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BBC Radio 3 is a radio channel that started transmitting on the 30th September 1967. It replaced Third Programme.

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Afternoon Concert

Music: Classical

Unique performances with BBC Orchestras, Choirs and other great orchestras

Unique performances with BBC Orchestras, Choirs and other great orchestras from around the world

Afternoon on 3: BBC National Orchestra of Wales on the Road

Afternoon Concert: BBC National Orchestra of Wales on the Road: Episode 3: North Wales

North Wales

Episode 3

Episode 3: North Wales

BBC National Orchestra of Wales on the Road

BBC Radio 3 - Afternoon Concert, BBC National Orchestra of Wales on the Road, North Wales

The BBC NOW performs in North Wales. Includes Weber, Haydn, Mathias and Dvorak.

The BBC National Orchestra of Wales spends much of its life 'on the road' and today's programme finds it in North Wales playing symphonies by Haydn and Dvorak.

BBC National Orchestra of Wales - around Wales and beyond

Each season the BBC National Orchestra of Wales gives concerts throughout the principality, visiting festivals and promoting its own seasons of 'North Wales Tours' as well as appearing in the South, including its home at BBC Hoddinott Hall. In this week of Afternoon on 3 we visit some of the festivals and venues through Wales, with comments from the players, and in Friday's programme we venture further afield and discover the strong ties between Wales and Italy.

Today - North Wales

It's a five hour coach journey up to the North for the Cardiff-based players of the BBC National Orchestra of Wales. It's a trip they make several times each year to fulfil their "national" role. We catch up with them in the company of Principal Guest conductor Jac van Steen on the border with England in Wrexham, Garry Walker raises the baton in the seaside holiday town of Llandudno, and from just a couple of months back, Rory MacDonald conducts Dvorak's ever-popular ninth symphony from the North Wales International Music Festival in St. Asaph, in the smallest ancient cathedral in Britain.

The St. Asaph Festival was founded in 1972 by Welsh composer William Mathias (he's buried here, just beside the cathedral), but for nearly two decades, Mathias taught at the university in Bangor an hour further West along the road. The orchestra is still a regular visitor to the Prichard Jones Hall here, set high on a hill overlooking the Menai Straits and the Isle of Anglesey. This afternoon we go back in the BBC archives to a concert from February 1985 conducted by William Mathias to celebrate the centenary of the university. This is the world premiere of his Anniversary Dances, written for the occasion. Presented by Penny Gore. 

2.20pm
Weber: Der Freischutz Overture
Jac van Steen, conductor

2.30pm
Haydn: Symphony No. 70 in D major
Garry Walker, conductor

2.45pm
Mathias: Anniversary Dances
conducted by the composer

3.10pm
Dvorak: Symphony No.9 in E minor "From The New World"
Rory MacDonald, conductor.

Afternoon Concert: BBC National Orchestra of Wales on the Road

Live music and the arts: broadcasts more live music than any other radio network. Classical music is its core. Genres include world and new music, jazz, speech and drama.

Series of performances given in the UK and abroad by the BBC National Orchestra of Wales

Series of performances given by the BBC National Orchestra of Wales - in the principality and around Europe

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Afternoon Concert

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Episode 3: North Wales

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