Wassailing - A Collection of BBC Programmes

Wassailing: An age-old tradition in modern day London https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/av/uk-england-london-68096577 Published 4 days ago
Since the Middle Ages, wassailing has involved visiting cider apple orchards in the winter and singing to the trees as well as reciting incantations to promote a good harvest for the coming year.
For the past 15 years, Ian White and others in Honor Oak, south-east London, have been meeting on the One Tree Hill Allotments to wassail the fruit trees.

BBC Radio Humberside Sat 20 Jan 2024 Fiona Mills Morris Men's wassail, shopping centre theatre, Arthur Smith https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p0h37kvl 19 days left to listen
Fiona chats to a group of Morris Dancers from Grimsby celebrating Wassail; a pop up theatre in a shopping centre, comedian Arthur Smith in Barton.

BBC World Service 18 Jan 2024 Food Chain; How to invent an apple Available for over a year.
In this week’s episode Ruth Alexander finds out about the science behind finding that perfect crunch, how long it takes to be able to taste an apple you’ve spent years planning and how to grab consumers’ attention with a new breed. Ruth also visits a wassail at Apple Barn, Dunham Massey, Cheshire to experience an ancient tradition involving cider, hanging toast on a tree and lots of singing to encourage a good apple harvest for the year ahead.

BBC Sounds The Food Programme Wassail! Wassail! A celebration of cider, orchards and song 30 Jan 2022 Available for over a year
Dan Saladino goes in search of the history, meaning and spirit of wassails and cider. In Somerset he takes part in a village wassail sung door to door and one sung in an orchard.
Contributors: The Drayton village wassailers, Gerard Tucker, wassail master of ceremonies
Music: Drayton Wassail (as documented by Cecil Sharp in 1903), Tam Lin, Fairport Convention (1968), Bruton Town, Pentangle (1968)

BBC Sounds Open Country Somerset Wassail Sat 9 Feb 2019 Available now https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m0002cg1
In the depths of the winter, on the old 12th Night, an ancient custom is held in the cider apple orchards of Somerset. By 1990 wassailing in apple orchards had almost died out in Somerset, but over the last thirty years the tradition has undergone a remarkable revival. As Helen Mark finds out, it's now very much alive and well - and if nothing else, provides a good excuse for a party to brighten up the dark winter nights!

Wassailing on Radio 2 Jeremy Vine Show - A West Countryman’s View Posted on April 3, 2017 by westcountryman http://www.westcountryman.co.uk/radio2wassail/
Having done an interview for BBC Radio Bristol about the ceremony of ‘Wassailing’ the apple trees, I received a call from the researcher for the Jeremy Vine show on BBC Radio 2. Would I help them with a live Wassail on the show was the question. Well… I could change things around a bit and be by the phone at the required time to do the interview. Oh no! They wanted me to go to London and do the thing live on air.

BBC Sounds The Early Music Show Here We Come a-Wassailing Sun 28 Dec 2014 https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b04vdgq4 Download (UK Only)
Lucie Skeaping investigates an ancient musical tradition whereby people went from door to door singing carols and were rewarded with hot mulled cider. Wassailing can be traced back possibly as far as Anglo-Saxon times and has evolved over time to become associated with Christmas. Lucie Skeaping introduces some of the music that has been associated with the wassailing tradition and her guests include the historian Joanna Crosby, from Essex Univeristy, who has a particular interest in apples.