Hong Kong radio host Jonathan Douglas bows out after more than 30 years on the airwaves
He interviewed hundreds of the world’s finest musicians and artists, and now is considering a life of acting and travelling around Europe
The city will lose more than just a broadcaster when Jonathan Douglas goes off air on Monday. The Londoner, who is one of the last remaining British voices on RTHK, will go into retirement after three decades presenting classical music on Radio 4.
“I feel I am in denial,” the softly-spoken Briton says about leaving the station that he joined back in 1986.
Douglas, with a degree in English literature, many years as a stage actor and a piano composer, sees his years in Hong Kong as only his second act, with a third about to begin.
“I want to enrol in acting classes in London and learn to ride a motorbike to explore Europe,” he says.
Having hosted the Morning Call – a popular weekday show – for years, Douglas is used to conducting live interviews with artists.
Of the thousand or more discussions he has had with artists, which helped put Hong Kong on the world map of classical music, he says “98 per cent of them were brilliant”.
From top international artists to budding local musicians, many have shared their thoughts with the local radio personality while Hong Kong, China and the wider world has undergone rapid change.