On the Passing of PAL pals

'Phased Alternating Line'- the British TV standard. But even TV doesn't stay the same for long these days. John Logie Baird may have invented it in the 1930s in the modesty of a Hastings house, but there's a real battle on these days- for audiences and for format- web TV, HDTV, 3DTV, Digital TV, Freeview, Freesat, Ball and Bat, Take That....

Hang on, my brain hurts! Yet some of the programmes seemed as if they'd go on forever, rocks of stability in a river of changing tastes and technological tides. Even this though is no longer so. In the coming weeks, two ITV stalwarts- police shows both, respectively The Bill and Heartbeat will stop plodding on- in the case of the former over a quarter of a century after those famous copper bottoms (well, shoe bottoms, anyway) first trod the beat in the original titles.

It seems like the end not just of a TV season, but an era, just as the rather erratic sunshine on this last Bank Holiday weekend before Christmas in England, Wales and Northern Ireland signals the end of the holidays for many. But perhaps the most poignant passing from the small screen this week is of a collection of characters first seen back in those far-off days of 1973, when there were just three channels available to British viewers- and many households, like mine, didn't even yet possess a colour TV set.

37 years. Until recently it claimed the title of the world's longest running TV sitcom. I must confess I haven't been a regular viewer of this show for some time, but like millions of others around the world who'll be watching re-runs as if in a time warp for years to come, I shall miss its gentle charms. And not least, the haunting harmonica part written into the theme music by the brilliance of Ronnie Hazlehurst.

As a real-life, somewhat younger "Cleggy" attempts to keep Britain in order while his boss wallows in the post-puerpal delights of his second daughter, Florence Rose Endellion Cameron, the deputy Prime Minister's fictional namesake will be the last voice heard tomorrow evening just before 8.30 p.m on BBC One. AKA "the voice of Wallace", veteran actor Peter Sallis, OBE, will be left to put the bottle in the re-cycling bin.

Farewell, LOTSW. Here, in tribute, is my eulogy to a quaint piece of English TV history, to be sung to the aforementioned theme tune. It's no match for a similar effort written a few years ago in the wake of Compo's death, but I hope fans and detractors both might appreciate it:

A few miles from Huddersfield
The Pennine stones are rugged lime
The water’s clear
The folk no fear
In this country of thine

Some old tykes
With ageing lass
Who polish proud
Their Yorkshire brass
In Autumn sun
They still have fun
They never heard called “time”

But now my friends,
That time has come
That everyone must face
The bottle full
Of youth’s sweet dew
Is lost in the mist...

But while there’s
Still breath in me
And this glass still half full
These weathered men
Are boys again
With promise, hope and glee

So come my friends
Don’t shed a tear
At passing of t’year
For this is life
E'en with some strife
May it never end

We’ll drink then
The vine’s sweet fruit
And ponder days of yore
Our days we’ll spend
And laugh til ends
Last of the Summer Wine

(c) Mark A Savage 2010
Click on the title of this posting for a link to the "Summer Wine" Appreciation Society, and some other lyrics to the tune- which I had not read before I wrote this. They include, poignantly, some written by the late Bill Owen, who played Compo, and which were played on the TV episode which marked his passing in the show, shortly after the actor's death.