30 episodes
| Series | Episode | Title | First Broadcast | Description |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 01 | Edwardian Snapshots | 20041220 | Today, he reveals the unexpected range and diversity produced in the first decade of the last century, when a new wave of composers emerged - familiar names like Vaughan Williams, Frank Bridge and Gustav Holst, but also composers like Williams Hurlstone and Samuel Coleridge-Taylor, who died before their promise bore a lasting reputation. Conductor Alasdair Mitchell champions the music of John Blackwood McEwen, whose once popular Border Ballad, Grey Galloway, is the major offering. | |
| 02 | 09 | Don't Frighten The Horses | 20060105 | Martin Handley looks at some of the modernist composers with a 'friendly face'. Bingham: The Shepherds' Gift BBC Singers Robert Quinney (organ) Stephen Cleobury (conductor) Maxwell Davies: 5 Klee Pictures (A Crusader; The Oriental Garden; Twittering Machine) BBC Philharmonic Orchestra Peter Maxwell Davies (conductor) Dring: Melisande, The Far Away Princess Robert Tear (tenor) Philip Ledger (piano) Knussen: Horn Concerto Barry Tuckwell (horn) London Sinfonietta Olive Knussen (conductor) Tavener: The Lamb The Sixteen Choir Harry Christophers (conductor) Maw: Little Concert Nicholas Daniel (oboe) Britten Sinfonia Nicholas Cleobury (conductor) Souster: Echoes Besses o'th' Barn Band Peter Bassano (conductor) Bedford: Recorder Concerto (4th & 5th Movements) Piers Adams (recorder) BBC Symphony Orchestra Martyn Brabbins (conductor) Matthews: Pluto Halle Orchestra Ladies of the Halle Choir Mark Elder (conductor) Beamish: The Wise Maid Robert Irvine (cello) Bryars: Jesus' Blood Never Failed Me Yet (excerpt) Evening Morning Afternoon. |
| EMS | Live From Uppingham School | 20061104 | Lucie Skeaping launches the Early Music Show's month-long Made in Britain series with a live concert from Uppingham School in Rutland. Alison Bury and Rachel Isserlis (violins) Sebastian Comberti (cello) Maggie Cole (harpsichord) Works by William Boyce and Thomas Arne. | |
| EMS | Eton Choir Book | 20061105 | Lucie Skeaping visits Eton College in Berkshire to look at the Eton Choirbook, the most outstanding choirbook to have survived the Reformation. She is joined by Jeremy Summerly and they discuss the importance of this vast book and play music by the most important composers represented in the collection. | |
| EMS | The Mackworth Collection | 20061111 | Catherine Bott visits the Music Department at Cardiff University, home to the Mackworth Collection. This collection of manuscripts was built up over several generations of the Mackworth family, whose family seat was at Gnoll Castle, Neath, in Wales. She meets Dr Sarah McCleave, who has catalogued the collection, and they talk about the different generations of the family who added to the collection, and the social side of music-making within the family in the 18th and 19th centuries. Including music by Sandoni, Hasse, Bononcini and Handel. | |
| EMS | Music For The Jacobean Theatre | 20061112 | As part of The Early Music Show's Made in Britain series, Lucie Skeaping visits The Globe Theatre in London to look at music from the Jacobean theatre. The Globe's music director Clare van Kampen escorts Lucie through the hallowed corridors, accompanied by music by Holborne, Cornysh, Dowland, Morley, Hume, Playford and Phillips. | |
| EMS | Thomas Tomkins | 20061118 | Lucie Skeaping visits Worcester Cathedral to mark the 350th anniversary of the death of Thomas Tomkins, who held a cathedral post as organist during the 17th century. She talks to Stephen Cleobury, who was a chorister at the cathedral and conducts the BBC Singers in the madrigals and anthems performed during the programme. | |
| EMS | The Roseingraves | 20061119 | As part of the month-long celebration of early music from Great Britain and the British Isles, Catherine Bott travels to Dublin to learn more about the colourful 18th-century Roseingrave family, who seem determined to be more than just a footnote in the history of music. | |
| EMS | Scotland; Stirling Castle | 20061125 | Lucie Skeaping talks to James Ross about the music that might have been heard at Stirling during the time of Mary Queen of Scots and her son, James VI of Scotland. Music includes extracts from a mass by Robert Carver and a feature about the work of French Huguenot composer Jean Servin. | |
| EMS | The 40 Part Motet | 20061126 | Catherine Bott investigates the story behind the creation of Tallis's magnum opus and explores its links with one of the Tudor era's architectural masterpieces, Nonesuch Palace. | |
| EMS | The Mackworth Collection | 20071021 | Catherine Bott visits the Music Department at Cardiff University, home to the Mackworth Collection. This collection of manuscripts was built up over several generations of the Mackworth family, whose family seat was at Gnoll Castle, Neath, in Wales. She meets Dr Sarah McCleave, who has catalogued the collection, and they talk about the different generations of the family who added to the collection, and the social side of music-making within the family in the 18th and 19th century. Including music by Sandoni, Hasse, Bononcini and Handel. | |
| LL | 20050207 | How can you define British music? | ||
| 02 | Fishing For Tunes | 20041221 | Percy Grainger, Australian by birth by English by adoption, travelled to Lincolnshire and the West Country to go "folksong fishing" - his colourful term for folk song collecting. Some of the fruits of his labours and those of composers George Butterworth, Gustav Holst and Ernest Moeran are included in Tommy Pearson's second selection, which also includes part songs and pieces for the British brass and military band inspired by traditional tunes. Charles Stanford, the teacher of many of the new wave of composers, wove three traditional Irish tunes into his influential Irish Rhapsody No 1. Vaughan Williams forged a unique style from the music of past centuries, including folk song, as conductor Richard Hickox acknowledges as he introduces his recording of the masterpiece Flos Campi. Evening Morning Afternoon. | |
| 03 | 1945-1951. A Time Of New Beginnings | 20051228 | The new cultural optimism was reflected in the founding of major artistic festivals - like Aldeburgh, Cheltenham and Edinburgh - the birth of the BBC Third Programme and the Festival of Britain. Peter Wishart: Alleluya, A New Work Is Come in Hand Polyphony Choir Stephen Layton (conductor) Britten: Occasional Overture City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra Simon Rattle (conductor) Elizabeth Maconchy: String Quartet No 5 (1948) Bingham Quartet George Dyson: Veni Emmanuel (Concerto da Chiesa) Bournemouth Symphony Orchestra David Lloyd-Jones (conductor) Eric Ball: Resurgam Grimethorpe (UK Coal) Band Elgar Howarth (conductor) Gerald Finzi: Clarinet Concerto Alan Hacker (clarinet) English String Orchestra William Boughton (conductor) Vaughan Williams: Music and Silence Joyful Company of Singers Peter Broadbent (conductor) Evening Morning Afternoon. | |
| 03 | A Sense Of Place | 20041222 | Tommy Pearson takes a musical journey through the British Isles, from the Scottish Highlands to the Norfolk Broads and all points in between, including music by John Ireland, William Baines and Hamish MacCunn. Stephen Johnson also offers his thoughts on Herbert Howells's youthful Piano Quartet in A minor, a work that he considers to be an unacknowledged masterpiece. | |
| 04 | The Pity Of War | 20041223 | George Butterworth is the most well known of the composers who never returned from the killing fields of Flanders, but there were others, among them Cecil Coles, W Denis Browne and Ernest Farrar. A generation later, the promising talent of Walter Leigh was silenced. We also hear from two survivors, Ivor Gurney and George Lloyd, and from a composer whose masterly cello concerto was composed as a memorial for all those who never returned from the first world war - the Concerto Elegiaco "Oration", by Frank Bridge. | |
| 05 | The Passing Seasons | 20041224 | Tommy Pearson reveals how successive generations of composers have evoked the passing seasons in their music, from Frank Bridge's summer landscape and a magical midsummer nocturne by Rebecca Clarke, to a haunting autumnal soundscape from William Alwyn. The Halle Orchestra's music director, Mark Elder, also offers his impression of Arnold Bax's vivid early symphony Spring Fire. | |
| 06 | The Young Guns | 20041227 | The second week kicks off with the young guns of the 1920s and 30s; the "enfants terribles" who took the British musical establishment by storm. Tommy chooses some of the unfashionable gems from that time, including music by Arthur Bliss, Constant Lambert and Alan Rawsthorne. Peter Warlock's biographer Barry Smith gives his thoughts on why "The Curlew" should be given a more regular hearing. | |
| 07 | Inspired By Great Words | 20041228 | Tommy Pearson explores the many ways in which composers of the first half of the last century used great poetry and prose to create music which is distinctively British in character. Shakespeare was a potent influence for vocal pieces by Vaughan Williams and Roger Quilter. The opening paragraphs of Thomas Hardy's The Return of the Native provided the inspiration for Holst's orchestral masterpiece Edgon Heath. Gerald Finzi set great words like no other composer of his generation. Pianist and broadcaster Ian Burnside waxes lyrical about the classic recording of Finzi's Dies Natalis sung by Wilfred Brown. | |
| 08 | Mysticism And Exoticsm | 20041229 | Today Tommy Pearson looks at some of the music written by British composers with a deep interest in all things exotic. Sanskrit literature, Celtic mysticism and the occult were all influential paths for British composers in the early decades of the twentieth century. The programme includes music by Bernard ven Dieran, Cyril Scott, Kaikhosru Sorabji and the mighty Three Mantras from John Foulds' opera Avatara. | |
| 09 | Looking Over The Shoulder | 20041230 | In the penultimate programme of this series, Tommy Pearson introduces some of the British music inspired by past generations, including works by EJ Moeran, Hubert Parry and John McCabe, plus Edmund Rubbra's Improvisations on Virginal Pieces by Giles Farnaby, with thoughts from Rubbra's son Adrian Yardley. | |
| 10 LAST | Anniversaries And Re-discoveries | 20041231 | Tommy Pearson ends the series with a selection of birthday tributes and re-discoveries. 2004 marked the centenary of the birth of the Scottish composer Erik Chisholm and the 75th anniversary of the birth of Kenneth Leighton both of whom are represented here by some of their distinctive piano music. There is also a chance to re-assess the work of Robert Simpson, Eugene Goossens and Howard Ferguson. To end Stephen Johnson introduces a performance of Malcolm Arnold's elusive Symphony No 6, recorded recently at his birthday concert. | |
| 20051226 | Martin Handley presents a series spotlighting some of the unexplored music composed in Britain in the 20th Century. 1/10. 1934-1939, After the Death of Elgar Following the passing of Elgar, Delius and Holst, the young guns of the 1920s, became the new leading musical creators. Britten: A Boy was Born (opening) Holst Singers Stephen Layton (conductor) Bliss: March from Things to Come BBC Philharmonic Rumon Gamba (conductor) Berkeley: Night Covers Up the Rigid Land, Op 14/2 Philip Langridge (tenor) Steuart Bedford (conductor) Britten: Scherzo - from King Arthur BBC Philharmonic Richard Hickox (conductor) Bridge: String Quartet No 4 Maggini Quartet Mayerl: Sweet William Susan Tomes (piano) Howells: King's Herald (from Pageantry) Britannia Band Howard Snell (conductor) Lambert: Madrigal con ritornelli (Summer's Last Will and Testament) Leeds Festival Chorus Orchestra of Opera North David Lloyd-Jones (conductor) Rawsthorne: Piano Concerto No 1 Geoffrey Tozer (piano) London Philharmonic Orchestra Matthias Bamert (conductor) Walton: Set Me As a Seal Polyphony Choir Stephen Layton (conductor) Evening Morning Afternoon. | |||
| 20051227 | Martin Handley presents a series spotlighting some of the unexplored music composed in Britain in the 20th Century. 2/10. 1939-1945. In Time of War A selection of music composed to lift the spirits or express something of the personal tragedies of this turbulent time. Patrick Hadley: I Sing of a Maiden Choir of Gonville and Caius College, Cambridge Frank Bridge: Rebus BBC National Orchestra of Wales Richard Hickox (conductor) George Lloyd: March - HMS Trinidad Black Dyke Band David King (conductor) Lambert: Aubade Heroique Orchestra of Opera North David Lloyd-Jones (conductor) Addinsell (arr Douglas): Warsaw Concerto Martin Roscoe (piano) BBC Philharmonic Rumon Gamba (conductor) Walton (arr Paul Hindmarsh): Romance (from Next of Kin) Black Dyke Band James Watson (conductor) Lutyens: Chamber Concerto No 1 Jane's Minstrels ensemble Roger Montgomery (conductor) Moeran: Sinfonietta Bournemouth Symphony Orchestra David Lloyd-Jones (conductor) Howells: Like As the Hart Choir of St Paul's Cathedral John Scott (conductor) Evening Morning Afternoon. | |||
| 20051229 | Martin Handley presents a series spotlighting some of the unexplored music composed in Britain in the 20th Century. 4/10. The Lost Decade (the 1950s) Fricker: A Babe is Born The Sixteen Choir Harry Christophers (conductor) Vaughan Williams (orch Gordon Jacob): Variations Munich Symphony Orchestra/Douglas Bostock Matyas Sieber: Epilogue (To Poetry) Lesley-Jane Rogers (soprano) Zsuzsa Kollar (piano) Phantasy for cello and piano Peter Szabo (cello) Zsuzsa Kollar (piano) Le Rossignol (4 French Popular Songs) Andrea Melath (mezzo) Zsuzsa Kollar (piano) Improvisations for jazz band and orchestra (extract) Johnny Dankworth and his orchestra London Philharmonic Orchestra Hugo Rignold (conductor) Wilfred Heaton: Five Little Pieces Black Dyke Band Nicholas Childs (euphonium) Stanley Glasser: E-goli (Lalela Zulu) The King's Singers Grainger, (arr Alan Gibbs): Goodbye to Love John Mark-Ainsley (tenor) Polyphony Choir Stephen Layton (conductor) Francis Chagrin: Overture - Helter Skelter BBC Philharmonic Rumon Gamba (conductor) Howard Ferguson: Piano Concerto Peter Donohoe (piano) Northern Sinfonia Michael Berkeley: Farewell Joyful Company of Singers/Peter Broadbent Evening Morning Afternoon. | |||
| 20051230 | Martin Handley presents a series spotlighting some of the unexplored music composed in Britain in the 20th Century. 5/10. Our friends from the North Presented by Martin Handley. The first week of the series ends with a selection of music from the pens of a collection of significant northerners, many of whom studied in Manchester and some who are now our among our leading musical knights. Peter Maxwell Davis: O Magnum Mysterium Choir of Cirencester School/ composer Howarth: Mosaic Eikanger-Bjorsvik Band/ composer Arthur Butterworth: Symphony No 1(1st movt) Munich Symphony Orchestra/ Douglas Bostock Harrison Birtwistle: White and Light Mary Wiegold (voice) Composers Ensemble/ Dominic Muldowney Rawsthorne: Violin Concerto No 2 Rebecca Hirsch (violin) BBC Scottish Symphony Orchestra/ Lionel Friend Ellis: Elegiac Variations, Op 66 John Turner (recorder) Tom Dunn (viola) Jonathan Price (cello) Thomas Pitfield: Studies On an English Dance John McCabe (piano) McCabe: Cloudcatcher Fells Britannia Building Society Band/ Howard Snell Wilby: Sonnet - If God Survives Us Choir of Lincoln College, Oxford Tom Lydon (conductor) Evening Morning Afternoon. | |||
| 20060102 | Martin Handley presents a series spotlighting some of the unexplored music composed in Britain in the 20th Century. 6/10. Dramatis Personae A selection of music from 20th-century British theatre, opera, ballet and melodrama. Gardner: Tomorrow Shall Be My Dancing Day The Sixteen Choir Benedict Hoffnung, William Lockhart (percussion) Margaret Phillips (organ) Harry Christophers (conductor) Lambert: Horoscope (Saraband for the followers of Virgo) BBC Concert Orchestra Barry Wordsworth (conductor) Bliss: Checkmate (Prologue - The Players) Ulster Orchestra Vernon Handley (conductor) Vaughan Williams: Riders to the Sea (And May He Have Mercy On My Soul) Linda Finnie (mezzo-soprano) Northern Sinfonia Richard Hickox (conductor) Berkeley: A Dinner Engagement (In the Summer of My Time) Roderick Williams (baritone) Yvonne Kenny (soprano) Jean Rigby (mezzo-soprano) City of London Sinfonia Richard Hickox (conductor) Britten: Owen Wingrave (Act II, Scene I) Peter Pears (Speaker) Wandsworth School Boys' Choir English Chamber Orchestra Benjamin Britten (conductor) Maxwell Davies: 8 Songs for a Mad King - No 3, The Lady-in-waiting (Miss Musgrave's Fancy) Kelvin Thomas (baritone) Psappha Ensemble Musgrave: Concerto for clarinet and orchestra Victoria Soames (clarinet) BBC Scottish Symphony Orchestra Thea Musgrave (conductor) Birtwistle: Gawain's Journey (excerpt) Philharmonia Orchestra Elgar Howarth (conductor) Muldowney: The Brontes (Wuthering Heights) Northern Ballet Theatre Orchestra Dominic Muldowney (conductor) Dove: Welcome, All Wonders In One Sight Schola Cantorum of Oxford Mark Shepherd (conductor) Evening Morning Afternoon. | |||
| 20060103 | Martin Handley presents a series spotlighting some of the unexplored music composed in Britain in the 20th Century. 7/10. More than a Celtic Twilight The music composed in Scotland over the past 40 years has not always travelled well south of the border. There is, however, a lot more to the Scottish voice than James Macmillan - as Martin Handley aims to reveal. Thomas Wilson: There is no Rose Cappella Nova Choir Alan Tavener (director) Buxton Orr: Intrada (A John Gay Suite) Guildhall Symphonic Wind Ensemble Peter Gane (conductor) Thea Musgrave: Winter (The Seasons) Scottish Chamber Orchestra Nicholas Kraemer (conductor) Ronald Stevenson:Traighen (Shores); The Rose of All the World Susan Hamilton (soprano) John Cameron (piano) Leighton: Double Concerto, Op 88 John Turner (recorder) Keith Elcombe (harpsichord) Northern Ballet Sinfonia Gavin Sutherland (conductor) Hans Gal: 3 Preludes Leon McCawley (piano) Thomas Wilson: Refrains and Cadenzas Grimethorpe Colliery Band Peter Parkes (conductor) Edward McGuire: Calgacus BBC Scottish Symphony Orchestra Rob Wallace (pipes) Takuo Yuasa (conductor) James Macmillan: The Gallant Weaver BBC Singers James Macmillan (conductor) Evening Morning Afternoon. | |||
| 20060104 | Martin Handley presents a series spotlighting some of the unexplored music composed in Britain in the 20th Century. 8/10. From Hills and Valleys Wales might be the land of song to many, but its heritage of symphonic music is substantial. It comes from the many concertos and symphonies of Daniel Jones, Williams Mathias and Alun Hoddinott; to the ambitious brass works premiered by Wales' leading brass band and the monumental choral works from, among others, Karl Jenkins. William Mathias: A Babe Was Born King's College, Cambridge Choir Philip Ledger (conductor) William Mathias: Dance Overture, Op 16 London Symphony Orchestra David Atherton (conductor) Grace Williams: Pied Beauty; Hurrahing the Harvest; The Windhover (from Six Gerald Manley Hopkins Poems) Helen Watts (contralto) Members of City of London Sinfonia Alun Hoddinott: Concertino for viola and small orchestra, Op 14 (1958) Csaba Erdelyi (viola) New Philharmonia Orchestra David Atherton (conductor) Geraint Lewis: The Souls of the Righteous Choir of St Paul's Cathedral John Scott (conductor) Pickard: Eden Buy As You View Band Robert Childs (conductor) Karl Jenkins: Charge and Better is Peace (Ring in the Christ That Is to Be) - From The Armed Man National Youth Choir of Great Britain LPO Karl Jenkins (conductor) Daniel Jones: A Hymn for Peace Welsh Opera Chorus Royal Philharmonic Orchestra Charles Groves (conductor) Evening Morning Afternoon. | |||
| 20060106 | A Good New Year In the final programme of the series, Martin Handley looks back to some of the less heralded anniversaries of 2005 and forward to some significant birthdays in 2006. John Rutter: What Sweeter Music The Cambridge Singers CLS Rutter (conductor) Edward Gregson: Blazon BBC Philharmonic Martyn Brabbins (conductor) Tippett: Piano Sonata, 1st Movement Peter Donohoe (piano) Arnold: Oboe Concerto, Op 39 Jennifer Galloway (oboe) BBC Philharmonic Rumon Gamba (conductor) Rutter: Musica Dei Donum Karen Jones (flute) Cambridge Singers John Rutter (conductor) Michael Ball: Chaucer's Tunes Black Dyke Band Nicholas Childs (conductor) Benjamin Frankel: Pause for Thought, Op 14/3 Northwest Chamber Orchestra Seattle Alun Francis (conductor) Richard Rodney Bennett: Trumpet Concerto Martin Winter (trumpet) RNCM Wind Orchestra Timothy Reynish (conductor) Bennett: A Good Night Joyful Company of Singers Peter Broadbent (conductor) Evening Morning Afternoon. |