An Introduction to the Delia Derbyshire Archive

This short film is an Introduction to the Delia Derbyshire Archive held at John Rylands Library in Manchester, UK. "For Interest Only" was produced by Belle Vue Productions as part of a Heritage Lottery Fund supported "Delia Derbyshire 80th birthday electronic music heritage project" managed by electronic music charity Delia Derbyshire Day.

[@livvy94]

I wish I lived close to Manchester so I could go to the events and listen to the archive. Unfortunately I'm stuck in the USA for now... But like so many other people, Delia (via the Alchemists of Sound documentary, which I don't think is legally available to buy anywhere...) was my first inspiration, and the reason I became interested in creating electronic music. In 2009, I discovered a program called OpenMPT that has the ability to import uncompressed WAV files and re-pitch them on-the-fly, similar to the traditional Radiophonic techniques, and started learning how to use it. While I've gone in a different direction in recent years (making music with obsolete videogame hardware), I still use OpenMPT for most of the things I do, and I still think about the Radiophonic Workshop and Delia's music a lot.

[@davidhuggins16]

A fascinating introduction to Delia's unique musical archive!
The clip of her incidental music heard from 3.44 is beautiful. Do we know which film she composed it for?

[@deliaderbyshireday]

Hi there David. Glad you like the film. I think the music at 3:44 is part of the make up tapes for Amor Dei (one of the Four Inventions for Radio).

[@davidhuggins16]

Thank you! Amor Dei is amazing. Great that the make up tapes survive.
Was lucky enough to find an extract from Amor Dei on an old BBC LP recently - I think it might be the only official release from the Inventions for Radio series. It's on the compilation "50 Years of Religious Broadcasting" (1975)
www.discogs.com/Various-50-Years-Of-Religious-Broadcasting/release/4348158