Annie Lennox and Iain Glen lend their voices to landscape film

October 28, 2021 | Film & TV

Singer-songwriter Annie Lennox and Game of Thrones actor Iain Glen will narrate BBC Scotland’s Changing Landscapes: A Story of Scotland.

Scheduled for broadcast on Tuesday, November 2, the 60 minute film will tell the story, in music, words and moving images, of the care – and carelessness – humans have brought to bear on Scotland’s landscapes. The film, commissioned as part of BBC Scotland’s COP26 related programming, features archive footage of rural and urban scenes around Scotland stretching back over a century.

Former Eurythmics singer Annie Lennox said:’I’m honoured to take part in this beautiful film offering a unique perspective of Scotland and its ancient landscapes at this crucial point in time, when the sustainability of our precious planet for future generations is being called to question.’

Iain Glen added: ‘I was very happy to be asked to read on Changing Landscapes. It deals with the most pressing issue of our time. How we all can better look after the beautiful planet Earth.’

The main soundtrack for the film comes from the BBC Scottish Symphony Orchestra conducted by Stephen Bell and Geoffrey Patterson.

The orchestra presents old favourites like Hamish MacCunn’s The Land of the Mountain and the Flood. Music from one of Scotland’s youngest composers, Jay Capperauld and one of its oldest, Thea Musgrave also feature as well as renowned folk musicians, Julie Fowlis, Kris Drever and Donald Shaw.

Woven into the fabric of the film is poetry from Scotland’s recently appointed Makar (national poet), Kathleen Jamie, together with poems from previous Makers, Liz Lochhead and Edwin Morgan.

The words of renowned Scottish poets; Robert Burns, Edwin Muir, Magi Gibson and Don Paterson also feature alongside the words of travel writers and journalists who have written at length about the landscapes of Scotland, including Osgood Mackenzie, creator of the famous Inverewe Garden, near Poolewe in Wester Ross, and influential ecologist Fraser Darling, who in a landmark report written in the 1930s, described the Scottish Highlands as ‘a wet desert.’

Changing Landscapes: A Story of Scotland will broadcast on Tuesday, November 2, at 10.35pm on BBC One Scotland with another chance to see on the BBC Scotland channel on Friday 5 November at 8.00pm.