SATURDAY 23 NOVEMBER 2013

SAT 00:00 Britten 100 (b03j46zt)
Britten by Night

Nocturnal

The night - what it both reveals and covers up - is a theme which runs throughout Britten's composing career. The first of two unpresented late night, hour-long music sequences delving into Britten's preoccupation with the nocturnal, supernatural and creepy. Including a performance of Britten's Nocturnal by Radio 3 New Generation Artist, guitarist Sean Shibe.


SAT 01:00 Through the Night (b03hmp6w)
Concertgebouw Archives

Episode 1

Concertgebouw Archives. Riccardo Chailly conducts Hindemith's Metamorphosis of Themes by Weber, and Sir Georg Solti conducts Shostakovich's 1st Symphony. With John Shea.

1:01 AM
Hindemith, Paul [1895-1963]
Symphonic Metamorphosis of Themes by Carl Maria von Weber
Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra, Riccardo Chailly (conductor)

1:23 AM
Shostakovich, Dmitri [1906-1975]
Symphony no.1 in F minor Op.10
Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra, Sir Georg Solti (conductor)

1:52 AM
Beethoven, Ludwig van (1770-1827)
Trio for piano and strings (Op. 1'1) in E flat major
Grieg Trio

2:23 AM
Dvorák, Antonín (1841-1904)
Symphony No.8 in G major (Op.88)
Norwegian Radio Orchestra, Berhard Gueller (conductor)

3:01 AM
Kilar, Wojciech (b. 1932)
Chorale Prelude (1988)
Polish Radio Symphony Orchestra, Wojciech Rajski (conductor)

3:19 AM
Beethoven, Ludwig van (1770-1827)
Symphony No.7 in A major (Op.92)
Norwegian Radio Orchestra, Giordano Bellincampi (conductor)

3:56 AM
Szymanowski, Karol (1882-1937)
Variations on a Polish Folk theme in B minor (Op.10)
Jerzy Godziszewski (piano)

4:16 AM
Trad. Hungarian
18th Century Dances
Csaba Nagy (solo recorder), Camerata Hungarica, László Czidra (conductor)

4:22 AM
Spohr, Louis (1784-1859)
Fantasia in C minor (Op.53)
Mojca Zlobko (harp)

4:31 AM
Moniuszko, Stanislaw (1819-1872)
Overture to Halka (Original version)
Polish Radio Symphony Orchestra, Lukasz Borowicz (conductor)

4:40 AM
Schubert, Franz (1797-1828)
Eight Ländler (German dances) (from D.790)
Leif Ove Andsnes piano

4:48 AM
Moszkowski, Moritz (1854-1924)
Guitarre
Jan-Erik Gustafsson (cello), Heini Kärkkäinen (piano)

4:52 AM
Telemann, Georg Philipp (1681-1767)
Concerto for trumpet and orchestra in D major
Friedemann Immer (trumpet), Musica Antiqua Köln, Reinhard Goebel (director)

5:01 AM
Sibelius, Jean (1865-1957)
Suite Champêtre (Op.98b)
Danish Radio Concert Orchestra, Hannu Koivula (conductor)

5:08 AM
Wassenaer, Unico Wilhelm van (1692-1766)
Concerto No.5 in F minor (from Sei Concerti Armonici 1740)
Combattimento Consort Amsterdam, Jan Willem de Vriend (conductor)

5:19 AM
Debussy, Claude (1862-1918)
La plus que lente (1910)
Roger Woodward (piano)

5:24 AM
Delius, Frederick (1862-1934) ed. Eric Fenby
La Calinda - concert version for orchestra from 'Koanga'
BBC Concert Orchestra, Stephen Cleobury (conductor)

5:28 AM
Bree, Johannes Bernardus van (1801-1857)
Allegro for 4 string quartets in D minor (1845)
Viotta Ensemble, Viktor Liberman (conductor)

5:40 AM
Grainger, Percy (1882-1961)
Danish Folk-Music Suite
Claire Clements (piano), Melbourne Symphony Orchestra, Geoffrey Simon (conductor)

5:59 AM
Haydn, Joseph (1732-1809)
Quartet for Strings (Op.74'3) in G minor "Rider"
Ebene Quartet (string quartet)

6:21 AM
Strauss, Richard (1864-1949) arr anon
Rosenkavalier - suite arr. anon
Sydney Symphony Orchestra, Stuart Challender (conductor)

6:45 AM
Dvorák, Antonín (1841-1904)
Scherzo Capriccioso (Op.66)
Orchestre du Conservatoire de Musique du Québec, Raffi Armenian (conductor).


SAT 07:00 Breakfast (b03j99mf)
Saturday - Martin Handley

Martin Handley presents Radio 3's classical breakfast show. As part of Britten 100, Martin catches up with Tom Service live in Aldeburgh. Also, featuring works by Penderecki, Elgar, Rimsky-Korsakov and Monteverdi.

Email 3Breakfast@bbc.co.uk or text 83111 with your music requests and Musical Map suggestions.


SAT 09:00 CD Review (b03j99mh)
CD Review

Live from Snape Maltings, Andrew McGregor and John Bridcut pick some of the plums from a bumper year for recordings of Britten's music. And on a day themed 'Festival of Britten', they look at the recorded legacy of the Aldeburgh Festival, including some highlights from Britten's own performances.

britten@bbc.co.uk
#britten100.


SAT 11:00 Radio 3 Live in Concert (b03j99mk)
Family Concert

Live from Snape Maltings, Suzy Klein presents a fun concert for children of all ages. It includes Britten's virtuoso introduction to the family of orchestral instruments, 'The Young Person's Guide to the Orchestra' (with CBBC's Johny Pitts as narrator) and 'Soirées Musicales', his sparkling arrangement of Rossini tunes. The boy from Lowestoft who became one of the greatest of English composers would surely have relished the three specially commissioned choruses by young composers sung by local schools' choirs. And the concert begins with his last ever piece, the jolly 'Welcome Ode', also written for Suffolk schoolchildren.

Britten: Welcome Ode
Britten: Soirées Musicales
Luke Fitzgerald: A Wish
Jay Richardson: And Death Shall Have No Dominion
Anna Meredith: My Car
Britten: The Young Person's Guide to the Orchestra

Choirs of: County Upper School Bury St Edmunds, Ipswich School, Woodbridge School
Julian Jarvis, Andrew Leach, Claire Weston (conductors)
Johny Pitts (narrator)
BBC Symphony Orchestra
Andrew Gourlay (conductor).


SAT 12:15 Music Feature (b03j99mm)
Singing for Britten

Benjamin Britten was notoriously particular about the professional musicians he worked with (a close-knit circle of friends) and he had famously high musical standards. Yet all his life he embraced working with amateurs and children. John Bridcut tracks down amateur singers from Suffolk and beyond to share their experiences of singing for Britten - and to discover why it was so special.

John Bridcut sang for Britten as a student in 1971, on the recording of Elgar's Dream of Gerontius. It's an experience he will never forget:

'How I wish I could remember every moment of those recording sessions. But at the time I was far too busy getting the notes right. What has stayed with me is Britten's crystal-clear beat, and his nervous intensity. He demanded the most of you. When he first appeared, he greeted our chorus master with a kiss on both cheeks - that sort of thing was quite rare in those days - and the whole of the London Symphony Chorus cheered!'

John returns to Suffolk, to Britten's Snape Maltings, to swap memories with two fellow singers from that summer more than forty years ago. He also talks to long-standing members of Britten's 'house choir', the Aldeburgh Festival Singers; Suffolk children who sang for Britten in the 1940s and 1950s; and two retired doctors who've not seen each other since they sang on Britten's celebrated recording of his War Requiem as schoolboys.

Britten worked with amateur singers right to the end of his career. John Bridcut asks what he drew from them, and why working with amateurs was so central to his vision of music being 'useful, and to the living'.

Producers: Jane Greenwood and Elizabeth Burke

First broadcast November 2013.


SAT 13:00 Britten 100 (b03j99mp)
Festival of Britten

1970s

Britten, at once performer, composer and planner, was still the creative force behind the Aldeburgh Festival of the 1970s, despite his failing health. Andrew McGregor talks to Jenni Wake-Walker, Aldeburgh Festival Concerts Administrator at the time and Festival regular, countertenor James Bowman, about the special atmosphere of the Festival of those years.

Purcell: Symphony (The Fairy Queen, Part IV: Epithalamium)
English Chamber Orchestra
Benjamin Britten (conductor)

Purcell / Britten: Sweeter than roses
James Bowman (countertenor)
Benjamin Britten (piano)

Wolf: An eine Äolsharfe (Mörike Lieder)
Peter Pears (tenor)
Benjamin Britten (piano)

arr. Britten: The Salley Gardens
Peter Pears (tenor)
Benjamin Britten (piano)

Britten: Canticle V 'The Death of Saint Narcissus'
Peter Pears (tenor)
Osian Ellis (harp)

Rossini: La regata veneziana (Soireés musicales)
Heather Harper (soprano) and Janet Baker (mezzo)
Benjamin Britten (piano)

Schumann: Overture (Scenes from Goethe's Faust)
English Chamber Orchestra
Benjamin Britten (conductor).


SAT 14:00 Britten 100 (b03j99mr)
Britten's Church Parables

Curlew River

On the face of it, Britten's Three Church Parables, composed in the 60s with their fusion of east and west, might be a sorry attempt to jump on a trendy bandwagon. But they are a triptych of beguiling one-act operas whose individual sound worlds are uniquely Britten's.

Curlew River, the first Parable, takes elements of traditional Japanese theatre and court music which so impressed Britten on his 1956 world tour and transplants them to East Anglia to tell the story of a woman driven mad by the loss of her child. The Madwoman, as with each principal tenor role in the Parables, was written for Peter Pears and here is sung by James Gilchrist.

Rarely presented as a group of three, these critically acclaimed performances were recorded at the 2013 Aldeburgh Festival in Orford Church, the place for which they were originally written.
Presented by Louise Fryer.

Britten: Curlew River
The Madwoman .... James Gilchrist (tenor)
The Abbot .... Lukas Jakobski (bass baritone)
The Ferryman .... Rodney Earl Clarke (baritone)
Mahogany Opera
Roger Vignoles (music director)
Frederic Wake-Walker (director)

The Burning Fiery Furnace is tomorrow at 2.00 pm.


SAT 15:30 Words and Music (b03j9d8h)
Words and Music: Britten's Poets

Benjamin Britten's settings of poetry have earned him comparisons with Schubert. He spoke of his desire to 'restore to the musical setting of the English language a brilliance, freedom and vitality' and this he did through the poets he loved, from John Donne and Henry Vaughan to Rimbaud and W.H Auden. In this special edition of Words and Music Alex Jennings and Diana Quick read a selection of verse by the poets who captivated Britten, alongside recordings of some of his best-loved settings, including the Canticles, Les Illuminations and the War Requiem.

Both readers have an association with Britten: Alex Jennings played the composer in Alan Bennett's play The Habit of Art about a fictional meeting between Auden and Britten.

Diana Quick has a home on the Suffolk Coast and has been involved in Britten centenary celebrations.


SAT 16:15 Britten 100 (b03j99mt)
Festival of Britten

English Chamber Orchestra

Continuing Radio 3's residency in Suffolk. The English Chamber Orchestra was Britten's 'house orchestra' at the Aldeburgh Festival. From shortly after its founding in 1960 until his death in 1976, Britten conducted it in a wide range of repertoire, performed chamber music with its principal players, and entrusted it with important premieres of both his and others' music.
Live from Snape Maltings Suzy Klein discusses the ECO's role as Britten's orchestra of choice with its manager at the time, Ursula Jones and its former cellist Anita Lasker-Wallfisch .

Bridge: Sir Roger de Coverley
English Chamber Orchestra
Benjamin Britten (conductor)

Britten: Act II (excerpt) (A Midsummer Night's Dream)
Oberon ..... Alfred Deller (countertenor)
Tytania ..... Elizabeth Harewood (soprano)
London Symphony Orchestra
Benjamin Britten (conductor)

Debussy: Prélude à l'après midi d'un faune
English Chamber Orchestra
Benjamin Britten (conductor)

Britten: Passacaglia (Cello Symphony)
Mstislav Rostropovich (cello)
English Chamber Orchestra
Benjamin Britten (conductor)

Britten: Overture 'The Building of the House'
Chorus of East Anglian Choirs
English Chamber Orchestra
Benjamin Britten (conductor)

Mozart: Rondo (Piano Concerto No 22 in E flat, K 482)
Sviatoslav Richter (piano)
English Chamber Orchestra
Benjamin Britten (conductor)

Schubert: Der Hirt aus dem Felsen
Heather Harper (soprano)
Thea King (clarinet)
Benjamin Britten (piano)

Shostakovich: Lorelei (Symphony No 14, Op 135)
Galina Vishnevskaya (soprano)
Mark Rezhetin (bass)
English Chamber Orchestra
Benjamin Britten (conductor)

Mendelssohn: Overture 'The Hebrides' Op 26
English Chamber Orchestra
Benjamin Britten (conductor).


SAT 17:55 Britten 100 (b03j9d8k)
Saint Nicolas

Britten's cantata Saint Nicolas, at once theatrical and solemn, humorous and quirky, was premiered in the opening concert of the first Aldeburgh Festival in 1948. As on that occasion, this live performance comes from Aldeburgh Parish Church. With its mainly amateur forces, including the community itself in the shape of the audience, it set a pattern that established the values at the heart of Britten's artistic credo: 'I want my music to be of use to people, to please them, to enhance their lives.' Introduced by Sean Rafferty in conversation with Ben Parry.

Britten: Saint Nicolas
Alan Oke (tenor)
Jubilee Opera Chorus
Aldeburgh Voices
The Suffolk Ensemble
Ben Parry (conductor)
David Briggs (Children's Chorus conductor).


SAT 18:50 Opera on 3 (b03j9d8m)
Albert Herring

Live from the Barbican, Steuart Bedford conducts the BBC Symphony Orchestra and a fabulous ensemble cast including Christine Brewer as Lady Billows, Gillian Keith as Miss Wordsworth, Roderick Williams as Mr Gedge and rising star Andrew Staples as Albert himself.

Presented by Donald Macleod with contributions from Steuart Bedford who knew and worked with Britten, and members of the cast. Plus, in the Radio 3 Opera Guide at about eight o'clock, soprano Dame Josephine Barstow and Britten experts Paul Kildea and Christopher Wintle uncover the sophistication that lies at the heart of Brittten's comic masterpiece.

Britten: Albert Herring

Lady Billows ..... Christine Brewer (soprano)
Florence Pike ..... Gaynor Keeble (mezzo)
Miss Wordsworth ..... Gillian Keith (soprano)
Mr Gedge ..... Roderick Williams (baritone)
Mr Upfold ..... Adrian Thompson (tenor)
Superintendent Budd ..... Matthew Rose (bass)
Sid ..... Marcus Farnsworth (baritone)
Albert ..... Andrew Staples (tenor)
Nancy ..... Kitty Whately (mezzo)
Mrs Herring ..... Catherine Wyn-Rogers (mezzo)
BBC Symphony Orchestra
Steuart Bedford (conductor)
Kenneth Richardson (director)

In the Suffolk town of Loxford, the lax morals of the local girls preclude local worthy Lady Billows from finding an appropriate candidate to crown May Queen. Desperate times call for desperate measures and she finds a suitably virtuous May King in Albert Herring, whose domineering mother has kept him on the straight and narrow. But it only takes lemonade spiked with rum for Albert to go off the rails and discover there's more to life than than doing what mother tells him.

Once again Britten found inspiration on his doorstep but unlike the grim tale of Peter Grimes from a couple years earlier, Albert Herring's affectionate parody of small-town life is a comic tour de force.


SAT 22:00 Britten 100 (b03j9d8p)
Britten String Quartets

Quartet No 3

Andrew McGregor presents the second of three concerts pairing the Britten Quartets with chamber music by composers Britten loved and admired. Recorded this evening at Snape Maltings Concert Hall, the Kuss Quartet play the extraordinary final string quartets of Schubert and Britten.

Schubert: String Quartet in G major, D 887
Britten: String Quartet No 3, Op 94
Britten's 3 Divertimenti, String Quartet No 1 and Shostakovich Piano Quintet, live tomorrow at 11.00 am.


SAT 23:30 Britten 100 (b03j9dc6)
Festival of Britten

Haydn: Cello Concerto in C

By 1964 both Mstislav Rostropovich and the English Chamber Orchestra were regular fixtures at the Aldeburgh Festival. In a concert at that year's Festival (which also included the premiere of Britten's Cello Symphony) Britten conducted them in the first English performance of the recently discovererd Haydn C major Cello Concerto. As if all that wasn't enough, Britten wrote the cadenzas for Rostropovich in the Haydn and they recorded it in December. Presented by Tom Service.

Haydn: Cello Concerto in C, Hob.VIIb:1
Mstislav Rostropovich (cello)
English Chamber Orchestra
Benjamin Britten (conductor).