Known in Yiddish as Der Schvartze Khazn--the Black Cantor--Thomas LaRue Jones was an African American tenor who sang Jewish music in the early decades of the twentieth century. Famed for his soulful voice and perfect Yiddish pronunciation, he performed in synagogues and theatres across the Eastern United States and toured Germany, Poland and Palestine. But after his death in 1954, LaRue Jones disappeared from memory, leaving behind only one recording, made in 1923. Drawing on research by the veteran musician and producer Henry Sapoznik, Maria Margaronis unpacks the mystery of LaRue Jones' career. What drew him to this music? What does his life tell us about race, faith and identity in America a hundred years ago? And why was he so quickly and utterly forgotten? LaRue Jones' story is entwined with the history of Newark, New Jersey, where he spent most of his life. Once known as the City of Opportunity, old Newark drew migrants from Europe and the American South in flight from persecution and searching for a new life. Blacks and Jews lived side by side in the city's poorer districts, absorbing each other's culture and musical traditions. But by mid-century, Newark's Jews were moving out in search of the suburban dream. Black people, hemmed in by racism and housing segregation, were left behind in an increasingly impoverished city. Thirteen years after LaRue Jones' death, the Newark riots, or rebellion, sealed the division of the two communities. LaRue Jones, like the world that made him, was consigned to oblivion--until zealous research by Henry Sapoznik tracked down that one recording and LaRue Jones' unmarked grave, and raised the curtain on the Black Cantor once more. Presenter: Maria Margaronis Producer: David Goren

Allyson Devenish uncovers the remarkable story of an African American composer and musician who made his life in London and Paris in the early twentieth century. Edmund Thornton Jenkins was a composer, musician and band leader from Charleston in South Carolina who travelled to London in 1914. He studied at the Royal Academy of Music for seven years and became a sub-professor. In 1919, at Wigmore Hall, he conducted his own work, A Folk Rhapsody, which incorporated themes from spirituals and songs of the Gullah fisherman of his native Charleston. As well as composing some of the earliest music in the European concert tradition to incorporate jazz rhythms and the folk melodies and spirituals of his home town, Edmund was also wildly successful as a dance band leader and recorded some of the earliest British jazz records in 1921 playing clarinet and saxophone. His early death, in 1926, far from home, meant his story almost faded away. His music, shipped back to the US after his death in 1926, remained almost entirely unperformed. Only one piece of Edmund's work has been commercially recorded: Charlestonia which was premiered in 1925 and reconstructed in the 1980's, by the composer Vincent Plush from manuscripts held at the Centre for Black Music Research at Columbia College in Chicago. Now, nearly a hundred years later, the pianist Allyson Devenish travels to Charleston to hear about Edmund's roots and to meet some of the people trying to bring his music the recognition it deserves. She traces his musical life in London and Paris and returns some of Edmund's music to the Royal Academy of Music, where he studied for seven years and performs it with some students and alumni, including the violinist Braimah Kanneh-Mason. Edmund Thornton Jenkins' story is told in a biography by Jeffrey Green and we are grateful for his invaluable help in researching this programme. Contributors include: Kellen Gray Assistant Conductor of the Royal National Scottish Orchestra and Associate Conductor of the Charleston Symphony Orchestra who conducted the premiere of Edmund T Jenkins' piece Rhapsodic Overture, (reconstructed by Tuffus Zimbabwe) for the Spoleto Festival in 2022. John Kennedy, Resident Conductor and Director of Orchestral Activity at the Spoleto Festival. Wojciech Milewski, Music Director of the Charleston Opera Theatre and the Summerville Orchestra who has made the parts and score for Charlestonia publically available. Dr Bernard Powers, historian and Director of the Center for the Study of Slavery in Charleston. Victoria Smalls, Director of the Gullah Geechee Cultural Heritage Corridor. Braimah Kanneh-Mason, violinist and Royal Academy of Music alumnus who performs Edmund T Jenkins' Reverie Fantasie with Allyson Devenish. Tamara Tare, a student at the Royal Academy of Music who sings Edmund T Jenkins' That Place Called Italy, accompanied by Allyson Devenish. Jeremy Ng, a student at the Royal Academy of Music who performs Edmund T Jenkins' Prelude Religieux. Emily Woolf, the archivist at Wigmore Hall. Adam Taylor, the librarian at the Royal Academy of Music. Dr Stephanie Doktor, Assistant Professor, Boyer College of Music and Dance at Temple University. Professor Catherine Tackley, Head of the Department of Music at the University of Liverpool. Presenter: Allyson Devenish Producer: Natalie Steed A Rhubarb Rhubarb Production for BBC Radio 3

Over a century ago, in 1881, the city of Birmingham purchased a copy of Shakespeare's first folio. It was to be the crown jewel of their new Shakespeare library, the brainchild of the first librarian George Dawson. From the outset it was to be the People's Folio, the property of the city's Free library. You can find the evidence stamped in red ink on many of the pages. That might seem like a defacement to some, but to Shakespeare scholar Islam Issa and members of the city's 'Everything to Everybody' project, it shows a profound commitment. In this feature Islam draws together the passion and belief of George Dawson and his fellow city fathers - Birmingham became a city in 1889 - with the voices and opinions of Birmingham today as expressed by people like the internationally acclaimed street artist Mohammed Ali. He's produced two school murals that have the Folio at the heart of the city's sense of itself. In the afterglow of the Commonwealth Games and the realisation that Birmingham's strength lies in its multi-cultural population, Islam points out that rather than some distant evidence of an elite and unfamiliar past, the time has come for the Folio to be celebrated from Sparkbrook to the Bullring and beyond. Producer: Tom Alban

Lindsay Johns makes the case for writer Rudolph Fisher's portraits of Black American life

One day, three decades after the event, the German poet and man of letters, Heinrich Heine, stood on the site of the battle of Marengo, one of Napoleon's earliest and most important victories and had an epiphany - or he invented one for his readers: ""Gradually, day by day, foolish national prejudices are disappearing; all harsh differentiations are lost in the generality of European civilization. There are no more nations in Europe, only parties; and it is marvellous to see how these parties, for all their varying colouration recognize one another and how they understand one another, despite many differences in language." This move past national differences would be a force for unalloyed good because, if Europeans could see themselves as a unified "civilisation" then their example would be a force that "could" lead to the liberation of the world from prejudice. Well, he was a child of the romantic age, you can forgive his enthusiastic language but his vision anticipates the principles that created and still guide the EU. The writer produced astounding amounts of work: poetry, verse dramas, and essays and letters while conducting love affairs and just generally being in the public eye. His poetry became the lyrical basis for lieder by Schubert, Schumann and many others. He had huge appeal in the middle of the 19th century. George Eliot wrote four monographs about him including one on his wit - bitterly ironic ,very Jewish. Today he is remembered in the English speaking world for this quote, "Where they burn books, they will, in the end, burn human beings too." When the Nazis held their book burnings outside the Berlin Opera House, Heine's were among those immolated. And when the Nazis initiated the war that would burn down a significant portion of the Europe Heine dreamed of, the connection to much of 19th century German culture was cut including the life and work of Heinrich Heine. Michael Goldfarb tells the story of Heine's life and the Europe in which he lived through interviews and using the musical settings of his poetry in lieder, readings from his poetry and plays, and George Eliot's perceptive comments. Heine's was a tremendous life - he endured censorship and was harassed by the police spies of the Federated German speaking nations. He lived as a celebrity - albeit an impecunious one - despite the fact his uncle was one of the German-speaking world's richest men. All the drama created a truly contemporary, 21st century sensibility Producer: Julia Hayball Readers: Jonathan Keeble, Robbie Stevens, Clare Corbett and Pavel Douglas Sound design: Chris Maclean A Certain Height production for BBC Radio 3

American musician Rhiannon Giddens investigates the fascinating life and recordings of the folk song collector Sidney Robertson Cowell. Travelling thousands of miles all over the US in the depression era, Cowell was willing to track down songs in unlikely places, once writing "I don't scare easily." She spent a night riding in a hearse in Wisconsin just to question the driver and hear his songs, walked up mountains to record lumberjacks and traditional Appalachian singers and poled three miles downriver after dark on a makeshift raft to find a famed fiddler in his goldmine in California. Listening to her recordings is like travelling back in time; they capture the voices of so many different nationalities that emigrated to the US, but she also made recordings on the Aran Islands in Ireland. During her lifetime Cowell was marginalised like so many women collectors of that period, but in this celebration of her recordings and observations, Giddens finally gives her work the attention it deserves. With indebted thanks to the American Folklife Center archive in the Library of Congress who hold the collection of Sidney Robertson Cowell's recordings and to the following contributors who have done so much to bring her work to light: Cathy Hiebert Kerst, folklorist and archivist who catalogued Sidney's recordings of the WPA California Folk Project. Sheryl Kaskowitz, scholar of American music and author of forthcoming book: The Music Unit: FDR's Hidden New Deal Program that Tried to Save America from the Great Depression—One Song at a Time. Jim P Leary, a folklorist and scholar of Scandinavian studies, and a professor at the University of Wisconsin–Madison, author of Folksongs of Another America. Dr. Deirdre Ní Chonghaile writer, researcher and musician (she plays fiddle with Rhiannon at the end of the programme) who has written about the collecting work of Sidney Robertson Cowell on the Aran Islands in the 1950s. Robert Cochrane, Professor of English and folklore specialist at the University of Arkansas. Peggy Seeger, folksinger. California Gold: Northern California Folk Music from the Thirties Collected by Sidney Robertson Cowell: https://www.loc.gov/collections/sidney-robertson-cowell-northern-california-folk-music/about-this-collection/ Producer: Clare Walker

Carol Morley follows the trail of Britain's most prolific female director, Muriel Box. She directed 13 films in 14 years and was the first woman ever to receive the Oscar for best original screenplay, for The Seventh Veil. Yet, she is barely known in her own country. She has never had a retrospective of her work here and her films are hard to get hold of, even box office hits like The Truth About Women, Simon And Laura and The Passionate Stranger. Carol made an appeal on Radio 4 for anyone who knew Muriel to get in touch. And she was overhwelmed by the response. On this cinematic journey of discovery, Carol talks to her daughter, Leonora, and her grandsons Ben and Charlie, as well as distant relatives Sean Barton and Olivia Howells. She also hears from Karen Peploe, who met the director when she wrote a thesis on her in the 1980s, and British Film Institute curator Jo Botting. Along the way, Carol digs through crates of diaries and letters and finally gets to hold an Academy Award, albeit one that's been loved to death by two small children. Carol also mounts a campaign to have Muriel's achievements recognised in this country, and discovers that her efforts have not been in vain. Presented by Carol Morley. Readings by Monica Dolan and Joanna Munro.

Chibundu Onuzo tells the fascinating story of ‘Africa’s Mona Lisa’ and artist Ben Enwonwu

“All Neapolitans were born to be musicians, to be singers,” says musicologist Dr Dinko Fabris, referring to the foundation myth of Naples, according to which the city was created by the siren Partenope. Song has been woven into Neapolitan life ever since, giving the city an extraordinary musical culture and heritage. Joanna Robertson travels to Naples to find out what makes this city so full of song. Walking around Naples, she hears singing in the least expected places: in the street, on the seafront, protesters at a demonstration singing rather than shouting their slogans. Song has permeated the culture of Naples for centuries. In the sixteenth century, when Neapolitans felt oppressed by their Spanish king, they created the villanella style of song as a form of protest. Its San Carlo opera theatre is the oldest in the world that's still in operation. Its brilliant nineteenth century impresario Domenico Barbaja attracted the likes of composers Donizetti, Bellini and Rossini to Naples. Poets – from the amateur to the famous – wrote poems that composers set to music, creating much-loved songs like O Sole Mio. Some were advertising jingles, like Funiculi Funicula which was written to promote the new funicular railway that ran up the slope of Vesuvius. Local-born baritone Ernesto Petti, a rising international opera star, says that “Neapolitan songs should be sung with complete abandonment. You put your whole heart in it." That's what the audience end up doing at a "Napulitanata" performance, taking over the singing of “O Sole Mio” from the artists. They know it all by heart. Presenter: Joanna Robertson Producer: Arlene Gregorius Sound engineer: James Beard Production coordinator: Iona Hammond Editor: Penny Murphy Recording of 'Santa Lucia Luntana' performed by Teresa Iervolino courtesy of Fondazione Pieta dei Turchini in Naples

Metalworking has been central to the rise and success of Birmingham over hundreds of years. But how has this industry affected the culture of the city? Did the experience of working with metal and hearing the continuous clang of metal-on-metal seep into the personality and creativity of Birmingham’s inhabitants? Gregory Leadbetter’s poem traces this story from the discovery of ore in the Staffordshire hills, through the Staffordshire Hoard, the Birmingham Pieces from the Knights Templar, the establishment and development of Birmingham as a great metalworking centre becoming the Toyshop of the World, the development of steam power by Matthew Boulton, being the birthplace of the Industrial Revolution and the City of a Thousand Trades, all the way to the birth of Heavy Metal Music. Metal City is a co-commission between BBC Radio 3 and The Space with funding from Arts Council England. It’s a collaboration with Royal Birmingham Conservatoire. And special thanks to Birmingham City University’s School of Jewellery for metal facilities. Producer Melvin Rickarby, grandson of a metal worker and whose dad moved from the metal factory to the steel strings of the bass guitar. Producer Rosie Boulton, great great granddaughter of a brass maker. A Must Try Softer Production