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Monday - Sarah Walker with Wasfi Kani

With Sarah Walker. Including Musical challenge; Music on Location: London. Handel's Water Music; Artist of the Week: Edward Gardner, featured conducting Walton's Symphony No 1.

9am
Sarah sets the tone and mood of the day's programme with a range of music to intrigue, surprise and entertain.

9.30
Take part in today's musical challenge: can you remember the television show or film that featured this piece of classical music?

10am
Sarah's guest this week is the opera impresario Wasfi Kani. Wasfi is one of the UK's leading opera organisers and fundraisers, and the founder of Pimlico Opera and Grange Park Opera. After studying music at the University of Oxford she worked as a computer programmer in the City, before realising she wanted to return to music. She founded Pimlico Opera with the aim of using music and drama for the public good, and it was one of the first opera companies to specialise in performing in unusual places, such as hospitals, banks and prisons. Grange Park Opera has become one of the UK's most successful summer opera companies and is currently enjoying its first season at a brand-new theatre in Surrey. As a pianist, violinist and conductor, much of the music that Wasfi has chosen for the week is music that she's played herself, including music by Schubert, Richard Strauss and Mozart.

10.30
Music on Location: London
Sarah explores one of London's most conspicuous premieres. Handel's Water Music was first performed on a barge floating up the River Thames in 1717, accompanying King George I and his guests as they journeyed into the night.

11am
Sarah's featured artist is one of Britain's most celebrated living conductors, Edward Gardner. Gardner is currently Chief Conductor of the Bergen Philharmonic Orchestra, but has spent much of his career in the opera house. From 2007-2015 he was Music Director at English National Opera and during this time he won the RPS Conductor of the Year Award and an Olivier Award for Outstanding Achievement in Opera. His big breakthrough came when he stood in at short notice for a répétiteur at the Salzburg Festival, and from there he went on to be Music Director of Glyndebourne Touring Opera. He regularly works with the National Youth Orchestra and the ѿý Symphony Orchestra (ѿýSO) with whom he led the Last Night of the Proms in 2011. Sarah's chosen four of Gardner's recordings with the ѿýSO: recordings of Walton's Symphony No.1, Szymanowski's Symphony No. 4 'Symphonie Concertante' (with pianist Louis Lortie), Britten's Violin Concerto with Tasmin Little, and Lutosławski's song cycle Chantefleurs et Chantefables with soprano Lucy Crowe. She's also chosen his recording of Schoenberg's Gurrelieder (Part III) with an array of musicians drawn from Norway, Sweden and the UK.

Walton
Symphony No. 1
ѿý Symphony Orchestra
Edward Gardner (conductor).

3 hours

Music Played

  • George Frideric Handel

    Sinfonia from Acis & Galatea

    Ensemble: Les Arts Florissants. Conductor: William Christie.
    • ERATO.
  • Darius Milhaud

    Scaramouche

    Performer: Sabine Meyer. Performer: Oleg Maisenberg.
    • EMI.
  • Charles Villiers Stanford

    Eternal Father, Op.135 no.2

    Choir: Choir of Trinity College, Cambridge. Conductor: Stephen Layton.
    • HYPERION.
  • Leos Janáček

    The Ballad of Blanik

    Orchestra: Bergen Philharmonic Orchestra. Conductor: Edward Gardner.
    • CHANDOS.
  • Franz Schubert

    Trio in B flat for piano and strings, D.28

    Ensemble: Beaux Arts Trio.
    • PHILIPS.
  • Engelbert Humperdinck

    Hansel Und Gretel (Overture)

    Orchestra: Philharmonia Orchestra. Orchestra: Philharmonia Orchestra. Conductor: Charles Mackerras. Conductor: Charles Mackerras.
    • CHANDOS.
  • Frédéric Chopin

    Scherzo no.2 in B flat minor Op.31

    Performer: Benjamin Grosvenor.
    • Benjamin Grosvenor: Chopin, Lizst, Ravel.
    • Decca.
    • 7.
  • Wasfi Kani's First Choice

    • Giuseppe Verdi

      Don Carlo: "Per me  giunto è il di" 

      Singer: Simon Keenlyside. Orchestra: Munich Radio Orchestra. Conductor: Ulf Schirmer.
      • SONY.
  • Wasfi Kani's Second Choice

    • Franz Schubert

      'Trout' Quintet in A major, D.667 (4th mvt)

      Performer: Martin Helmchen. Performer: Christian Tetzlaff. Performer: Antoine Tamestit. Performer: Marie-Elisabeth Hecker. Performer: Alois Posch.
      • PENTATONE.
  • Sally Beamish

    The Wise Maid

    Performer: Robert Irvine.
    • BIS.
  • Music on Location: London (The Thames)

    • George Frideric Handel

      Water Music Suite in G major, HWV 350

      Ensemble: Academy of Ancient Music. Director: Christopher Hogwood.
      • OISEAU LYRE.
  • Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart

    Horn Quintet in E flat major, K 407

    Performer: Timothy Brown. Ensemble: Academy of St Martin in the Fields Chamber Ensemble.
    • Philips.
  • Artist of the Week: Edward Gardner

    • William Walton

      Symphony No.1 in B flat minor

      Orchestra: ѿý Symphony Orchestra. Conductor: Edward Gardner.
      • CHANDOS.
  • Sérgio Assad

    Saga dos migrantes for two guitars

    Performer: Sérgio Assad. Performer: Odair Assad.
    • Saga dos Migrantes: Sergio and Odair Assad.
    • Nonesuch.

Musical Challenge: Heard on Screen

We heard the Romance (2nd movement) from Chopin’s E minor Piano Concerto, which features prominently in the 1998 fantasy film The Truman Show, starring Jim Carey.

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  • Mon 10 Jul 2017 09:00

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