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Your perfect Sunday soundtrack

Sarah Walker with three hours of classical music to reflect, restore and refresh, whether you’re working in the garden, or having a lie in.

Sarah Walker with three hours of classical music to reflect, restore and refresh.

Today, there’s music full of optimism, from Bach’s joyous Cantata ‘My soul magnifies the Lord’ to light music by Ronald Binge, renamed ‘Elizabethan Serenade’ in 1952 when Elizabeth II became Queen, and there’s also Mendelssohn’s Calm Sea and Prosperous Voyage.

This week’s choral reflection is Poulenc’s prayer to the Virgin Mary - Salve Regina - both flowing and declamatory with all the familiar twists and turns of Poulenc’s angular and beautiful melodies…

Plus, we’re treated to the whole of one of Mozart’s most beloved piano concertos…

3 hours

Last on

Sun 10 Aug 2025 09:00

Music Played

  • Jean Sibelius

    Andante festivo

    Orchestra: Bergen Philharmonic Orchestra. Conductor: Sir Andrew Davis.
    • Sibelius: Violin Concerto.
    • Chandos.
    • 10.
  • Pauline Viardot

    Hai Luli!, VWV 1106 (Arr. for Violin, Harp and String Quintet)

    Performer: Esther Abrami. Performer: Lavinia Meijer. Music Arranger: Jan-Peter Klöpfel. Ensemble: Esther Abrami.
    • Sony Classical/Sony Music.
  • Joseph Haydn

    Piano Sonata No 33 in C minor, Hob XVI:20 (2nd mvt)

    Performer: Alfred Brendel.
    • Haydn: 11 Piano Sonatas.
    • Decca Music Group Ltd.
  • Johannes Brahms

    Hungarian Dance No 1 in G minor (version for orchestra)

    Conductor: Claudio Abbado. Orchestra: Vienna Philharmonic.
    • Deutsche Grammophon (DG).
  • Valentin Silvestrov

    Birthday Dedications, Op 20 (No 2, '31 January 1797, To the Birthday of FP Sch')

    Performer: Alexei Lubimov.
    • Flowering Over Lethe.
    • Fuga Libera.
    • 3.
  • Antonín Dvořák

    Suite in A major, Op 98b, B 190, 'American'

    Conductor: Iván Fischer. Orchestra: Budapest Festival Orchestra.
    • CHANNEL CLASSICS.
  • Francis Poulenc

    Salve regina, FP 110

    Choir: Polyphony. Conductor: Stephen Layton.
    • Hyperion.
  • Manuel de Falla

    Canciones populares espanolas, G 40, arr for cello and guitar (4th mvt, 'Jota')

    Performer: Xuefei Yang. Performer: Johannes Moser. Music Arranger: Jaume Torrent.
    • Platoon Ltd.
  • Felix Mendelssohn

    Calm Sea and Prosperous Voyage Op.27

    Orchestra: London Symphony Orchestra. Conductor: Claudio Abbado. Conductor: Claudio Abbado.
    • Deutsche Grammophon (DG).
  • Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov

    The Flight of the Bumble-Bee (The Tale of Tsar Saltan, Act 3)

    Performer: Tasmin Little. Performer: Piers Lane. Music Arranger: Jascha Heifetz.
    • Parlophone UK.
  • Franz Danzi

    Wind Quintet in F major, No 3 Op 56 (4th mvt)

    Ensemble: Philharmonisches Bläserquintett Berlin.
    • Naxos Music UK Ltd.
  • Johann Sebastian Bach

    Cantata BWV 10, 'Meine Seel erhebt den Herren'

    Singer: James Gilchrist. Singer: Stephen Varcoe. Singer: Lisa Larsson. Singer: Daniel Taylor. Choir: Monteverdi Choir. Conductor: Sir John Eliot Gardiner. Orchestra: English Baroque Soloists.
    • SDG.
  • Ronald Binge

    Elizabethan Serenade

    Conductor: Vernon Handley. Orchestra: ѿý Concert Orchestra.
    • The Best Of British Light Music.
    • Sony Classical.
    • 10.
  • John Williams

    Han Solo and the Princess (Star Wars: The Empire Strikes Back)

    Orchestra: London Symphony Orchestra. Conductor: John Williams.
    • Star Wars: The Empire Strikes Back (Original Motion Picture Soundtrack).
    • Walt Disney Records.
    • 7.
  • Kate Rusby

    Underneath The Stars

    Ensemble: VOCES8.
    • Eventide (10th Anniversary Edition).
    • Decca Music Group Ltd.
    • 7.
  • Claude Debussy

    Prélude à l'après-midi d'un faune, CD 87a

    Performer: Emmanuel Pahud. Conductor: Claudio Abbado. Orchestra: Berliner Philharmoniker.
    • Deutsche Grammophon (DG).
  • Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart

    Piano Concerto No 5 in D major, K 175

    Performer: Mitsuko Uchida. Conductor: Jeffrey Tate. Orchestra: English Chamber Orchestra.
    • Decca Music Group Ltd.
  • César Franck

    Panis Angelicus (Mass, Op 12, FWV 61)

    Performer: Tom Winpenny. Choir: Boys of King's College Choir, Cambridge. Conductor: Stephen Cleobury.
    • Heavenly Voices.
    • Warner Classics.
    • 1.
  • Anoushka Shankar

    Maya

    Performer: Manu Delago. Music Arranger: Jules Buckley. Orchestra: Metropole Orkest. Conductor: Jules Buckley. Featured Artist: Manu Delago.
    • LEITER.
  • Sergey Rachmaninov

    Lilacs, No 5 Op 21 No 5 (transc for piano)

    Performer: Benjamin Grosvenor.
  • Arthur Bliss

    A Colour Symphony (2nd mvt, 'Red')

    Orchestra: Orchestra of Opera North. Conductor: David Lloyd-Jones.
    • Naxos.
  • Clara Schumann

    Piano Concerto in A minor Op.7 (1st mvt)

    Performer: Isata Kanneh‐Mason. Orchestra: Royal Liverpool Philharmonic Orchestra. Conductor: Holly Mathieson.
    • Romance.
    • Decca.
    • 1.
  • Antonio Vivaldi

    Violin Concerto in G minor, No 2 Op 8, RV 315, 'L'estate' [Summer] (The Four Seasons)

    Performer: Rachel Podger. Orchestra: Brecon Baroque.
    • CHANNEL CLASSICS.

Broadcast

  • Sun 10 Aug 2025 09:00