Mark Knopfler, musician
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BBC Sounds. Music, radio, podcasts. Hello, I'm Lauren Laverne and this is the Desert Island Discs podcast. Every week I ask my guests to choose the eight tracks, book and luxury they'd want to take with them if they were cast away to a desert island. And for rights reasons, the music is shorter than the original broadcast. I hope you enjoy listening. MUSIC PLAYS

My cast away this week is the musician Mark Knopfler. He's shot to fame as the lead singer and guitarist of Dire Straits. His brand of cinematic songwriting and his subtle mastery of his instrument stood apart from the new wave pop and punk of the late 70s and early 80s and made Dire Straits one of the most successful bands in history.

He earned his place in the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, but while he was always happy with the rock and roll, he could take or leave the fame, and he didn't attend the ceremony when he was officially inducted in 2018. After Dire Straits disbanded, his creative adventures continued, as a solo artist, as Buck Dylan's musical director, as the composer of acclaimed film scores, and as producer and collaborator with some of the greatest artists in contemporary music.

He grew up in Newcastle and found his voice as a songwriter when he was a young journalist, capturing the stories of the people he met, whether they were old-timers playing swing in the back room of a pub or delivery men wishing they were stealing a living on MTV instead of moving refrigerators.

He says, once you start becoming a songwriter, the songs start pushing to be born. Mark Knopfler, welcome to Desert Island Discs. Thank you very much. You make that sound very impressive. It certainly is impressive. Mark, I want to start with those creative labours with you, which are still ongoing. How much has that process changed in 50 years or so, writing a song? Well, I tell you, I've still got a junkyard.

of stuff that I can wander into and wonder if I'll find a place, a thing for it. And that hasn't changed. And every time I start recording, it feels like the first time. It's exciting. Yeah, it's exciting. And it's a challenge as well. I like the junkyard metaphor. There's a sort of experimental attitude to that. It's tinkering. I think tinkering is a kind word. It's a good word. And that is a bit what it's like. Um,

It's mysterious too. It took a while before I could call myself a guitarist. It took a while before I described myself as a songwriter. I mean...

A songwriter? I thought there are people who really do this. So it felt too grand? Yes, exactly. Your songs are very often stories and often inspired by real-life moments. I would imagine that having written like that for many years, it makes you a really good listener. You can tell a lot about a person by the way they listen to music, actually. And I asked my mum this, how did I listen when I was little? And you listen to the BBC radio.

Sitting on the carpet just as a baby, listening with mother and children's favorites was a big thing for me. I never missed it. And she said, you used to listen really intently. And I think I did. And that's what switched me on to lyrics as well as the music. I think I loved it all, the whole thing. So I could sing Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer all the way through at 18 months old.

And those lyrics, you know, some of which you've caught snippets of real-life conversations, characters that you've met that have made their way into your songs. Are you the kind of person who carries a notebook and is always ready to write one of those down? Quite often I have to look for a pencil. I was actually in an electrical shop in America, in New York, and there was a guy sounding off about the rock bands that were playing on MTV because all the TVs in the shop were tuned to MTV.

What he was saying was so classic and funny that I had to go and ask for a bit of paper and a pen so that I actually sat down in the kitchen display area in the window and started writing the song there. And that was literally him saying, that's the way you do it, money for nothing and checks for free. That was him. Yeah, he actually said things like, that ain't working and, you know, maybe get a blister on your little finger, you know. It was one of those, you know.

Mark, you're still writing songs and very much enjoying recording. In fact, you released your 10th studio album earlier this year. You've written tonnes of hits, not just for yourself, but for other artists too, and many of them have been chosen here by other castaways on Desert Island Discs. Going Home From Local Hero comes up a lot, and Tina Turner's Private Dancer, that's another one that springs to mind. Do you know when you've written a hit of that magnitude? Do you know in the moment? No, absolutely not. No, I never think about hits that...

If there was a formula, a promise, I'd tell you what it is. I know it must have been very difficult for you to choose the discs that you're bringing us today. Impossible. Just eight. It's a real task to narrow the music that you've loved down, I'm sure. What criteria did you use? I tried to use the innocence of childhood and the innocence of youth and I tried to use the...

just growing into knowing more about it. Well, you've got a lifetime's worth of music to share with us, Mark Knopfler, so let's get started. Disc number one, what are we going to hear first? Well, one of the first artists that I will have heard on the radio would have been Paul Robeson. Old man, you know. And then I heard Ray Charles. Just amazing artistry. And when I heard Ray Charles sing in Old Man River, it really struck me because...

This session was interesting. First of all, it's got the traditional choir singing for about, feels like an hour at the beginning. And then Ray comes in and it's just pure genius and never fails to move me tremendously. He had a cold on that session and he did keep falling asleep while the choir was singing the intro part.

But thank goodness he stayed awake for the take, and it's just magnificent. At Old Man River At Old Man River He must know something

That was Ray Charles and Old Man River. You were absolutely transported by that track, Mark. It never fails. So let's go back to the beginning then, Mark Knopfler. You were born in Glasgow, 1949, to Louisa and Erwin. Now, your dad's surname, Knopfler, that's Hungarian. Tell me a little bit more about him and his story. How did he end up in Glasgow? Well, he was a refugee and he came to England in 39. He was given two quid, I think, by the Red Cross and...

He's a lovely man. I mean, we had a regular childhood, three kids, and he got a job working in the architect's office because he studies in Vienna. And then he managed to get to England and was working in the city architects in Glasgow. And then when he got a job in Newcastle, it was the same thing, to do the same thing for the city architects. And my mum's family were all from Glasgow.

Newcastle, they were all Geordies. So when I was about eight, we moved to Newcastle. So your dad was a city architect. That was very important to him. I know that, you know, for his politics, that he was a municipal architect. Oh, yeah. No, he never, you know, he never wanted to go private. He called them architects. Yeah.

So it was all about the good of the people and the community. Are any of his buildings, any of his designs still standing? Yeah, I think they're still dotted about, yeah. And he was a keen chess player as well? Yeah, he was. He played for Northumberland and he played in the Scottish Championships when he was in Glasgow. He taught me how to play chess, but I wasn't quite the same standard.

And tell me about your mum, Louise. How would you describe her? Mum was from one of those working-class families that wanted to improve. My nana sewed her way through life and brought up all her children that way because she lost her husband just after the First World War and she lost a son in the Second World War. Nana, God bless her, you know, she sewed clothes for the blood transfusion process

professionally, but at night time she would run up dresses for people and try and earn a little bit of money, but that sewing machine never stopped. Let's have some more music, Mark Knopfler. It's your second choice today. What are we going to hear next? Well, when I was little I had an EP by Emile Ford and the Checkmates, and he did Red Sails in the Sunset. Red Sails in the Sunset. But then I didn't realise that it was a standard, so I slowly changed

gradually realized that other people had recorded it too. As soon as I heard Dean Martin, which would be years later, I loved Dino. He has a lovely, relaxed way of...

I think all that drinking thing was a complete spoof, you know. The Rat Pack era. Yeah, I think he probably had some tea in those glasses and I don't think that... Apparently he always knew his lines. And that kind of big band sound, you know, the crooners and all of that, that would have been the music that you were growing up hearing via your parents' generation. Well, I suppose. I mean, I remember my mum singing, singing, singing when I was sitting on the floor.

She must have been happy. Yeah, she was happy and she was singing. Did your mum sing this song? Did she sing Dean Martin? Yeah, she would have definitely sung Red Sails in the Sunset. Red sails in the sunset Out on the sea Carry my love home safely to me She sailed at the dawning All day I've been blue

Dean Martin and Red Sails in the Sunset. So, Mark Knopfler, your family moved to your mum's hometown of Blythe when you were around seven and that brought you nearer to your uncle Kingsley, one of your early musical influences with his boogie-woogie piano. I think he had a banjo too. Did your parents encourage your interest in music, your love of it? Oh yeah, they never stood in the way. I played shockingly bad boogie-woogie piano before.

Taught by my uncle Kingsley in the house. You know, I played it and played it and played it. I don't think it ever improved. I could not believe how patient they must have been because as well, my brother David had a drum kit. Dad always built a garden shed wherever we were. So the drums were in the garden shed just in the little back garden there.

the poor neighbours my poor parents were the boogie woogie and then later on when I got a guitar I'd be stumping on the floor you know they used to say please Mark will you stop stumping on the floor but

But they never stood in the way of it, ever. So, Mark, your playing style is very interesting and it developed in a particular way because you're a left-handed person playing right-handed guitar. So how did you come to play like that in the first place? Well, because my big sister Ruth, and I think big sisters are very important in this world, we had these dodgy little tennis rackets that you could get for not very much money.

Used to use the tennis racket as a guitar. I was playing it. I was pretending it was a guitar. And she turned it round so that I was holding it right-handed. She said, that's the way you play. And what does that bring to your technique? So your stronger hand is forming the notes. What does that let you do? A little bit of flexibility. So if you get a vibrato...

No, I could maybe do it on two or three strings at a time. So a bit more flexibility in that left hand. And what about the finger picking? Where did that come in? Finger picking came from not having an amplifier and

You know, after Dad forked out 50 for the guitar, I didn't have the nerve to ask him for an amp. I realised I needed an amp. I didn't have the nerve. I didn't think it was right, actually. What was it like when you finally got your hands on the guitar? And what was it? What kind? It was like an imitation Strat. It was really an imitation Fender. There were lots of people making them too, trying to sell guitars to all the kids that wanted to be in the beat groups and...

The whole beat group thing was about that. You'd sort out who'd be a guitar player, who'd end up with a bass, and who'd end up on the drums, and who'd end up maybe having a van. I mean, if you had a van, you were in. You can't go anywhere without the van. It's a very important role. I never thought that I would ever make a living at it, or I never cared about that happening. I never thought about that.

be impossible until you know later in the teens on that note mark knopfler disc number three what's gonna be next well it has to be the shads you know it has to be the the shadows i was still in short pants i think and uh they played apache and that was being the first big hit jerry lorden wrote i was totally struck by the sound of hank you know this magic sound

What it is, it's you're playing the guitar, but your left hand's not doing the vibrato. It's coming from the tremolo arm or what Americans call the whammy bar. But the magic of that sound. And Wonderful Land was one of the Jerry Lord and went on to write...

Wonderful Land after Apache. I actually got to meet Jerry Lord just after the Straits got successful. It was a wonderful thing to do. But Wonderful Land just filled me with joy, just the sound of it. I'd be in school twanging away, you know, singing the tune. And I remember one of the teachers coming and saying, no, you stop making that metallic sound in the back of your throat, boy.

You should call us boy then. But Wonderful Land just seemed to me to sum up the promise of the time. The word is promise to me. It just promised everything. The optimism, the excitement. Yeah. And a real live whammy bar. Let's go. MUSIC

The shadows and wonderful land, Mark Knopfler. Now, interestingly, you went to grammar school in Gosforth and I think your former headmaster wrote that you'd always gone your own way. What did he mean by that? I would be one of the people that he'd want to talk to about the length of their hair after assembly or something, you know, or

But I don't think that there's anything that the education system could do about people like us. And we were forming big groups and we were in bands and that's all that we would have cared about. And I just always felt I was too young for it, just always slightly too young.

I was just always behind, you know, the Beatles and the Stones and all of that and the Kinks, you know. They were away and going and I was still stuck at this school, you know, and in a different system as it seemed. Yeah.

so I couldn't wait to get going and get out of it. But it took a while, but in a way I'm glad it happened the way it did. So after school, Mark, as much as you were harbouring all of these dreams of making music, you did get a proper job. You were an apprentice on the local paper and then you got a job on the Yorkshire Evening Post. Why did you choose journalism? It was a different kind of a job. It was something else, a bit of excitement maybe. What were you covering? What kind of stories? The first job I got was on the Yorkshire Evening Post.

It was under 10 quid a week. And you're a junior, you're a cub reporter with the accent on cub. And I didn't know anything. But I tell you what, I think it grew me up quite a lot. The good thing about that is that it does give you a clue. You've got to get yourself organised. I think in some ways the songs got accelerated that way. So they started growing out of the characters that you met? Yeah. For instance, I was sent to...

interview the cast of this pantomime you know the theater in leeds and and i'd find myself talking to where the oldest ugly sisters in variety you know and that would and anyway i saw those lines in my notebook you know years late and because started to think well maybe this could be a song and that became a song as i said i'm very slow so years later i wrote this song and years after that

It got on an album, actually got on the Sailing to Philadelphia album. The song was called One More Matinee. And I started to call them portrait songs. There's a language that belongs to songs. And you realize, you know, I wouldn't be very good at writing a note for the milkman. I wouldn't. Honest, I'm serious. I wouldn't be very good at that. But songs have their own language. It's not the same as poetry either.

And I just seemed to be happy in the songs. That's where I felt as though I could survive because I became more critical of that kind of writing and kind of feeling more comfortable in songs. Speaking of songs, it's time to hear another one, if you wouldn't mind. Your fourth choice today, Mark Knopfler. What's it going to be? Mississippi Fred McDowell, Write Me a Few Lines.

I was already mad about the blues, you know, and so I became a blues nut. And when I was at Journalist College, actually, doing my one year's training there down in Harlow, Essex, I used to go to a blues club every week without fail. It was in Bishop Stortford in a loft. And I saw a lot of the blues bands. And also when I was at the paper, I used to go to all the gigs at Leeds University and at the Poly. A week would never go by when I wasn't at a gig.

I realized there was a whole world of acoustic blues music and a country blues music that was before all that, you know. And I got to know this lovely guy in Leeds called Steve Phillips. And he had a National Steel guitar and he was a proper blues singer. And, of course, Steve had a record collection.

a lot of the great country blues artists as well. So did he introduce you to Mississippi Fred McDowell? Yeah, I would have heard Mississippi Fred. And I always loved him from the minute I heard him. I think he used a finger pick and sometimes he used a bottleneck on one of his fingers. And I'd take into that like a duck to water anyway. I was playing, it's called slide guitar and I was doing that anyway.

I sort of realised that it was all part of a magnificent patchwork of music. MUSIC PLAYS

Mississippi Fred McDowell and Write Me A Few Lines. He's a terrific rhythmic player, wasn't he? That's just... You can see the boots on the floor.

All right, Mark Knopfler, you went on to complete an English degree at Leeds University and then you moved to Essex with your guitar and you got a job as an English lecturer. You also joined a band called Brewers Droop. Pop rock, I think, is the genre at that point, it's safe to say. How much did you enjoy teaching back then? Oh, I liked it and it gave me, I could afford then, I bought a motorcycle and...

And then I managed to buy a car that enabled me to put the guitar on the amp that I've got, you know, in the back.

go down and start Dire Straits in Deptford. So you moved into a new flat and started the band with flatmates, actually. You were living in Deptford with your brother Dave and John Ilsey as well, I think. So the three of you formed Dire Straits. Now, again, it's interesting because, you know, you said earlier that you felt a little bit too young while The Beatles and The Stones were taking off. But by this point, like 1977, summer of 77, it's the height of punk. So, you know, I think the Sex Pistols are in Highbury making the album Never Mind The Bollocks.

And you guys are creating Dire Straits. You're working on what become these legendary demos. And it's safe to say that, you know, the sound you were creating, this world that you were occupying was very much outside the zeitgeist. Yeah, well, I was 27 and I was into all this music and I'd been through all this music and influenced by all this other music. And if I'd been 17, I wouldn't have survived.

You know, I've seen a lot of that. In what way? What would have been too early? Yeah, I mean, I just don't think it's a good thing for children to be idolised, particularly. So you had the advantage of knowing who you were as a person. But I wonder about that, what it felt like making music that must have sounded and felt so different from what was fashionable at the time. Yeah, funnily enough, we'd go and play in a cellar in London or wherever. And...

The next time we'd go, there'd be more people in and you'd be queuing down the stairs and the next time they'd be queuing around the corner. So it was resonating with people from the get-go when we started playing. So we managed to hang on in there and then we went on a tour with Talking Heads in a minibus. Very early days. What was that like? Very early days and that was...

That was great. We used to get encores, you know, and things like that back then. So you were doing something that was kind of against the grain, very different, but it was embraced at home. I mean, obviously every British band that starts to get a certain level of success is then set the challenge of breaking America. Was that in your sights, having grown up as such a, you know, like you said, this junkie for American music right from the beginning? Well, we were hits in Europe first before England. England was the last place.

And when we did hit in England, it was massive. Your first single, Sultans of Swing, reached the top ten in both the States and here in the UK. Where did the idea for that song come from? It was one of those situations like Money for Nothing. You're in a room and suddenly you realise that the bits of the song are possibly in place. Sultans of Swing was in Deptford and in Greenwich there was a little pub

that I'd never been in. And it was just a grubby midweek night and it was pretty wet outside and there was a bunch of guys that looked like geography teachers, I mean, playing...

Dixieland jazz, which wasn't my favourite kind of thing anyway. And at the end of the set, one of them, who must have been the leader, he said, well, thank you very much, you know, good night. We are the Sultans of the Swing. And I just laughed, you know what I mean? You'd never see... They did not look like the Sultans of the Swing. They did not look like Sultans of anything. And so, again, it's that kind of thing that just...

gives you the bones of an idea to write about it because it really couldn't have been less glamorous. I was in the studio to do the first album and I said, this might be just another record to you, but it's not to me. And that's how I forget. It's easy to forget how important it was to me just to get something out there and get those songs born.

Mark, I'd love to hear your next track. What have you chosen for us? I've just chosen an unusual one by Bob Dylan just because, you know, I've been a Bob Dylan fan all my life since his first album. And again, Big Sisters are important because Ruth will have brought Bob's first album into the house. I think God knows how many records Bob's made.

over the years, but it's a thing called Duquesne Whistle and it's just, to me, it's totally original. It sums up, it's a beautiful little piece of American life, you know, the whole panorama of it, the whole richness of it. You've collaborated a lot over the years. What do you like to work with?

It would vary from song to song just because all songs are different and so you never know what you'll be involved with with a song because they're all so different. Listen to that Duquesne whistle blowin' Blowin' like it's gonna sweep my world away I'm gonna stop and carve a dam and keep on goin' That Duquesne train gonna ride me night and day You say I'm a gambler

Bob Dylan and Duquesne Whistle. So Mark, the band was doing well, but in 1985, that was when things really went stratospheric for Dire Straits. The album Brothers in Arms exploded and it remains one of the best-selling albums of all time. 30 million copies. And it's a great album.

And it's mega success. Part of it, you say, was down to technology was on your side. It was the development of a new format. The CD was coming in. MTV was obviously a huge deal, you know, especially in the States. And Dire Straits were kind of perfectly poised to take advantage of both those things. Yeah, it was almost like critical mass. And it was a lot of luck involved because the record company was,

Phillips of Polygram or Phonogram or the Polyglots or whatever you want to call them, they had invented the CD. And so they brought it out in Europe. And I think that coincided with the Brothers in Arms record. And also, we'd had some hit singles in America. And I really think that just combined. So we'd had, I think, so far away and we'd had

walk of life and we'd had Money for Nothing. And there was also a lot of people wanted to see the band play live.

It all just came together at the same time. Yeah, you were putting the hours in. I mean, you took on a huge tour to promote that album. I think you did 234 shows in 12 months. Are you going to want to do it? How did that lifestyle suit you of touring and travel? Oh, it suited me down to the ground. And you've got to want it means you've got to want all of it, you know. And my favourite...

Bits are rehearsing and favourite bits are writing, my favourite bits are performing. So I was one of the lucky people who liked the whole cycle. If you don't want to do it, then you can go home. I remember once we were hiring some roadies and one guy said, oh, I've got to be able to watch Wimbledon. How did that go down? Did he get the job? No.

Two and a half million people came to see you on that tour. How was that, playing to enormous crowds night after night, being part of this huge machine? Because it kind of grows up around you along with your success, I'm imagining. But it's what you always wanted, isn't it? Yeah. It's what you wanted, isn't it? How does that feel? It's great. I had a great time with Dire Straits. I loved it. And still, I mean, I was talking to John yesterday and I've got lots and lots of good memories of it. How can you describe it? It's not a normal...

It's not a normal existence, but it's what you always wanted. That's the only thing I can say. If you wanted this, I think the byproduct of the success is there's a fame thing. It's almost like exhausting an engine. I mean, you know, I couldn't see much point in all of that. I mean, I love the success because the success enabled me to build a studio.

And the success enabled me to buy instruments that I wanted and amps that I wanted and stuff like that. You were working with your heroes, playing to fans, but the fame you didn't like. No, I could never see the point of that. And I still, you know, don't... If you can think of something good about it, then tell me what it is. The only thing that enabled me to survive was the fact that I wasn't a teenager anymore.

I think if I'd been 17 or 18, I wouldn't have survived it. You call time on Dire Straits in 1995. The band had already been on sabbatical for a few years by that point. Why was it the right time? Well, I think it just got too big and we were exhausted. You know, I was exhausted too. I mean, I think the last tour that we planned, it had what they call leapfrogging stages where...

You're doing a big stage somewhere, big gig somewhere. And incidentally, even that, that the gig becomes an event. So it's a different thing, slightly. Because it's like a mini city with all these people and catering and all that kind of thing? Yeah, and you have another stage being set up somewhere else. And I think sometimes there's three stages. I'm not quite sure how all that works, but...

It's an incredible industry when you think about it. You're in a different place every night. You develop a thing with a crew. You're like a little family circus. And you sit with the truck drivers because you know them. They're part of the company, you know. But once you start doing bigger stuff, gigantic stuff, you don't know the crew. You don't know all of them.

And I didn't like that. I didn't like that feeling. I quite enjoyed the little family circus thing. Yeah. You're like show folk almost. Back to the Ugly Sisters again. Yeah. Exactly. But you missed being able to see the white of the audience's eyes by the sound of it. Yes, that's right. It's slightly different. The intimacy is...

And I always enjoyed playing in round places for some reason. All right, let's have some more music, Mark Knopfler. Your sixth choice today. What have you gone for and why are you taking it with you to your island? It's Ennio Morricone's Deborah's Theme from Once Upon a Time in America. Morricone is a genius. And I actually met him in Italy and we had a cup of coffee together at the time.

It's a wonderful piece of music. To me, it's just inspiring. And it's one of those pieces of music that I feel as though I need to hear it every so often. What was it like having a cup of coffee with Ennio Morricone? Please tell me you were in a sunny piazza with the smell of lemons in the air. Exactly that. You have to be in Italy to have a cup of coffee with Morricone. And you know, another thing is that you'll know it'll be good coffee. It was lovely to meet him.

♪

Deborah's Theme by Ennio Morricone from the film soundtrack to Once Upon a Time in America. Mark, one of the things that you've invested some money in is your recording studio, British Grove. It's home not only to your solo recordings but very much a destination for other musicians and people talk about it in these hushed, reverent tones once they've been. Tell me about it. What treasures does it contain? Not a lot. I mean, I just wanted to be able to do things in there that I found that I couldn't do

in other studios when I was going round the world to record and I would be going to America to record. The desk is pretty special by the sounds of it. Yeah, there's a desk. The big desk in the big studio is probably Analog's last great shout. And I've got a couple of early EMI desks as well, which are just lovely things. And it's funky junk, a lot of it. But I love that as part of the romance. Like you say, it's the story that makes it. The important thing is that it gets used regularly.

I've still got a guy who began at EMI as a junior back in the days when the staff used to have to wear white coats to operate the machinery. And this chap who still works at British Grove, you know, and...

he was the first kid to refuse to wear a white coat to operate the tape machine. But I think it's important to keep the tape stuff going if you want to use, if you want to record with tape.

You can do digital editing in there, of course, you know, and it's got the latest and greatest digital stuff. But I like the good stuff to try to work in tandem with the best old stuff working with the best new stuff. Your studio was the venue for a new version of Going Home not too long ago. That came out earlier this year. And the cast list is a real who's who of rock and roll guitarists, Bruce Springsteen, Pete Townsend, Nile Rodgers, capturing the final performance of the great Jeff Beck.

What was it like working on that song? Oh, well, it was just marvellous. And the quality of the contributions were... It was incredible. The first day... And this was for Teenage Cancer, I should say, the Teenage Cancer Trust. Pete Townsend comes in with a guitar and an amp the first day and you can hear Pete's chords ringing through the studio on the first. And, you know, when Pete plays a chord, boy...

It just went on from there. I mean, Eric Clapton came in the next day and he did some beautiful playing. And then shortly after that was Jeff Beck, was Dave Gilmour. But the Jeff Beck stuff came from Jeff's studio himself. And it was so magnificent. It made me quite emotional. And Guy, too. That's Guy Fletcher, the musician and producer. Because he really was on some...

magical level with the guitar. And it just went on like that. I'd come in and poor Guy would be trying to deal with too much music. I mean, there would be Bruce Springsteen would have sent a piece from the States or, you know, Joe Bonamassa or whoever it would be. And so it was only really due to Guy's brilliance at editing and that he put it together. It seemed as though it would never start happening. I mean, Hank...

sent a piece from Australia that was just lovely and it's great to hear him playing that tune again and you name it, they were on it. Mark, I've thought of a good thing about fame. Do you want to hear what it is? Go on. Sometimes you get to have a dinosaur named after you. Well, yes, there is that, but that was just, again, that was just luck again because when they were playing the records...

On the digs, they found stuff. So this is the archaeologist. Yeah. On site, on Madagascar, listening to Dire Straits, OBS, and they unearthed the Masiarchosaurus not flurry. What did you make of this little fella? He's about the size of a dog. It's something, isn't it? It's like when some astronauts came in and told me that they'd been playing the stuff up in space.

This must be, God, 30, 40 years ago. I can't remember. But that was an amazing, amazing thing. Just stuff like that, stuff that happens like that. Well, maybe it does have its perks. Yeah, you don't realise what it is that you're getting into. It's the same before you know it, you've got your own dinosaur. Quite an unusual looking little fella, the dino. I must put him up somewhere.

Listen, Mark, it's time for your seventh choice of music today. And this is another hero of yours and also someone you've collaborated with many times. Yeah, again, Van Morrison's somebody. I've been playing Van records every place I've ever lived since I was a teenager anyway. And the only reason I'm playing this is, you know, in telling you these circular moments is when I'm on the studio floor and I've got the guitar in my hand

And Van Morrison is in the vocal booth and you're hearing Van's voice and you're playing the lick. I mean, this is before they put the lead guitar on it and I was just playing this lick along to the music, you know, and I had sort of came up with the lick for the song. And what I like about it is it's about Van's life, you know, Van's talking about his life.

his early days when he's cleaning windows, and that's the song, Cleaning Windows, and it's a great song, and it's fantastic to be part of it, and to hear Van's voice coming through your headphones, that's quite a thing, and it brings, you know, it's another one of those, what you'd call a circular moment, circular moment. In a down joint

Number 36.

Van Morrison, cleaning windows. So, Mark Knopfler, earlier this year, Christie's Auction House sold off an array of your guitar collection with a quarter of the proceeds going to charities. The collection raised almost £9 million, but I know it was painful for you to see some of those instruments go. I think you described it at the time as a happy pain. Yeah.

Which ones hurt the most? Well, it was much more happy than pain, I can tell you. No, it's always great because I give guitars to whoever I'm playing with, you know, on tour and recording with. You always say, I hope there's a song in this for you. And that's what it is. And I had a lot of guitars would be just be gathering dust. So it's nice to think of them going to happy homes.

It's almost time to cast you away, Mark Knopfler. The next chapter in your story is the desert island. How will you manage in isolation, do you think? Pretty badly. I'm happy in a cafe with a mate, so...

There'd be no calves and no mates, so I don't think I'd do very well. What will you miss the most about your everyday life? I think just the banter and I think the humour that you have to have in music is very important. You couldn't survive without it. So I think that's what I'd miss.

You know, when I'm touring, very often you'll see us walking on stage and we'll still be getting over the last joke that somebody's told.

and you couldn't survive without it. So I think that's what I'd miss most, would be the humour. So you said that there's three parts to the job, essentially, of being a musician. You write, you record and you tour. And you also said that touring is always the first thing to go as artists get older. You're 74 now. Do you want to keep playing? Do you see an end to...? I do see an end to touring, yeah. I think that would be the... Just because with the studio...

I've got to be in there. You know, I haven't had a bad day in there. And I want to, I think, be able to record in there a bit more than I have done. So that would be, I think the touring is the sensible thing to go first. And also Kitty's been so patient. This is your wife, Kitty? Yeah, and she's incredible because she's never made me do anything. She's never, never...

stop me doing what I want to do and it's time to, I think it's just time to have a little break from the road maybe. Well, you've got some time on your island first. What sort of place are you imagining that you'll be cast away on? You've toured the world. I mean, you must have seen a few islands in your time, Mark. I think it would have to be quite

Quite a warm place because I like, you know, I do like that. How will you cope with making a shelter, looking after yourself, the practicalities of life? I think I'll use every version of every memory from every desert island thing I've ever read or seen on the books. But I don't think I'd be much cop.

Not practical? No, I don't think so at all. I don't think I'm terribly practical at all. And I'd be the one furiously waving, you know, from the highest point on the island if a ship was sailing past.

Try Desperate for Rescue. Yeah. You'd have your discs to keep you company, though, and you've got one more to share with us before we send you away. What's it going to be, your final choice? Well, yes, I know. I realised when I was picking these things, I should have really had 500 other ones, but I love Bobby Gentry, you know, and like everybody else, I, you know, I love Ode to Billy Joe. That's the one that everybody loves and everybody knows. So I thought I'd just play...

or suggest one that nobody seems to know, or lots of people. I always say, do you know this song, Jessie Elizabeth? I think it's a great song, and there's something very tender about it, but there's a little thing that's sort of got that gothic southern thing that...

Bobby Gentry seems to get into what she does. This is like a mother-daughter thing, isn't it? You know, where she's whispering to her daughter who's asleep. It's a very tender thing, but there's something else, just like there always is something else. A darkness under the surface. Yeah, there is something else there, and that's the depth, I think, of Bobby Gentry. Pray tell, Jess Elizabeth

me why are we pray tell jessie elizabeth when you should be sleeping what secret are you keeping jessie elizabeth

Bobby Gentry and Jessie Elizabeth. So, Mark, the time's come. I'm going to cast you away to the island. I will, of course, as well as your discs, give you the books, the Bible and the complete works of Shakespeare. You can also take another book of your choice. What would you like?

I think I'd like to take a slim volume because, you know, I'll be so busy reading all the Shakespeare. Penelope Fitzgerald, she wrote a little book called The Blue Flower and it's about Germany at the end of the, you know, the 18th century. So it's the romantic period. It's a different Europe. It's a whole, you're transported into this whole other Saxony and Europe.

You're in this world. Well, you can enjoy that under your palm tree. You can also have a luxury item. What do you fancy? Well, my luxury item from heaven would be one of my favourite guitars and a lovely thing it is. And finally, which one track of the eight that you shared with us today would you rush to save from the waves first, Mark? I think it would have to be Bob, just because, you know, because I've been...

Just a Bob fan all my life and I would just like to have that to hand. I think it would be the Bob Dylan track. Mark Knopfler, thank you very much for letting us hear your Desert Island Discs. Thank you very much for having me. Hello. It was lovely to chat to Mark and I hope he's very happy on his island, jamming away with his guitar.

There are more than 2,000 programmes in our archive that you can listen to. We've cast many other musicians away, including Bono, Noel Gallagher, Adele and David Gilmour. You can hear their programmes if you search through BBC Sounds or on our own Desert Island Discs website. The studio manager for today's programme was Jackie Marjoram, the production coordinator was Susie Roylands and the producer was Sarah Taylor. Join me next time when my guest will be the writer and creator of Peaky Blinders, Stephen Knight.

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