Bromski on his collaboration with Radio Luxembourg
Jacek Bromski took to the airwaves as a guest of Polish Radio's Programme 1. Not to talk about cinema, though, but about… radio. There was a time when he was Radio Luxembourg’s one and only Polish DJ.
When Grand Duke Henri and Grand Duchess Maria Teresa of Luxembourg made a state visit to Poland this May, Programme 1 compiled a number of special programmes about the Grand Duchy, a country still relatively unknown in Poland. One of them was related to Radio Luxembourg and Jacek Bromski, that station’s sole Polish DJ, was its guest.
“When I was about fifteen or sixteen, I used to listen to Radio Luxembourg under the duvet and dream that I’d find my way there one day. And when it happened, I was already at film school. As ever, the dream came true when it had stopped being a dream,” the President of the Polish Filmmakers Association told Music on One. “Radio Luxembourg was incredibly popular in Poland. They received floods of letters from Polish listeners. As a result, they suggested that I presented a thirty-minute programme with them once in a while, in a mix of Polish and English,” he continued.
In Poland, Bromski was a well-known music presenter. He had his own programmes, including Radiowy magazyn przebojów (Radio Hits Round-Up) on Programme 1 and ran discos organised by Franciszek Walicki, the generally acknowledged father of Polish big beat and rock. Radio Luxembourg imposed a certain style. “Introducing jingles, dynamic announcements, breaking into the music to say something else… all that was something revolutionary. We adopted that style of music presenting,” he remarked.
Both Bromski and the presenter, Marcin Kusy, commented on the fact that Radio Luxembourg also had a dramatic influence on the development of the youth music movement in Poland in the early nineteen sixties. As Bromski put it, “Polish Radio didn’t broadcast rock at all back then. It was on the wave that came along with Radio Luxembourg that Franek Walicki began organising concerts in Szczecin and that’s where groups like Niebiesko-Czarni and Czerwono-Czarni sprang from”.
“Is it possible to make a film about radio?”, hinted the presenter. “It’s not a very spectacular idea, because the action takes place in a single studio. If there were a good screenplay, then making a film like that would certainly be enjoyable,” Bromski concluded.
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“When I was about fifteen or sixteen, I used to listen to Radio Luxembourg under the duvet and dream that I’d find my way there one day. And when it happened, I was already at film school. As ever, the dream came true when it had stopped being a dream,” the President of the Polish Filmmakers Association told Music on One. “Radio Luxembourg was incredibly popular in Poland. They received floods of letters from Polish listeners. As a result, they suggested that I presented a thirty-minute programme with them once in a while, in a mix of Polish and English,” he continued.
In Poland, Bromski was a well-known music presenter. He had his own programmes, including Radiowy magazyn przebojów (Radio Hits Round-Up) on Programme 1 and ran discos organised by Franciszek Walicki, the generally acknowledged father of Polish big beat and rock. Radio Luxembourg imposed a certain style. “Introducing jingles, dynamic announcements, breaking into the music to say something else… all that was something revolutionary. We adopted that style of music presenting,” he remarked.
Both Bromski and the presenter, Marcin Kusy, commented on the fact that Radio Luxembourg also had a dramatic influence on the development of the youth music movement in Poland in the early nineteen sixties. As Bromski put it, “Polish Radio didn’t broadcast rock at all back then. It was on the wave that came along with Radio Luxembourg that Franek Walicki began organising concerts in Szczecin and that’s where groups like Niebiesko-Czarni and Czerwono-Czarni sprang from”.
“Is it possible to make a film about radio?”, hinted the presenter. “It’s not a very spectacular idea, because the action takes place in a single studio. If there were a good screenplay, then making a film like that would certainly be enjoyable,” Bromski concluded.
Copyright © by Jacek Bromski 2024