Donal Macleod explores how, from childhood, Poulenc was exposed to two versions of Paris: one that was working class and religious, another that was high society, secular... and avant-garde. Francis Poulenc was the epitome of Parisian high society: suave, convivial and connected. Or was that how he wanted us to see him? The critic Claude Rostand famously commented that Poulenc was a combination of “moine et voyou” - monk and rogue. This week, we follow the composer from Paris’s artisanal upper class heartland, to the city’s dark underbelly, discovering the moments when the monk and the rogue met face-to-face. Music Featured: Piano Concerto in C-Sharp Minor, FP 146 (1st mvt) Sonata for Piano 4 Hands Gnossiennes Rapsodie Nègre L’Album des Six (5th mvt, ‘Valse’) Les Biches Concert Champêtre Les Soirées de Nazelles Les Litanies à la Vierge Noire Bleuet Les Animaux Modèles L’Histoire de Babar Les Mamelles de Tirésias La Fraîcheur et le Feu Les Dialogues des Carmelites La Voix Humaine Presented by Donald Macleod Produced by Alice McKee For full track listings, including artist and recording details, and to listen to the pieces featured in full (for 30 days after broadcast) head to the series page for Francis Poulenc (1899 – 1963) https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m001lkym And you can delve into the A-Z of all the composers we’ve featured on Composer of the Week here: http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/articles/3cjHdZlXwL7W41XGB77X3S0/composers-a-to-z

Sir Arthur Sullivan became the most renowned composer of the Victorian era, with his fame spreading across Europe and America too. His output spanned many genres including oratorios, a symphony, chamber music, hymns and anthems, but it was for his collaboration with the librettist W. S. Gilbert on operetta’s that he is best remembered today. He was a personal friend to royalty, and he was knighted when he was in his early forties. He also had a liking for playing cards, buying race horses and gambling, frequently loosing the substantial earnings from the stage works he’d composed. Sullivan became a pillar of the British musical establishment, so that when he died, despite wanting to be buried with his family in Brompton Cemetery, he was laid to rest in the crypt of St Paul’s Cathedral, with an additional service at the Chapel Royal in St. James’s Palace. Music Featured: HMS Pinafore (Overture) HMS Pinafore (When I was a lad) O Israel Overture ‘In Memorium’ Will he come? Symphony in E major, ‘Irish Symphony’ (Andante espressivo) Cox and Box (excerpt) The Merry Wives of Windsor (excerpts) Lead Kindly Light HMS Pinafore (excerpts) Pirates of Penzance (excerpt) Who is like unto thee Mikado (excerpts) The Golden Legend (excerpt) Ruddigore (excerpts) The Yeomen of the Guard (excerpts) Ivanhoe (excerpt) Utopia Limited (Society has quite forsaken) The Long Day Closes Presented by Donald Macleod Produced by Luke Whitlock For full track listings, including artist and recording details, and to listen to the pieces featured in full (for 30 days after broadcast) head to the series page for Arthur Sullivan (1842-1900) https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m001kpgh And you can delve into the A-Z of all the composers we’ve featured on Composer of the Week here: http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/articles/3cjHdZlXwL7W41XGB77X3S0/composers-a-to-z

As Christians around the world prepare for Easter, Donald Macleod explores the life and music of two nuns who were also composers. Though Hildegard of Bingen and Isabella Leonarda lived five centuries apart, their stories and music are connected by their shared faith and their shared vocations. Both lived cloistered lives, shut away in convents and cut off from the everyday concerns of the societies in which they lived. Yet, they also enjoyed a profoundly rich and human connection with the world and with their God, revealed in the music and poetry they created and sent into the world. Music Featured: Hildegard: Spiritus Sanctus Vivificans Leonarda: Sonata, Op 16 No 8 Hildegard: Columba Aspexit Hildegard (ed Wishart): O frondens virga Hildegard: O virga ac diadema Leonarda: Memento rerum Leonarda: Volo Jesum, Op 3 No 4 Leonarda: Sonata, Op 16 No 3 Leonarda: O anima mea Leonarda: Dixit dominus, Op 19 Hildegard: Ordo Virtutum (Prologue and Scene 1) Hildegard: Antiphon, O quam mirabilis est Leonarda: Purpurei Flores, Op 20 Leonarda: Magnificat Op 19 Leonarda: Sonata Op 16, No 12 Leonarda: Ave suavis dilectio, Op 6 No 5 Hildegard: O rubor sanguinis Hildegard: O Ecclesia Presented by Donald Macleod Produced by Chris Taylor For full track listings, including artist and recording details, and to listen to the pieces featured in full (for 30 days after broadcast) head to the series page for Hildegard of Bingen and Isabella Leonarda https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m001kh9p And you can delve into the A-Z of all the composers we’ve featured on Composer of the Week here: http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/articles/3cjHdZlXwL7W41XGB77X3S0/composers-a-to-z

150 years ago this week, Sergei Rachmaninov was born: one of the finest pianists of his generation, touring the world in the 1920s and 30s as a musical megastar. Composing had been his real passion since childhood, and towards the end of his time in Russia before the Revolution, it was farming. Though St Petersburg and then Moscow was his base for much of his early life, it was Ivanovka – a country estate deep in the Russian countryside - that formed him. The house and the land surrounding it were a major source of his creative inspiration until his last visit in 1917. Donald Macleod explores how important Ivanovka was to Rachmaninov, and how he carried the precious memory of it with him when he left it behind for a life of exile. Music Featured: Lilacs op 21, No 5, ‘Siren’ Piano Concerto No. 1 (mvt 1) Dances from Aleko Cello Sonata in G minor (mvt 1) Vesna Symphony No 2 (Mvt 2) Songs Op 34, No 12 Piano Concerto No 3 (Mvt 1) All-Night Vigil (Excerpt) Piano Concerto No 2 (Mvt 1) Etudes-Tableaux Op 39, No 6 The Bells (Mvt 2) Prelude Op 3, No 2 Three Russian Songs Symphony No 3 (Mvt 2) Rhapsody on a Theme of Paganini (Excerpt) Isle of the Dead Symphonic Dances (Mvt III) Suite No 2 for Two Pianos (Mvt IV) The Bells op.35 (Mvt IV) Presented by Donald Macleod Produced by Megan Jones For full track listings, including artist and recording details, and to listen to the pieces featured in full (for 30 days after broadcast) head to the series page for Sergei Rachmaninov (1873 – 1943) https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m001k8ck And you can delve into the A-Z of all the composers we’ve featured on Composer of the Week here: http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/articles/3cjHdZlXwL7W41XGB77X3S0/composers-a-to-z

Georges Bizet’s story ought to have been a very straightforward one. It was clear to everyone who met him just how brilliantly and excitingly talented he was. He was also fortunate to live and work in Paris, a city laden with musical opportunities in the mid-nineteenth century. Donald Macleod shows how Bizet’s life proved more challenging and event-filled than anyone might have expected – and that success can never be guaranteed! Music Featured: Carmen (extracts) Symphony in C, III. Scherzo Le Docteur Miracle: Overture L'Arlesienne Suite No. 2 (arr. Guirand), IV. Farandole Te Deum Roma, II. Allegro Vivace & III. Andante molto Vasco da Gama: Aria, “Ouvre ton Coeur” Les Pêcheurs de Perles: Duet,“Au fond du temple saint” La jolie fille de Perth: choeur de la Saint-Valentin (Act 4) Variations chromatiques Jeux d'enfants: No 3 ‘La poupée’ Djamileh: Overture L'Arlesienne Suite No. 1: I. Prelude & II. Minuetto Patrie Overture Presented by Donald Macleod Produced by Chris Taylor For full track listings, including artist and recording details, and to listen to the pieces featured in full (for 30 days after broadcast) head to the series page for Georges Bizet (1838 – 1875) https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m001h57j And you can delve into the A-Z of all the composers we’ve featured on Composer of the Week here: http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/articles/3cjHdZlXwL7W41XGB77X3S0/composers-a-to-z

Johanna Müller-Hermann once held a significant place as a composer and teacher in Vienna, yet has been largely forgotten over the decades since her death in 1941. Radio 3 has been working to unearth her music and story through its Forgotten Women Composers project, in collaboration with the Arts and Humanities Research Council and Dr Carola Darwin. This week, Dr Darwin and Professor Robert Evans join Donald Macleod to explore this fascinating composer and her times. Their series includes many specially recorded works by Müller-Hermann that have sat neglected in dusty archives for decades. Müller-Hermann was greatly celebrated in her own lifetime and moved in eminent musical circles. She studied with Zemlinsky, befriended Alma Mahler, and also corresponded with Arnold Schoenberg. She went on to teach at Austria’s New Vienna Conservatory where students travelled from as far away as America and the UK to study with her. She became a pivotal figure in Vienna’s cultural scene and her music was regularly performed and published during her lifetime. Music Featured: String Quintet in A minor, Op 7 (excerpt) Piano Sonata, Op 8 (Allegro enérgico) Herbst, Op 20 No 3 (Vier Lieder) Wie eine Vollmondnacht, Op 20 No 4 (Vier Lieder) Zwei dreistimmige Frauenchöre, Op 10 Piano Sonata, Opus 8 (excerpt) Cello Sonata, Op 17 (Moderato) String Quartet in E flat, Op 6 (Moderato) Intermezzo in D, Op 3 No 4 (Fünf Klavierstücke) Vier Lieder, Op 2 Violin Sonata in D minor, Op 5 (Moderato serioso) UK Broadcast Premiere String Quartet in E flat, Op 6 (excerpt) Die stille Stadt, Op 4 No 1 Heroic Overture, Op 21 (excerpt) Alle die wachsenden Schatten, Op 9 No 3 (Drei Chöre) Violin Sonata in D minor, Op 5 (excerpt) UK Broadcast Premiere Heroic Overture, Op 21 String Quintet in A minor, Op 7 (Adagio con expressione) Piano Quintet in G minor, Op 31 (excerpt) Zwei Lieder, Op 11 Cello Sonata, Op 17 (excerpt) Epilog zur einer Tragodie ’Brand‘ – symphonic fantasy, Op 25 Intermezzo in D minor, Op 3 No 3 (Fünf Klavierstücke) Impromptu in D minor, Op 3 No 5 (Fünf Klavierstücke) In Memoriam, Op 28 No 5 (Herbstlieder) Novelette in A flat, Op 3 No 2 (Fünf Klavierstücke) Violin Sonata in D minor, Op 5 (Allegretto amabile) UK Broadcast Premiere Piano Quintet in G minor, Op 31 (Adagio sostenuto) Drei Gesange, Op 33 String Quartet in E flat, Op 6 (Allegro con spirito) Presented by Donald Macleod Produced by Luke Whitlock For full track listings, including artist and recording details, and to listen to the pieces featured in full (for 30 days after broadcast) head to the series page for Johanna Müller-Hermann (1868-1941) https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m001h57j And you can delve into the A-Z of all the composers we’ve featured on Composer of the Week here: http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/articles/3cjHdZlXwL7W41XGB77X3S0/composers-a-to-z

The singer, and composer Barbara Strozzi neither held any position at church or court, nor had a consistant patron, and yet she published eight volumes of her own music, and had more secular music in print than any other composer of the era. Donald Macleod is joined by Professor Laurie Stras to explore the life of this extraordinary musician, and the world of 17th Century Venice in which she lived and worked. This was a world in which, despite the acknowledged successes of female artists in literature and music, being a successful composer seems to have aroused suspicion, and brought accusations of impropriety. Music Featured: Mi fa rider la speranze, Op.7’10 Che si puo fare, Op 8’6 Sonetto Proemio dell'Opera, Op 1’1 Godere in gioventù, Op. 1’12 L'Usignuolo, Op.1’5 Il contrasto di cinque sensi, Op. 1’14 Parla alli suoi pensieri, Op.6’5 L’Amante segreto, Op. 2’16 Sospira respira, Op.6’17 Godere e tacere, Op.1’9 Cuore che reprime alla lingua di manifestare il nome della sua cara, Op.3’1 La sol fa, mi, re, do, Op.2’25 Cor donato, cor rubato, Op. 3’10 Sino alla morte, Op.7’1 E pazzo il mio core, Op.8’9 Fin che tù spiri, spera, Op.7’3 Cristiana Presutti, soprano Ensemble Poiesis La riamata da chi amava, Op.2’18 Silentio nocivo, Op. 1’6 Donne Belle, Op.8’12 Se volete così me ne contento, Op. 6’18 Lagrime Mie, Lamento, Op. 7’4 L'Eraclito amoroso, Op. 2’14 Amante loquace, Op. 6’16 Il Lamento - S’ul rodano severo, Op.3’3 Begl’occhi, Op.2’2 Mater Anna, op.5’1 O Maria, Op.5’7 Tradimento, Op.7’9 Sete pur fastidioso, Op. 7’12 Conclusione dell’opera, Op.1’25 Parasti in dulcedine, Op.5’8 L’Astratto, op.8’4 Salve Regina, Op.5 Gite, o giorni dolenti, Op.2’21 L’amante modesto, Op.1’13 Presented by Donald Macleod Produced by Sam Phillips For full track listings, including artist and recording details, and to listen to the pieces featured in full (for 30 days after broadcast) head to the series page for Barbara Strozzi (1619 – 1677) https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m001h57j And you can delve into the A-Z of all the composers we’ve featured on Composer of the Week here: http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/articles/3cjHdZlXwL7W41XGB77X3S0/composers-a-to-z

“So great a musician are you.....that if the Fates carried you off.....music would be mute.” So wrote a contemporary of Thomas Tallis, showing us just how highly this composer was regarded in his own time. Over the course of this week, Donald Macleod traces the career of Tallis, unquestionably one of England's greatest ever composers. We follow him from the early faint mentions of the composer in Dover Priory, to his 40-plus years serving four successive monarchs as part of the Chapel Royal, and through the upheaval of one of the most tumultuous periods in all of English history. O Sacrum Convivium Lamentations of Jeremiah I & II Euge celi porta Alleluia. Per te Dei genitrix Ave, rosa sine spinis When shall my sorrowful sighing slack Sequence: Celeste Organum - Agnus Dei Magnificat for 4 voices Salve Intemerata Mass for four Voices Magnificat for 5 voices 5 part Litany Sancte Deus Hodie nobis caelorum Videte Miraculum for Vespers on Purification of Virgin Mary Remember not, O Lord God Te Deum for Meanes If Ye Love Me A New Commandment Gaude Gloriosa In nominee II Mass: Puer natus est nobis – Agnus Dei Archbishop Parker’s Psalter: O Come in One to Praise the Lord; E’en like the Hunted Hind; Expend, O Lord, my Plaint; Why Brag’st in Malice High ; God Grant with Grace Psalm 2, the third of 9 tunes for Archbishop Parker’s psalter “Why Fum’th In Fight” Suscipe quaeso domine My Soul Cleaveth to the Dust O Nata Lux (arr. Christian Forshaw) Spem in alium Cantiones Sacrae - Salvator Mundi I; Derelinquit impius; Semone blando angelus; In ieiunio Miserere nostri Presented by Donald Macleod Produced by Sam Phillips For full track listings, including artist and recording details, and to listen to the pieces featured in full (for 30 days after broadcast) head to the series page for Thomas Tallis (1505 – 1585) https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m001h57j And you can delve into the A-Z of all the composers we’ve featured on Composer of the Week here: http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/articles/3cjHdZlXwL7W41XGB77X3S0/composers-a-to-z

Donald Macleod explores how Smetana created a musical Czech identity The title of Smetana’s most popular work, ‘Ma Vlast’, gives us a clue to what drove him through much of his career. It translates as ‘My Homeland’ and the music is Smetana’s ardent tribute to the Czech sprit of his beloved Bohemia. The composer was deeply involved with his people’s struggle for cultural and political independence from the Hapsburg empire. He pledged his art to those aims and he even took to the streets to fight on the barricades, on one occasion. Smetana’s life was also beset by great misfortunes. When times were hardest, he always turned to music, even after illness made composing an almost impossible exertion. He created some of his most extraordinary works under the most painful circumstances. This week Donald Macleod follows Smetana as he grows from naïve revolutionary into one of the foundational figures in Czech music. Music Featured: The Bartered Bride: Overture Triumphal symphony, II. Largo maestoso Polka: Memory of Plzeň Wedding Scenes (orch. F. Hertl) Piano Trio in G minor Vision at the Ball Memories of Bohemia, Op 13 Håkon Jarl Song of the Czechs Overture to Doktor Faust The Brandenburgers in Bohemia The Bartered Bride: Act III finale The Two Widows: Act 2: Scene 3 Má Vlast: 2. Vltava & 4. Z českých luhů a hájů. On the Sea Shore Libuše: Overture String Quartet No.1 in Em ‘From My Life’ Czech Dances, Book 2: No.7 ‘The Lancer’ String Quartet No.2 in D Presented by Donald Macleod Produced by Chris Taylor, for BBC Audio Cardiff For full track listings, including artist and recording details, and to listen to the pieces featured in full (for 30 days after broadcast) head to the series page for Max Richter (b. 1966) https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m001ghdw And you can delve into the A-Z of all the composers we’ve featured on Composer of the Week here: http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/articles/3cjHdZlXwL7W41XGB77X3S0/composers-a-to-z

As performer, composer, impresario, musical director, and teacher, Antonio Vivaldi was a key figure in the musical life of Baroque Italy. Thanks to his set of Concertos “The Four Seasons”, he remains one of the most famous and best loved composers today. This week, Donald Macleod puts these four celebrated concertos front and centre as he also explores the four seasons of Vivaldi’s own life, lingering a little in his summer. We'll follow him from the start of his musical story, teaching at the Ospedale della Pietà in Venice, through his time as an opera composer, catering to the crowds who swarmed to Venice during carnival season, to his successes away from Venice. Vivaldi had many highs in his career, however he also had some difficult low points, finding himself embroiled in scandal and accused of immoral behaviour, before dying in poverty in a foreign city – his star having fallen from favour. Music Featured: Violin Concerto in E major, Op 8 no. 1 RV 269 “Spring” Credo, RV 591 L’oracolo in Messenia – “S’in campo armato” La costanza trionfante de gl'amori e de gl'odii, RV 706 Ottone in villa, RV 729 – “Frema pur, si lagni Roma” Farnace, RV 711 - “Gelido in Omni” Armida - Act I Scene 13: “Armata di furore” Concerto for Multiple Instruments, 'per l'orchestra di Dresda' in G minor, RV 576 Magnificat in G minor, RV 610b Violin Concerto in G minor, Op 8 no. 2 RV 315 “Summer” Violin Concerto in F major, RV 293 Op.8 no 3 “Autumn” Dorilla in Tempe, RV709 – Act II, Scene 8: “Arsa da rai cocenti” Griselda, RV 718 – “Ho il cor gia lacero”; “No, non tanta crudelta”; Terzetto “Non piu regina”; “Son infelice tanto” Farnace, RV 711 – “Forse, o caro, in questi accenti...” Lauda Jerusalem, RV609 Violin Concerto in F minor, RV 297 Op.8 no. 4 “Winter” Presented by Donald Macleod Produced by Sam Phillips For full track listings, including artist and recording details, and to listen to the pieces featured in full (for 30 days after broadcast) head to the series page for Mel Bonis (1858 – 1937) https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m001h57j And you can delve into the A-Z of all the composers we’ve featured on Composer of the Week here: http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/articles/3cjHdZlXwL7W41XGB77X3S0/composers-a-to-z