Friday Night Extra on Phoenix FM

Tonight we played two hours of great music across the genres and decades.

11 year old Jude Ball from Maldon joined us this evening. He talked about taking part in the www.chesshomeless/sleepout next week the 22nd at Chelmsford Cathedral. THis is a sponsored event and Jude is one on 75 people who will be sleeping outside. Jude did this last year also and told us how many layers of clothes he wore to try and keep warm, and still he was cold. He told us that he felt no-one should have to sleep rough as a homeless person which he thought was a very scary thing to have to do.

Tonight we had a feature on the award winning Simon & Garfunkel album Bookends. Side one of this concept album follows a journey through aging.

Tonight we had an eclectic music mix covering the decades and the genres. This included local band The Goodbye Look on the day that their keyboard player graduated. Congratulations Michael.

Diana Ross is touring the States and in 2020 will be headlining the Glastonbury Legends stage. By then she will be aged 76 years. We looked back at her career.

It was fascinating hearing Revd. Paul Carr talk about his sabbatical in the Philippines, being a Festival Angel in Leeds and walking part of the Camino de Santiago.

It was great to welcome back Revd. Stuart for his fourth visit to the show, but the first for four years. He talked about his journey through theological college in Oxford and curacy in Chelmsford to starting his ministry in Warley in May this year.

It was great to have Tom Page with us tonight, singing three songs and staying for most of the show to join in the chat. Jonty was also back, four years since he first came into the show, and off to university on Monday. We played lots of classic songs tonight that have been very successful and clearly mean a great deal to many people.

David Pickthall joined us to talk about DPBB Live, the new album from the Big Band. The band grew out of The Brentwood School Big Band and now has over 100 registered members.

Rob Saggs returned to the show to give us an update on the work of Chess Homeless.