The poet Don Paterson meets the composer Thomas Adès.

Don Paterson received the Queen's Gold Medal for Poetry in 2010, but when he left school at 16 he was aiming for a career in music, and worked as a guitarist and composer for many years. In 1993, his first volume of poems, Nil Nil, won the Forward Prize for the Best First Collection, and since then his work has won every major British award. He is professor of poetry at the University of St Andrews.

By his mid-20s, Thomas Adès had won an international reputation as a composer, notably for his opera Powder Her Face, and his orchestral work Asyla, premiered by Simon Rattle in Birmingham. Since then he has written two more large scale operas, as well as numerous works for orchestra and for smaller groups. He is also a conductor and pianist.

Producer Clare Walker Show less