Wednesday 22nd September 2004
After more than 30 years in local radio, Hedley Feast is stepping down from his role as presenter of Sunday Breakfast with Radio Oxford. It is has been an immensely rewarding career which has formed an essential part of his ministry, he tells Rebecca Paveley.
For thousands of listeners across Oxfordshire and beyond, Hedley Feast’s is the voice to which they wake each Sunday morning. His show, Sunday Breakfast, is one of the most popular on Radio Oxford, regularly drawing in up to 30,000 viewers. Many of his listeners tune in as they get ready to attend their own church or place or worship; but for many others it is their only connection with any form of worship, either because they are housebound or choose not to attend church. Still others, with no religious background or affiliation, tune into the programme.
Hedley’s last broadcast on 3 October will be felt keenly by all his viewers. It will bring to an end more than 30 years at Radio Oxford.
He first became involved when local radio first started, back in the 70s. At the time he was a full time Baptist minister in Kings Sutton, near Banbury.
‘I thought to myself this is a good medium which God could use and the Church could use for the communication of the Christian gospel so I joined up to one of the BBC’s audience panel. It was noticed I was interested in sport, so I started first covering local football matches. It was some years later before I became involved in the religious output.’
When Sunday Breakfast first started, it was recorded on Friday nights. Hedley had by then moved to Holmer Green in Buckinghamshire and used to come down two or three times a week to prepare the show.
‘We’d start at seven which invariably meant 8 and go at it with tape and razor blades. More than once I’ve finished very late and its been past midnight and I’ve just got home and into bed when the producer would ring and say, the second part hasn’t recorded properly and I’d have to drive all the way back to Oxford to do it again and try and sound bright and breezy!’
Now the show is put out live, his alarm clock goes off promptly at 3am – the one thing he won’t miss when he leaves, he tells me!
‘I have always considered myself firstly as a minister and not a broadcaster, my BBC work has to me been just a dimension of my ministry.
‘It has given me far more than I have given it. It has opened doors and windows on so much for me and I have met so many wonderful people.
‘One of the most noticeable interviews I’ve done was meeting Lord Tonypandy in the house of Lords, George Thomas. He recorded three or four Lent pieces for us and showed me round the Lords. He was a very humble man, a very Godly man.
‘David Winter is one of my favourite guests. I knew I could always phone him up, sometimes at late notice, and ask him to speak on something or other. And Michael Chantry, who died last year, was a great friend. He was chaplain to Hertford College and Oxford United and he used to do our Sunday reflections, he even did them right up to the week he died. In fact he had written the one for the Sunday after he died, and I read it out for him.
‘Chris Lambrianou, one of the Kray gang, who lives in Bicester was a great person to interview. He was very evangelical, very committed. He converted in prison but Michael Chantry had been his ‘guardian angel’ since he left jail. He had some very moving stories to tell.
‘I have heard so many moving stories from people, stories of loss and bereavement. It is through these stories that I feel at times that God is talking through people, helping them offer up very vivid testimonies.’
His dedication pays off not just in his audience figures but in appreciation from viewers which leads some of them to supply him with cake to eat through his show. He tells me to mention Greta and Gerald in Longworth who regularly make him chocolate cake to keep him going through the morning.
Sunday Breakfast is a careful mix of hymns, testimonies and light interviews. Hedley says he structures the show to allow it to be a service of worship for those who can’t get out to church.
‘Angela and Graham, who man the phones, know there are many people who listen just for friendship. They get calls at 5am from people who just want to talk – and counselling isn’t too strong a word for the service they offer. They prove what I believe – that radio is a family, that broadcasting is a ministry’.
Listeners will be glad to know that Hedley isn’t disappearing altogether and will still be heard occasionally reporting on Sunday mornings for Radio Oxford. And he will remain as free church chaplain at the John Radcliffe hospital in Oxford.