due to be a guest, but his non-appearance just created lots of merriment. Firstly they were told his car had broken down – "Love it! Such a 70s excuse!" said Emily. Later, this changed – Byrne had, apparently, driven into a ditch. "What?" squealed Emily. "First it was the 70s, now it's gone 16th-century!"
Ian Rankin was a terrific guest on this week's Private Passions (Radio 3, Sunday, 18 October). He said he'd come late to classical music, but his selections – Glenn Gould playing Bach, a Vivaldi cello concerto, Mozart's Requiem – were hugely seductive. "In a good requiem you should get a sense that there is a higher purpose, that there's somewhere you're going after your death – that you're not just ending up buried in a lime pit," he said, adding, "although Mozart did." There's something appealingly unelitist about Rankin – talking about his PhD on Muriel Spark he added: "She's the author of The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie, among other things," not assuming prior knowledge in his listeners, and after introducing a piece by Coleman Hawkins as "the most gorgeous piece of jazz saxophone you'll ever hear", he added modestly, "I hope you'll agree." Michael Berkeley, an admitted fan of Rankin's Rebus novels, pressed him on whether Rebus will be making a comeback in future books. "He hasn't left the building, shall we say," said the author.
There's more Scottish crime in this week's Woman's Hour drama, The Dead Hour (Radio 4, Monday, 19 to Friday, 23 October), an adaptation of Denise Mina's novel. Set in 1984, it has an irresistible soundtrack of the Communards, Culture Club and Bananarama, and is gripping from the off. Paddy Meehan, a junior reporter on a Glasgow newspaper, is working the "dead hour" nightshift and desperate for a good story when she hears of an attack on a female lawyer in a wealthy suburb. When Paddy knocks on the door of the house, she catches a glimpse of the woman, but the man who answers reassures her that all is well and asks her to leave – with the incentive of a £50 note. For Paddy, one of several children who still lives at home, and is the only person in the house working, this is a considerable sum. She's forced to reassess her decision the next morning, however, when the news leads on the story of the lawyer's murder ... The drama runs throughout next week too, so expect plenty more twists and turns.
