David Leonard Rayvern Allen (5 February 1938 – 9 October 2014)Michael Dow
"David Rayvern Allen obituary"
''The Guardian'', 26 October 2014 was a

cricket Cricket is a bat-and-ball game played between two teams of eleven players on a field at the centre of which is a pitch with a wicket at each end, each comprising two bails balanced on three stumps. The batting side scores runs by st ...

writer and historian, as well as a radio producer and presenter, a speaker and a musician. His radio productions won awards including the 1991

Prix Italia The Prix Italia is an international Television, Radio-broadcasting and Web award. It was established in 1948 by RAI – Radiotelevisione Italiana (in 1948, RAI had the denomination RAI – Radio Audizioni Italiane) in Capri and is honoured with th ...

for ''Who Pays the Piper'', a collaboration with Richard Stilgoe. He died aged 76 in 2014.

Life and career

Allen was born in Streatham,

London London is the capital and List of urban areas in the United Kingdom, largest city of England and the United Kingdom, with a population of just under 9 million. It stands on the River Thames in south-east England at the head of a estuary dow ...

, and went to school at

Sir Walter St John's School Sir Walter St John's was founded in 1700 for twenty boys of the village of Battersea. As the population and the English educational system changed, so did the school. The school was colloquially known as "Sinjuns" and was finally closed in 1986-7. ...

Battersea Battersea is a large district in south London, part of the London Borough of Wandsworth, England. It is centred southwest of Charing Cross and extends along the south bank of the River Thames. It includes the Battersea Park. History Batte ...

. He gained external music diplomas from the

Royal Academy of Music The Royal Academy of Music (RAM) in London, England, is the oldest conservatoire in the UK, founded in 1822 by John Fane and Nicolas-Charles Bochsa. It received its royal charter in 1830 from King George IV with the support of the first Duke ...

and the

Guildhall School of Music and Drama The Guildhall School of Music and Drama is a conservatoire and drama school located in the City of London, United Kingdom. Established in 1880, the school offers undergraduate and postgraduate training in all aspects of classical music and jaz ...

in London. Allen spent his working life as a radio producer with the BBC, working on a wide range of programmes before retiring in 1993."Obituaries", ''

Wisden ''Wisden Cricketers' Almanack'', or simply ''Wisden'', colloquially the Bible of Cricket, is a cricket reference book published annually in the United Kingdom. The description "bible of cricket" was first used in the 1930s by Alec Waugh in a ...

'' 2015, p. 175. Later, as a member of the MCC's Arts and Library committee, he was largely responsible for the club's Audio Archive Project, a collection of several hundred interviews with cricket people; he conducted more than a hundred of the interviews himself. He won several awards for his cricket biographies. His ''

'' obituary said of them that he was "conscientious, readable, judicious" and that he "did not flinch from the less agreeable aspects of his subjects' characters". He married Rosemary Clark in 1966. They had two daughters.

Works

Radio

King Vidor profile
BBC Radio 1978 (presenter)
Billy Wilder profile
BBC Radio 1978 (interviewer) *'' Who Could Ask for Anything More? A Celebration of Ira Gershwin'' BBC Radio 2 1996 (producer)

With Richard Stilgoe

*''Used Notes'' *''Music on the Brain'' *''The Singing Wheelchair'' *''Hamburger Weekend'' (1984)Richard Stilgoe website
/ref> *''Who Pays the Piper'' (1991)

Cricket-related (partial list)

*''A Song for Cricket'' (1981) *''The "Punch" Book of Cricket'' (1985) *''Cricket on the Air: A Selection from Fifty Years of Radio Broadcasts'' (1985)

BBC Books BBC Books (also formerly known as BBC Publishing) is an imprint majority-owned and managed by Penguin Random House through its Ebury Publishing division. The minority shareholder is BBC Studios, the commercial subsidiary of the British Broadca ...

*''Arlott on Wine'' (1987) (with

John Arlott Leslie Thomas John Arlott, OBE (25 February 1914 – 14 December 1991) was an English journalist, author and cricket commentator for the BBC's '' Test Match Special''. He was also a poet and wine connoisseur. With his poetic phraseology, he be ...

) *''Peter Pan and Cricket'' (1988) Constable & Co *''Sir Aubrey: A Biography of C. Aubrey Smith - England Cricketer, West End Actor, Hollywood Film Star'' (1st 1982),

J. W. McKenzie J. W. McKenzie is a bookseller and publisher specialising in cricket Cricket is a bat-and-ball game played between two teams of eleven players on a field at the centre of which is a pitch with a wicket at each end, each comprising two ...

, (2nd 1987), ; augmented edition: limited to 150 (2005), 2010: *''The Guinness Book of Cricket Extras'' (1988) (with Honor Head),

Guinness Publishing ''Guinness World Records'', known from its inception in 1955 until 1999 as ''The Guinness Book of Records'' and in previous United States editions as ''The Guinness Book of World Records'', is a reference book published annually, listing world ...

*''Arlott: The Authorised Biography'' (2004) *''Jim: The Life of

E. W. Swanton Ernest William Swanton (11 February 1907 – 22 January 2000) was an English journalist and author, chiefly known for being a cricket writer and commentator under his initials, E. W. Swanton. He worked as a sports journalist for ''The Daily T ...

'' (2004) *''The Second Lord's Cricket Ground: Home of MCC, 1811-1813'' (2006) MCCMCC Publications
*''Songs of Cricket'' (2011) mentor for this Signum CD by cantabile - the London Quartet with guests

Rory Bremner Roderick Keith Ogilvy "Rory" Bremner,"Rory Bremner". '' Who Do You Think You Are?''. Wall to Wall for BBC One. 2 February 2009. No. 1, series 6. (born 6 April 1961) is a Scottish impressionist and comedian, noted for his work in political sa ...

Tim Rice Sir Timothy Miles Bindon Rice (born 10 November 1944) is an English lyricist and author. He is best known for his collaborations with Andrew Lloyd Webber, with whom he wrote, among other shows, '' Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat'', ...

, Richard Stilgoe, Alex L'Estrange, Eliza Lumley and Chris Hatt

Other

*''Punches on the Page: A Boxing Anthology'' (1998) *''Living with London'' (2012) Methuen (with Nick Botting)

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Rayvern Allen, David 1938 births 2014 deaths People from Streatham People educated at Sir Walter St John's Grammar School For Boys British radio producers Cricket historians and writers English biographers 20th-century British businesspeople