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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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Composer of the Week

Music: Classical

An informative guide to composers' lives and their music.

An informative and accessible guide to composers' lives and their music.

Composer of the Week: Edward Elgar (1857-1934)

Composer of the Week: Edward Elgar (1857-1934): Episode 4: Elgar and The Fringes of the Fleet

Edward Elgar (1857-1934)

Episode 4

Episode 4: Elgar and The Fringes of the Fleet

Elgar and The Fringes of the Fleet

BBC Radio 3 - Composer of the Week, Edward Elgar (1857-1934), Elgar and The Fringes of the Fleet

Donald Macleod explores Elgar's song cycle The Fringes of the Fleet.

Donald Macleed explores Elgar's song cycle The Fringes of the Fleet, which used words written by Rudyard Kipling.

By the end of the Great War, Sir Edward Elgar couldn't compose any music to celebrate peace, disillusioned as he was by the whole period, which Donald Macleod explores in conversation with Terry Charman from the Imperial War Museum.

With no end in sight for the war, it continued on into 1917. This is when Elgar heard of the death of his friend and supporter Hans Richter, who had given the premiere of some of Elgar's best known works, including the Enigma Variations. Things however were starting to change in Britain, with a new government, and the introduction of convoys to protect cargo and hospital ships from the German u-boat campaign. But with the continued reports of atrocities on the front line, and increased deprivations at home, Elgar finally found the stimulus to finish his work The Spirit of England, with a setting of The Fourth of August. It wasn't only war music which Elgar concentrated on during this time, as he also composed his only ballet incorporating 18th century French costumes and classical mythology, in The Sanguine Fan.

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.

Donald Macleod explores the life and music of Elgar during the First World War

Donald Macleod and Terry Charman from the Imperial War Museum explore the life and music of Elgar during the First World War, tracing how events affected him

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Edward Elgar (1857-1934)

Episode 4: Elgar and The Fringes of the Fleet

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