
Blue
Texts and music inspired by the colour blue, with readings by Angel Coulby and Raymond Coulthard. Including Keats, Kipling and Wells, plus Gershwin, Joni Mitchell and Miles Davis'.
Angel Coulby and Raymond Coulthard read texts inspired by the colour blue, from seas and skies, to a lover's eyes, and blue's associations with sadness and hope. Texts include John Keats' Blue! Tis the Life of Heaven, Rudyard Kipling's Blue Roses, Mary Elizabeth Coleridge's The Blue Bird, and excerpts from H.G. Wells' The Island of Doctor Moreau and James Frey's A Million Little Pieces. Blue-toned music ranges from Stanford's setting of Coleridge's poem to a jazz trio arrangement of Gershwin's Rhapsody in Blue, and tracks by Joni Mitchell, Brian Eno and Miles Davis.
First broadcast in January 2013.
Last on
Music Played
Timings (where shown) are from the start of the programme in hours and minutes
-
00:00
Gershwin arr. Monty Alexander
Blue Rhapsody
Performer: The Monty Alexander Trio.- TELARC CD83578.
- Tr1.
-
William Gass
On Being Blue: A Philosophical Inquiry (excerpt), reader Raymond Coulthard
00:05Michael Tippett
The Blue Guitar (3rd movement: Dreaming)
Performer: Craig Ogden (guitar).- NIMBUS NI5390.
- Tr3.
John Keats
Blue! 'Tis the Life of Heaven, reader Angel Coulby
00:06Joni Mitchell
Blue
Performer: Joni Mitchell (vocals, piano).- REPRISE 7599271992.
- Tr5.
Christopher Moore
Sacre Bleu: A Comedy d'Art (excerpt), reader Raymond Coulthard
00:10Clifton Parker
The 'Blue Lagoon'
Performer: ÃÛÑ¿´«Ã½ Concert Orchestra, Rumon Gamba (conductor).- CHANDOS CHAN10279.
- Tr14.
Edith Farr Geer
Bermuda Seas, reader Angel Coulby
Francis Saltus Saltus
Blue, reader Raymond Coulthard
00:17Seasick Steve
My home (blue eyes)
Performer: Seasick Steve (vocals, guitar), Dan Magusson (drums).- ATLANTIC 5051865615828.
- Tr11.
Thomas Gent
Black Eyes and Blue, reader Angel Coulby
00:19Joby Talbot
Blue cell
Performer: Apollo Saxophone Quartet.- BLACK BOX BBM1078.
- Tr2.
00:25Miles Davis
Blue In Green
- COLUMBIA CK64935.
- Tr3.
Henry Lawson
Two Little Blue Eyes, reader Raymond Coulthard
George Meredith
Blue is the sky, reader Angel Coulby
00:30Irving Berlin arr. Robert Farnon
Blue Skies
Performer: Robert Farnon and his orchestra, Dave Goldberg (guitar).- GUILD GLCD5129.
- Tr7.
00:33Robert Fripp arr. Andrew Keeling
Midnight Blue
Performer: The Metropole Orkest, Jan Stulen (conductor).- DGM 1102.
- Tr2.
H.G. Wells
The Island of Doctor Moreau (excerpt), reader Raymond Coulthard
00:35Max Reger
Improvisation uber den waltzer'An der schonen, blauen Donau' for piano
Performer: Konstanin Scherbakov (piano).- EMI 5697042.
- Tr1.
Mary Elizabeth Coleridge
L'Oiseau Bleu, reader Angel Coulby
00:39Stanford
The blue bird
Performer: Oxford Camerata, Jeremy Summerly (conductor).- NAXOS 8553088.
- Tr16.
Ronald Campbell Macfie
The Blue Bird, reader Raymond Coulthard
00:44Brian Eno
Deep Blue Day (from the album Apollo)
Performer: Brian Eno.- EMI 6845312.
- Tr9.
00:46Elena Katsâ€Chernin
Blue Rose
Performer: Acacia Quartet.- VEXATIONS840 8401202.
- Tr19.
DH Lawrence
The Blue Jay, reader Angel Coulby
00:51Walter Donaldson arr. Grofe
My Blue Heaven
Performer: Harvey and the Wallbangers, London Sinfonietta, Simon Rattle (conductor).- EMI CDC7479112.
- Tr6.
Rudyard Kipling
Blue Roses, reader Raymond Coulthard
00:54Ludwig van Beethoven
6 Bagatelles for piano (Op.126), no.3 in E flat major
Performer: Steven Kovacevich (piano).- PHILIPS 4269762.
- Tr21.
Anne Bronte
The Bluebell, reader Angel Coulby
00:58Simon Fisher Turner
Blue (soundtrack) (excerpt)
- MUTE CDSTUMM49.
- Tr4.
James Frey
A Million Little Pieces (excerpt), reader Raymond Coulthard
01:02Jennifer Higdon
blue cathedral
Performer: Atlanta Symphony Orchestra, Robert Spano (conductor).- TELARC CD80596.
- Tr4.
Marjorie Evasco
Is it the Kingfisher?, reader Angel Coulby
Producer's Note
Blue was a latecomer in art, language and the written word, but amongst the colours it is in the modern day by far the most popular. Early on in this edition of Words and Music, in excerpts from William Gass’ 1970s philosophical exploration of the colour blue, and Christopher Moore’s novel Sacre Bleu: A Comedy d'Art, along with Joni Mitchell’s classic song Blue from her same-titled album, we’re introduced to dozens of associations, from oceans to diamonds, virgins to movies, alcohol to ink. For the rest of the programme I have taken as my starting point a handful of blue connections, from the obvious in nature to the long-held appeal of blue eyes, and how it can represent both sadness and hope.
Ìý
The most obvious blues around us – azure seas and cerulean skies – are seen through the words of John Keats, and in Edith Far Geer’s vision of Bermuda Seas, along with Clifton Parker’s stirring music for Frank Launder’s 1949 film The Blue Lagoon. The American poet, Francis Saltus Saltus, makes the connection between these blues in nature around us and the blue hues in a lover’s eyes, as does the blues musician Seasick Steve in My home (blue eyes). It is blue eyes which fight for supremacy over black in a poem by the 18th century Irish writer Thomas Gent (though Cupid swiftly puts them in their place), and that’s followed by Henry Lawson’s short verse about a father’s gentle hopes for his blue-eyed child. George Meredith’s Blue is the sky brings together the blue above with the eyes of his lover, questioning whether one of them shows more of heaven than the other.
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A collection of words and music about blue wouldn’t be complete without that most famous of birds, the Bluebird, the subject of Mary Elizabeth Coleridge’s poem, which we hear in its original form and in its choral setting by Charles Villiers Stanford, and also in a poem of the same title by Ronald Campbell Macfie. And not to be forgotten alongside its more famous cousin, DH Lawrence introduces us to a mischievous Blue Jay, who laughs at the author and his black dog in the snow.
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Rudyard Kipling writes of a lover searching elusively for Blue Roses (we also hear Elena Kats-Chermin’s piece for string quartet of the same name). In The Bluebell, Anne Bronte, the youngest member of the Bronte literary family, tells a story of bitter childhood memories of the sweetest of wild flowers. The sense of loss in Bronte’s text is echoed in one of Beethoven’s late Bagatelles, written long after he had begun mourning the loss of his hearing.
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A short excerpt from Simon Fisher Turner’s soundtrack to Derek Jarman’s Blue (his final feature film made at the end of his life, when he had almost lost his sight due to AIDS related complications) leads us into a passage from James Frey’s gritty semi-fictional novel A Million Little Pieces, in which a young man talks about his sense of loneliness and despair during rehabilitation from alcoholism and drug abuse, but then seems to find a sense of freedom in the colour blue as he begins to recover. That intimate text is accompanied by Jennifer Higdon’s orchestral work, blue cathedral: in Higdon’s words, “Blue – like the sky. Where all possibilities soar.â€
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And finally, the colour blue can be found in the search for God, according to the Filipino poet Marjorie Evasco.
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Music with blue tones featured in the programme also includes a jazz trio arrangement of Gershwin’s Rhapsody in Blue, a paraphrase for piano of Johann Strauss’ The Blue Danube, Irving Berlin’s Blue Skies, Walter Donaldson’s Blue Heaven, Michael Tippett’s sonata for solo guitar, The Blue Guitar, Joby Talbot’s Blue Cell for saxophones, Miles Davis from his iconic album Kind of Blue, Brian Eno’s Deep Blue Day from his album Apollo, and an orchestration of Robert Fripp’s evocative soundscape Midnight Blue.
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Andy King (producer)
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