The Listening Service

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The Listening Service

1antimuzak
gen. 5, 2020, 1:46 am

Sunday 5th January 2020 (starting this afternoon)
Time: 17:00 to 17:30 (30 minutes long)

How to Love New Music.

All noise and no fun? Modern art and modern architecture, new plays and novels, new dance and films - all get plenty of attention and love. Modern classical music? Seemingly this just perplexes the average listener, to the extent that details of new pieces are sometimes left off concert promotional materials - too frightening for the potential audience? Why is modern classical music often thought of as hard work and how can we learn to love it? With music from Beethoven to Birtwistle to Stormzy, advocate Tom Service has words of encouragement.

2antimuzak
gen. 12, 2020, 1:46 am

Sunday 12th January 2020 (starting this afternoon)
Time: 17:00 to 17:30 (30 minutes long)

Texture.

Tom Service considers the texture of music. People often talk about the pitches and the rhythms in a piece of music, but how does it strike the ear? Is it rough or smooth, dense or transparent? And how are such textures achieved? Tom talks to composer Anna Meredith about how she creates excitement through combining different layers of orchestral sound; and to arranger Iain Farrington about how to preserve the textures of a Mahler symphony when it's arranged for only a dozen musicians.

3antimuzak
feb. 2, 2020, 1:44 am

Sunday 2nd February 2020 (starting this afternoon)
Time: 17:00 to 17:30 (30 minutes long)

The String Quartet.

Why is a chamber ensemble of two violins, viola and cello the most popular in all of music? The string quartet has inspired - and instilled fear into - composers like no other ensemble, and has been used in pop songs from the Beatles to Bjork. Tom Service explores the string quartet, from Haydn's epic 68 works for the medium, to Beethoven's heroic and tortured late masterpieces, to Shostakovich's 15 soul-bearing 20th Century works. Tom's guests are composer Dobrinka Tabakova, who takes inspiration from the wealth of quartets written before her, and one of the best quartets in the business - the Brodsky Quartet who, besides the great classical cannon, have played with pop artists including Elvis Costello, Sting and Paul McCartney in their nearly 50-year existence.

4antimuzak
feb. 16, 2020, 1:47 am

Sunday 16th February 2020 (starting this afternoon)
Time: 17:00 to 17:30 (30 minutes long)

More than the Score.

Are the 100s of recordings of each Beethoven symphony (and the thousands upon thousands of live performances over the years) really so very different from each other? Can one interpretation be better than another? What is interpretation and why is it apparently so central Western classical music? Why do we keep coming back for more? With the help of music critic Fiona Maddocks and pianist Kristian Bezuidenhout, Tom Service is on the case.

5antimuzak
març 1, 2020, 1:56 am

Sunday 1st March 2020 (starting this afternoon)
Time: 17:00 to 17:30 (30 minutes long)

The Fifth.

Tom Service savours the sound of the fifth - an interval with many meanings, from mystic drone to military bugle call. He's joined by Early Music expert Jeremy Llewellyn who explains the significance of the fifth in medieval music, related to The Music of the Spheres and used to invoke the Almighty in religious chant; and by composer David Bruce, who describes how composers today find fresh uses for this primal sound. Tom finds the open, ringing sound of the fifth in all sorts of music, from a Buzzcocks guitar solo to a Bruckner symphony, providing the thrill of adventure in the Star Wars theme and underpinning the reels of Scottish bagpipe music.

6antimuzak
març 22, 2020, 2:47 am

Sunday 22nd March 2020 (starting this afternoon)
Time: 17:00 to 17:30 (30 minutes long)

Sonata Form - Or There and Back Again.

Tom Service tells stories in sonata form. This word sonata originally meant simply a piece of music. But over the course of music history "sonata form" came to mean something very specific and laid the foundations for over two hundred years of sonatas, string quartets, symphonies and concertos. In this edition of The Listening Service Tom explores sonata form - according to the revision guides it's all about Exposition-Development-Recapitulation. But its so much more than that - the template is just the bare bones of a three act drama - lyrical, exciting and compelling musical stories are told in sonata form . How can you hear them? How is it done? With David Owen Norris at the piano.

7antimuzak
abr. 19, 2020, 1:48 am

Sunday 19th April 2020 (starting this afternoon)
Time: 17:00 to 17:30 (30 minutes long)

Lisztomania.

Tom takes a deep drive into the music of Franz Liszt, celebrated, and sometimes denigrated, for his ultra-virtuosity. Tom is joined by former Radio 3 New Generation Artist Mariam Batsashvili who plays some of her favourite moments of Liszt at the piano, and explains why Liszt has always held a special place in her heart. From struggling with being the first world-famous musician, to pre-empting the likes of Wagner and Schoenberg, Tom explores the surprising and conflicting role Liszt played on the musical stage.

8antimuzak
abr. 26, 2020, 1:42 am

Sunday 26th April 2020 (starting this afternoon)
Time: 17:00 to 17:30 (30 minutes long)

Countertenors - Classical Rock Gods!

From Frankie Valli and Jimmy Somerville to Andreas Scholl and Iestyn Davies - Tom Service celebrates the male singers hitting the high notes. Why do they do it? How do they do it? And why is it so uniquely thrilling a sound? And it's not about singing like a woman! With inside knowledge from countertenor Lawrence Zazzo.

9antimuzak
maig 31, 2020, 1:50 am

Sunday 31st May 2020 (starting this afternoon)
Time: 17:00 to 17:30 (30 minutes long)

Wagner's Ring Cycle: The Ultimate Boxset Binge.

Tom Service explores classical music's ultimate binge-listening boxset - Richard Wagner's apocalyptic four-part sixteen hour marathon music drama, The Ring. Cram-packed with heroes, heroines, gods and goddesses it took 25 years to write and has inspired everyone from JRR Tolkein to Francis Ford Coppolla and Bugs Bunny. Selfishness, deception, hypocrisy, greed, destruction; like all good boxsets they're all in there, but what's The Ring really about? And what can we, and perhaps today's world leaders, learn from it? Tom has half an hour to find out.

10antimuzak
juny 14, 2020, 1:45 am

Sunday 14th June 2020 (starting this afternoon)
Time: 17:00 to 17:30 (30 minutes long)

The Musical Universe of Maurice Ravel.

Tom Service scopes the musical world of one of his favourite composers, Maurice Ravel.

11antimuzak
jul. 5, 2020, 1:49 am

Sunday 5th July 2020 (starting this afternoon)
Time: 17:00 to 17:30 (30 minutes long)

What's the Point of Practice?

Does practice make perfect? And what is perfect practice? Tom Service asks whether anyone can become a good musician by just putting in the hours. Pianist James Rhodes talks about the role practice plays in his life, and Professor Brooke Macnamara reveals the true role practice plays in performance.

12antimuzak
jul. 19, 2020, 1:51 am

Sunday 19th July 2020 (starting this evening)
Time: 19:00 to 19:30 (30 minutes long)

Getting to Grips with Beethoven.

Beethoven: deaf for most of his life, unbearable egotist, flagrant opportunist and musical anarchist whose music reaches the heights of ecstasy. Where do you start with this bundle of contradictions, probably the most admired composer in Western music, whose works have unfailingly filled concert halls for over 200 years? Tom Service goes in search of what makes Beethoven Beethoven and suggests a few key pieces to help unlock the man and his music.

13antimuzak
jul. 26, 2020, 1:48 am

Sunday 26th July 2020 (starting this evening)
Time: 19:00 to 19:30 (30 minutes long)

The Goldberg Variations.

Tom Service is joined by harpsichordist Richard Egarr to explore one of the most mysterious, complex and rewarding pieces in all music, Bach's keyboard work The Goldberg Variations.

14antimuzak
ag. 23, 2020, 1:47 am

Sunday 23rd August 2020 (starting this evening)
Time: 19:00 to 19:30 (30 minutes long)

The Key to Keys.

What is a key? In western music, if all the intervals and possible chords in every scale in any major key are the same (and ditto for every scale and chord in every minor key), why do we need 12 major keys and 12 minor ones? What have keys meant to composers down the centuries and has that changed? Are keys now so last century (or even before that)? What even is a key? Why is the Pythagorean Comma important and what even is it? So many questions... To attempt some answers, Tom Service enlists the help of harpsichord maker and tuner Andrew Wooderson, harpsichord player Masumi Yamamoto and musicologist Katy Hamilton.

15antimuzak
set. 6, 2020, 1:44 am

Sunday 6th September 2020 (starting this afternoon)
Time: 17:00 to 17:30 (30 minutes long)

Beethoven's Ninth Symphony.

Tom Service explores arguably the most famous piece of music in the world: the Ode to Joy from Beethoven's Ninth Symphony. It's a piece which has been appropriated by everyone from the European Union, to the writer Anthony Burgess, who used it as an unsettling counterpoint to the murderous exploits of the characters in his novel A Clockwork Orange. Tom asks whether Beethoven's original vision of a musical utopia has actually turned out to be far more dangerous than the composer could ever have imagined.

16antimuzak
set. 20, 2020, 1:44 am

Sunday 20th September 2020 (starting this afternoon)
Time: 17:00 to 17:30 (30 minutes long)

Classical Music: The Height of Fashion.

Whisper it or shout it from the roof tops but Classical music is IN. There is an assumption that classical music sits above passing trends and fashions but in fact, popularity does increase, and even decrease with time. Tom talks to The Telegraph's head of fashion Lisa Armstrong about what influences fashion and how trends are made. Plus, with new listeners year on year reported through streaming services, what are they listening to? Is Classical music still all about the big three (Bach, Mozart and Beethoven) or is there a new kind of classical pushing its way into people's listening habits? Tom looks at the figures with Guy Jones, head of curation at streaming service, Primephonic.

17antimuzak
oct. 25, 2020, 2:52 am

Sunday 25th October 2020 (starting this afternoon)
Time: 17:00 to 17:30 (30 minutes long)

How to Sing Classical -Vibrato!

Good vibrations or horrible wobbling? Why do singers use vibrato? Tom Service goes to the wobbling heart of the matter of vibrato in singing. Why does it induce such visceral reactions - love and hate? Is it a matter of classical-singing artifice or is it a welcome and naturally occurring phenomenon in the healthy workings of our vocal chords, in the way our bodies make the sounds we call singing?

18antimuzak
nov. 1, 2020, 1:47 am

Sunday 1st November 2020 (starting this afternoon)
Time: 17:00 to 17:30 (30 minutes long)

Tricky Timing.

Two, three and four beats in a bar are pretty standard in music. But what happens when a composer decides to go with seven or five or 13 as the underlying structure? And why would they do that? Tom Service talks to composer Anna Meredith and conductor Martyn Brabbins about the fascination and challenge of difficult time signatures.

19antimuzak
nov. 15, 2020, 1:54 am

Sunday 15th November 2020 (starting this afternoon)
Time: 17:00 to 17:30 (30 minutes long)

Rewilding Sibelius.

Tom Service explores the music of Sibelius as a force of nature with Wild writer Jaye Griffiths. The inspiration for Sibelius's Fifth Symphony - the famous flight of sixteen majestic swans across the lake from his house north of Helsinki was, in the composer's words `One of my greatest experiences. Lord God, that Beauty." It's a well-known story, but in today's Listening Service Tom argues that Sibelius's music isn't just a prettified depiction of nature, it's a wilderness itself, with its own teeming, wild ecologies: from the pagan creationism of Luonnotar, to the primeval forest gods of Tapiola, and the elemental forces of the Oceanides. With writer Jaye Griffiths on wilderness as freedom, listening to a woodlouse, devotion to absolute life, and silence as extinction.

20antimuzak
des. 6, 2020, 1:47 am

Sunday 6th December 2020 (starting this afternoon)
Time: 17:00 to 17:30 (30 minutes long)

Becoming Beethoven's Fifth.

Beethoven 5: one of the most instantly recognisable and enduring works in all classical music. How did Beethoven compose it? How did he whittle down his musical choices from the endless number available to make this seemingly inevitable-sounding, gripping orchestral drama? For insights into the essence of composition -- how you decide what comes next -- Tom Service talks to one of today's most exciting young composers. Shiva Feshareki explains how she decides one musical path over another in her own work and what choices she has made in her new piece based on a specially recorded performance of the first movement of Beethoven's Fifth. Part of Radio 3's Beethoven Remixed project, which offers musicians and non-musicians alike the chance to create their own remixes of Beethoven's Fifth, using recordings made by the BBC National Orchestra of Wales.

21antimuzak
gen. 3, 2021, 1:47 am

Sunday 3rd January 2021 (starting this afternoon)
Time: 17:00 to 17:30 (30 minutes long)

How to Compose Music.

So you want to write a piece of music? Where do you start? And then how do you carry on? How much music theory do you need to know? Or can you get away with knowing very little about music? Tom Service offers encouragement with the help of composers Brian Irvine and Cheryl Frances-Hoad.

22antimuzak
gen. 17, 2021, 1:47 am

Sunday 17th January 2021 (starting this afternoon)
Time: 17:00 to 17:30 (30 minutes long)

Virtuosity.

Virtuosity: what does it mean to be good? Really, really good? If you're a virtuoso pianist, violinist, cellist, does that mean you can play faster than everybody else - or better? From Liszt to Paganini, Horowitz to Lang Lang, what does it mean to be a virtuoso? Are you in league with the devil, as 19th-century critics said about the violinist Paganini, or are you able to communicate more movingly, more emotionally, more humanly than other players?

23antimuzak
feb. 14, 2021, 1:51 am

Sunday 14th February 2021 (starting this afternoon)
Time: 17:00 to 17:30 (30 minutes long)

Wagner's Ring Cycle: the Ultimate Box Set Binge.

Tom Service explores classical music's ultimate binge-listening box set - Wagner's apocalyptic four-part 16-hour marathon music drama, The Ring. Packed with heroes, heroines, gods and goddesses, it took 25 years to write and has inspired everyone from JRR Tolkein to Francis Ford Coppola, and Bugs Bunny.

24antimuzak
feb. 21, 2021, 1:48 am

Sunday 21st February 2021 (starting this afternoon)
Time: 17:00 to 17:30 (30 minutes long)

The Feasibility of Studies.

Studies began life as an aid in the struggle to master the piano within the human limitations of two hands and ten fingers. But from being the bane of many a pianist's life and a means of selling more pianos, these arid technical exercises flowered into some of the greatest music written for piano from Chopin, though Debussy to György Ligeti. And in Conlon Nancarrow's studies for player piano, they even inspired the greatest set of keyboard works beyond any human ability. To find out how and why studies evolved to transcend their original function, Tom Service is joined by musicologist Katy Hamilton and talks to Pierre-Laurent Aimard who worked closely with Ligeti on his extraordinary series of studies, widely regarded as some of the greatest piano music of the 20th century.

25antimuzak
març 7, 2021, 1:52 am

Sunday 7th March 2021 (starting this afternoon)
Time: 17:00 to 17:30 (30 minutes long)

The Viola - Music's Secret Fire.

Tom Service explores the viola's secret influence in music, setting out to unlock the key to its elusive sound and to understand how it can drive the energy of the orchestra. To find out he speaks to Lawrence Power, one of the world's great viola players, and Sally Beamish, viola player and composer.

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