MINING RADIO GOLD VIA BBC, KCSN.

Byline: Dick Lochte and Tom Nolan Special to the Daily News

In this country, we think of the Golden Age of radio drama as a thing of the past; but in England, thanks to the BBC, it's an ongoing tradition. Insomniacs in the Valley can hear some of ``the Bee's'' current plays over KCSN-FM from midnight to 6 a.m., when that Northridge station carries the BBC's World Service. More conveniently, a growing number of BBC shows are available on audiocassette.

Sherlock Holmes, one of the most enduring literary characters of the century, has been adapted many times for British radio. ``The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes: Volume One'' (BDD Audio, three hours; $16.99) contains four episodes from a 1991 BBC series starring Clive Merrison as Sir Arthur Conan Doyle's detective, with Michael Williams as the redoubtable Dr. Watson. This quartet of cases includes two of the most familiar in the Holmes canon (``The Red-Headed League,'' ``A Scandal in Bohemia''); but an unsentimental interpretation by the cast and its directors (Patrick Rayner, Enyd Williams) makes the stories fresh. The softly stereophonic sound of Holmes' London, from horse-drawn cabs to rattling teacups, is an added treat.

Crisp sound and original music by Christopher Whelan also lend appeal to the BBC's production of William Shakespeare's ``King Lear'' (Modern Library/BBC Audiobook, three hours, $18); the realistic sound effects ``open up'' the classic drama in ways not possible on stage.

But the play's the thing, to quote another Shakespeare character; and this one is splendidly acted by a sterling cast that is headed by Alec Guinness. Sir Alec is quietly brilliant as the proud king brought low by fate and his own blind folly. Guinness' Lear is less raging and more nuanced than other famous actors' interpretations - and much better suited to the intimate medium of radio. John Tydeman capably directs the troupe, which includes Eileen Atkins as daughter Regan and a very recognizable Cyril Cusack as the Earl of Gloucester.

Eartha Kitt is the best-known player in the BBC's 1994 adaptation of Rudyard Kipling's ``The Jungle Book'' (BDD Audio, two hours, 20 minutes; $1.99), which stars Nisha K. Nayer as Mowgli, the human boy raised by wolves. Kitt is delightfully sinuous-voiced as Kaa, the serpent; and Jonathan Hyde adds some amusing growls to the throaty speech of the panther Bagheera. Kipling's 100-year-old tale of the boy-cub Mowgli and his long rivalry with the tiger Shere Khan is still captivating; and director Chris Wallis does a nice job with Michelene Wandor's script.

The pleasures are more refined and mature in E.M. Forster's 1908 novel ``A Room With a View'' (BDD Audio, four hours; $22), as dramatized by David Wade and directed by Glyn Dearman. This radio adaptation of Forster's pointed social comedy (as fully as entertaining as the 1985 hit film) has Cathy Sara as Lucy Honeychurch, the young Englishwoman whose Italian vacation forever alters the conventional course of her life. For a time, though, Lucy seems determined to marry the superficial Cecil Vyse; yet her inherently romantic nature, exemplified by her able playing of Beethoven's piano pieces, rebels against doing the expected. ``If Miss Honeychurch ever takes to live as she plays,'' someone observes, ``it will be very exciting.''

Urging her to do just that are the impulsively honest Emersons: son George, who thinks he'd make a much better match for Lucy than Vyse; and his father, Mr. Emerson, portrayed by John Moffat (who, in a much different voice, is BBC Radio's Hercule Poirot). Forster's affinity for Jane Austen is wonderfully evident in this spirited production, which is nicely framed by pianist Terence Albright's sparkling keyboard work.

From 1952 to 1960, when its members went their separate comedic ways, ``The Goon Show'' was a Friday night listening must for most of Great Britain. With Spike Milligan concocting the bizarre scripts, as hilarious as they were surreal, Peter Sellers appearing as a cast of thousands and Harry Seacomb limning the put-upon protagonist Neddie Seagoon, the Goons delivered a special blend of wackiness and social satire. And, as can be discerned from ``Goon Show Classics: `He's Fallen in the Water!'' (BDD Audio, two hours; $16.99) Milligan, Sellers and Seacomb have exerted a major influence on succeeding comedy groups from Monty Python to the Not Ready for Prime-Time Players.

This sampling of shows includes ``The String Robberies,'' which, when it stays on subject (a rare occurrence), follows the wild and woolly search for the theft of a ``two-edged string.'' In ``The Mountain Eaters,'' the Goons try to consume Mount Snowden. The hapless Seagoon is carted off to South America for a career as a nude piano dancer in ``Trade.'' And in ``The Spon Plague,'' he comes down with the dreaded bare knees disease and must find the cure pronto.

As a final diversion, we tune to the CBC for a couple of Canadian radio plays ``Flynn: Whirlpool'' (Durkin Hayes/Paperback Audio, one hour; $4.99) contains episodes of an original 1994 CBC mystery series written by Lyle and Barbara Brown. The CBC has done some excellent detective shows, notably an outstanding Nero Wolfe series that should be (but as far as we know isn't) commercially available.

Unfortunately, these Flynn capers (one involving maritime drug-smuggling, the other a rare-postage-stamp scam) are the radio trappings that give even this undistinguished effort a certain charm; and it is amusing to encounter the Canadian version of the classic U.S. hard-boiled detective. Flynn, a pale cousin of California tough guys such as Sam Spade and Philip Marlowe, is described as ``that gently reluctant Vancouver private eye.''

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2 Photos

Photo: (1) Eartha Kitt

``The Jungle Book''

(2) Alec Guinness

``King Lear''