John Muir

John Muir, (1937-2017), sometimes known as John F Muir worked at the BBC from 1961 to 1974 and was a radio producer from 1966 until he left the Corporation. He began his career producing a variety of programmes for the Light Programme and Home Service, but when the BBC reorganises its radio networks in 1967 he became a regular producer of the late-night programme Night Ride. Later he produced jazz programmes for Radio 3 and Sounds of the Seventies shows for Radio 1.

Links to Peel
John Muir has been credited with coming up with the idea which developed into John Peel's Night Ride. As Ken Garner relates in The Peel Sessions (pp. 49-50), Muir was working for the BBC's Recorded Programmes Department, or Service (RPS), later known as Archive Features. This was the source of the "Archive Things" - non-needletime recordings of exotic music - which became a regular feature of the show. Muir's idea was to combine these recordings with poetry and music, and when, in late 1967, he heard from Peel's manager Clive Selwood that the DJ's future at the BBC was uncertain, offered Peel the chance to make a pilot show. After a delay, the project was approved by management and Peel began his Night Ride series on 6 March 1968, with Muir producing.

Although there were other producers of Peel's Night Ride shows, Muir continued to be associated with the series until the "son of Night Ride" shows which ran from April to September 1969. By then, Muir was working as a staff producer. He was later responsible for Sounds of the Seventies shows by DJs other than Peel, and also for the Sequence series, which featured continuous music with no interruptions from DJs. But Muir's interest in non-Western music which had inspired his original Night Ride concept remained with him, and his post-BBC career was influenced by his deep involvement with Indian music and culture.