Charles Parker (producer)

Charles Parker (1919–1980) was a BBC Radio producer based in Birmingham from 1954-1972 who specialised in Documentary Radio and Theatre. In particular, he is remembered for his collaboration with Ewan MacColl and Peggy Seeger on the 1958-1963 series of Radio Ballads, which won an Italia Prize for Radio Documentary in 1960 and is seen as a landmark of study in oral history.

He came to believe passionately in the value of the testimony of working people and the creative importance of the oral tradition and its relationship to folk music. This became the key to his work in radio, theatre and in his extensive teaching activities.

He was a founder, writer, singer and actor with Banner Theatre in Birmingham from 1974-1980 and in 1966 established the Birmingham and Midland Folk Centre with Roy Palmer, Pam and Alan Bishop, Joan Smith, Olga Nicholls and other enthusiasts in the area.

The Charles Parker Archive is deposited in the Archives & Heritage Service at the Library of Birmingham and consists of tapes, production books, papers, correspondence and scripts for most of the programmes Charles Parker produced and the organisations in which he was active.

It contains historical records for studying the culture of the 1950s-1970s in broadcasting, the folk revival, pop music, community arts - as well as contemporary social and political issues. Parker made programmes with blind people, Irish labourers, workers in China in 1972, Asian teenagers, protesters against the Vietnam War and other minorities traditionally denied a voice on the air.

Parker collaborated on several occasions with documentarist Philip Donnellan, notably on 'The Colony' (1963) and 'The Irishmen' (1965).

The Charles Parker Archive Trust is active in promoting the Archive and in fundraising to disseminate its contents. Two Heritage Lottery grants have enabled cataloguing to take place within the City of Birmingham's Collecting Histories project.

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