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Last broadcast on Sat, 14 Nov 2009, 12:15 on BBC Radio 3.
Synopsis
Tom Service talks to composer Richard Rodney Bennett, impresario Lilian Hochhauser, musical pioneer Lukas Ligeti, and violinist Leonidas Kavakos.
Richard Rodney Bennett
The Great American Songbook was the first musical love of 73-year old composer Sir Richard Rodney Bennett. His reputation now – largely as a writer of film and TV scores, melodic orchestral pieces, and as a master of jazz piano and song – disguises the fact that as a student in the 1950s, Bennett fell for the novelty of hard-core modernism, moving to Paris to become the first pupil of Boulez.
He talks candidly to Tom about his first childhood musical experiences, his rejection of the modernism of his youth and early career, and his move towards a more inclusive musical language based on a lifelong passion for harmony and song – and about the connections which hold it all together.
The Hochhausers
Promoters and impresarios Victor and Lilian Hochhauser are this week being honoured with an award from the Royal Academy of Dance, in recognition of a lifetime contribution to dance in Britain. It is through their work that companies such as the Bolshoi and Kirov Ballets toured the UK in the years after the Second World War, but they also played a huge role in providing audiences the chance to witness musicians such as Dmitri Shostakovich, David Oistrakh, Mstislav Rostropovich and Sviatoslav Richter.
At her home in London, Lilian Hochhauser tells Tom how she and her husband navigated cold war Soviet bureaucracy to bring Russian musicians to Britain, and how she came to develop personal friendships with so many of the great artists they promoted.
Lukas Ligeti
New York-based composer Lukas Ligeti is attracting a following as one of the most adventurous young musical pioneers – from his music for orchestra and chamber groups, to his sonic explorations into electronica and performances as percussionist and jazz improviser.
Lukas’s music is infused with ideas from around the world, from Norwegian fiddling to Miles Davis, but it is the inspiration of traditional African rhythms and melodies which links his music to that of his father, the great Hungarian composer Gyorgy Ligeti. Ligeti junior has chosen to face head-on the challenge of defining his own unique musical language under the weight of his father’s legacy. He tells Tom about their mutually supportive yet critical relationship, and how his creativity today transcends his father’s music, but is also indebted to it.
Lukas Ligeti is on a UK tour 13-17 November
Leonidas Kavakos
Violinist Leonidas Kavakos has been hailed as a visionary soloist. He gained an international reputation as a classical musician in his teens, yet he grew up in Greece surrounded by the traditional music his father played, and has retained the influence of those folk roots.
As an Artist in Focus at the South Bank Centre in London, Kavakos has designed a series of programmes which reveal what he believes is the essence of music. Tom meets him to find out how, through performances as soloist, chamber musician, and violinist-conductor – and with music ranging from Bach to Berg, Haydn to Schnittke – Kavakos hopes to reveal to audiences his concept of Source, ‘the well-spring of inspiration that lies at the heart of all great music’.
Leonidas Kavakos: An Artist in Focus runs at London’s South Bank Centre 25 November - 1 December
Broadcast
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Sat 14 Nov 200912:15
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