Saturday Classics/Inside Music

[Eine Alpensinfonie]

The other week when there was a short on-air discussion on R3 about Katie Derham's dancing prowess and how great her leg's were I felt that R3 had reached an all time low.

How utterly sickening. I'm glad I missed it. It's bad enough hearing the presenter herself talking herself up.

[Eine Alpensinfonie]

HEATH WARNING!!

Saturday Classics today:

Radio 4 investigative journalist Shari Vahl chooses music inspired by her fascination with birds, with music by Prokofiev, Ravel, Vaughan Williams and Rautavaara.

Surely that means The Lark Ascending - again.

[french frank]

This does seem to be a feature of Radio 3's guests: there are too many regular BBC contributors popping in from other services to be a coincidence. Is it that they're easier to get hold of because they meet in the staff canteen so it saves the cost of a meal to discuss a proposal - or even just the cost of a phone call? Radio 3's Ask A Chum?

And quid pro quo, Radio 3 presenters appear on Pointless Celebrities and Strictly Come Dancing. How about Clemmie or Katie on Celebrity Mastermind - special subject Classical Music?

[Tony Halstead]

HEATH WARNING!!

Saturday Classics today:

Radio 4 investigative journalist Shari Vahl chooses music inspired by her fascination with birds, with music by Prokofiev, Ravel, Vaughan Williams and Rautavaara.

Surely that means The Lark Ascending - again.

'HEATH WARNING' ( sic)
Maybe she will choose e.g. Edward HEATH conducting Elgar, Holst's Egdon HEATH or even something by Clive HEATH?

[french frank]

'HEATH WARNING' ( sic)
Maybe she will choose e.g. Edward HEATH conducting Elgar, Holst's Egdon HEATH or even something by Clive HEATH?

An' 'im a teacher, too!

[ferneyhoughgeliebte]

An' 'im a teacher, too!

No - when he retired he got the "L" out of it.

[ahinton]

And quid pro quo, Radio 3 presenters appear on Pointless Celebrities and Strictly Come Dancing.

At least Pointless Celebrities is an appropriate programme title, which is more than can be said for SCD.

How about Clemmie or Katie on Celebrity Mastermind - special subject Classical Music?

Special subject The Violin Works of Szymanowski, methinks (since they were each apparently violinists of a sort at one time or another). Actually, no; isn't it already quite dispiriting enough to have R3 infected with the worst aspects of these kinds of public display of self-centredness without it also spreading to Celebrity Mastermind and afflicting John Humphrys (whose instrument is the cello anyway)? Next thing some bright spark will get the idea of having one of them on Choral Evensong - Clem in C, as in...

[ahinton]

Oh, for goodness sake - will no one rid me of these troublesome old fossils?

Fateful extraction, perhaps?

[peterthekeys]

Kathryn Tickell

For the first time in a long time, I'm greatly enjoying Saturday Classics at the moment. Kathryn Tickell is presenting it, and is concentrating on the influence of folksong on classical composers - she's coming up with some fascinating things (including Ligeti's Rumanian Concerto, which I didn't know at all - apparently Ligeti described it as from his "prehistoric period"). I've always admired Tickell - as well as being a virtuoso on the Northumbrian pipes and other folk instruments, she's extremely well-versed in classical music: a real living bridge between the two idioms in a way that is all too rare at the moment.

[usher]

I usually withdraw the hem of the garment from SC but I,too, admired the Kathryn Tickell programme and have found Simon Butteriss enjoyable and informative this afternoon on what makes comic opera comic. Interesting selections and witty commentary with a very dry delivery.

[french frank]

That sounds like a shift from the original idea, which boiled down to: "This is some of my favourite music - enjoy" to something which has more of a single theme.

[usher]

That sounds like a shift from the original idea, which boiled down to: "This is some of my favourite music - enjoy" to something which has more of a single theme.

I think you are right, certainly as regards today's programme which was as thoughtful and intelligent (me iudice) as it was witty. Chosen composers were Sullivan, Mozart, Rossini, Verdi, R Strauss, Offenbach among others. I was pleased that he took a view of comedy that recognised the forgiving and healing element as well as the funny. All in all an enjoyable and instructive experience and I'll be listening again.

[jean]

...I, too, admired the Kathryn Tickell programme and have found Simon Butteriss enjoyable and informative this afternoon on what makes comic opera comic. Interesting selections and witty commentary with a very dry delivery.

Very much agree on both of these.

[doversoul1]

Well, if this is the New Radio 3, CFM has nothing to worry about. Here is the clear blue water Mr Jackson asks for.

[ed.] the clear blue water widens; next week’s programme:

Waldemar Januszczak

Ahead of his BBC4 series Renaissance Unchained, art critic Waldemar Januszczak conjures up the sound world of this epoch of huge passions and powerful religious emotions across all of Europe. The term 'Renaissance', or 'rinascita', was coined by Giorgio Vasari in 16th-century Florence, and his assertion that it had fixed origins in Italy has since influenced all of art history. But what of Flanders, Germany and the rest of Northern Europe? Waldemar presents music from the time of the Renaissance greats: Jan Van Eyck, Hans Memling, Albrecht Dürer, Hieronymus Bosch, Pieter Bruegel, Botticelli, Michelangelo, Leonardo and El Greco

http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b0702y8k

[Tony Halstead]

I think you are right, certainly as regards today's programme which was as thoughtful and intelligent (me iudice) as it was witty. Chosen composers were Sullivan, Mozart, Rossini, Verdi, R Strauss, Offenbach among others. I was pleased that he took a view of comedy that recognised the forgiving and healing element as well as the funny. All in all an enjoyable and instructive experience and I'll be listening again.

I agree with everything you say/write.
It was particularly enjoyable to hear Malcolm Sargent's performance of 'Iolanthe' overture with the 'Pro Arte Orchestra' ( a 'pick up band',?) whose woodwind soloists were superbly 'plangent' and characterful, in particular the oboe and clarinet. Although now aged nearly 71, I am too young to have known or played with this orchestra, however I have a strong suspicion ( based on their tones) that they were Peter Graeme ( oboe) and Jack Brymer (clarinet).
It was equally lovely to hear the Sadlers Wells orchestra's Offenbach, with wonderfully sweet-toned violin solos ( who? with maybe a gut or even silk E-string?) conducted by the late Sandy Faris.