‘The Afterlife’ (also known as ‘The Great Adventure’) is the third of four Inventions for Radio, written by Barry Bermange and constructed by Delia Derbyshire and the BBC Radiophonic Workshop. It was first broadcast on 1 April 1965. Although a shorter ‘transcription’ version was broadcast outside of the U.K., this is (to my knowledge) the unabridged, original broadcast.
The Radio Times described the piece as ‘an attempt to reconstruct in sound the spiritualistic vision of Death and Eternity…conceived as a dream of Death.’ According to the article, it contains fragments from ‘The Dreams’ and ‘Amor Dei,’ the two previous Inventions for Radio.
Movements:
1. 0:00 ‘Death is going from shadow into reality.’
2. 7:48 ‘It’s just like going to sleep’
3. 18:55 ‘Light. Everywhere is light.’
4. 29:25 ‘Death is just a changing…’
Produced by David Thomson.
Disclaimer: I do not own this recording, but I am uploading it here for easy access, as an admirer of Delia’s work and for others interested.
The picture is a screenshot from ‘The Silver Chair’ by the BBC.