To be honest, I’d be surprised if anyone is reading this (and to be even more honest, I wrote this a few days back anyway) but, in case it’s timely, here are a few things on TV that you might be interested in today:

• Birmingham Royal Ballet’s Cinderella, BBC2 at 3pm
• Best of European Opera 2010 (ft Birmingham Opera Company’s Othello), BBC4 at 7pm

Screen WM have done a round-up of the festive stuff they’ve been involved in, including The Brothers McLeod’s The Moon Bird (Christmas Day, 12.40am on Channel 4 – oh, bit late for that, sorry), the new series of Upstairs Downstairs (Boxing Day, 9pm on BBC 1), Toast (30 December, 9pm on BBC 1) and, later on in January, the return of Hustle.

If you’ve got some vouchers burning a hole in your pocket then Soulboy and Nativity are out on DVD.

On the radio side of things, Robin Valk’s Handsworth Evolution will be played on 30 December on BBC WM.

I hadn’t realised they were in any sort of trouble until I read Robin Valk’s post:

Last month, there was more bad news. Like many community stations, the eccentric but occasionally quite wonderful Rhubarb Radio is feeling the cold winds of recession. The current managerial team is bailing out; an intensive effort is being mounted to build a new and solid structure for the continued existence of the station.

The campaign to shore up Rhubarb Radio is being coordinated, from what I can tell, by some of the current DJs and contributors via a ‘Save Rhubarb Radio’ Facebook page. There have been a few meetings to work out what’s going to happen and things seen to be picking up pace, which is good.

However, from flicking through the FB page, there seems to be a short-term financial hurdle to be overcome. It looks like (put some clear info up somewhere you guys!) they’re need £600 sharpish and are after a few people to chip in £20. There’s a donate button on the Rhubarb Radio website.

There’s also a meeting at the Custard Factory tonight if you want to help out in any way, that’s at 7pm in the Orwell Room.

It’s all there – the story of how the children of those early post-war immigrants came up with a vital new approach to reggae, mixed, matched and mashed up… and invented whole new styles of music along the way.

Here’s part 1 of the Handsworth Evolution documentary:

Handsworth Evolution Part 1 by Radio To Go

Listen to parts 2 & 3 over on Radio to Go.