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

BBC Radio 3

Radio 3

Private Passions Podcast

Private Passions

Discussion & Talk

Music: Classical

Guests from all walks of life discuss their musical loves and hates

Guests from all walks of life discuss their musical loves and hates, and talk about the influence music has had on their lives

Private Passions: Celia Imrie

Celia Imrie

10/06/2012

BBC Radio 3 - Private Passions, Celia Imrie

Michael Berkeley's guest is actress Celia Imrie.

Michael Berkeley's guest is actress Celia Imrie. Her musical choices include Shostakovich, Josef Suk, Brahms, Charpentier, Puccini, Prokofiev and Shirley Bassey.

Michael Berkeley's guest this week is one of the most successful British actresses of recent decades. Celia Imrie has enjoyed frequent collaborations with Victoria Wood from the 1970s onwards, appearing as Miss Babs in the spoof TV soap 'Acorn Antiques', and as Philippa Moorcroft in 'Dinnerladies'. Other major TV roles include Diana Neal in After You've Gone, and Gloria Millington in Kingdom. Her film credits include Nanny McPhee, Hilary and Jackie (in which she played Iris du Pre), Calendar Girls, Bridget Jones' Diary, the 2007 remake of St Trinian's, in which she played the Matron, and The Best Exotic Marigold Hotel . She is also a highly successful stage actress, appearing in Michael Frayn's Noises Off in London's West End, for which she was nominated for an Olivier Award.

Celia Imrie learnt to play the piano as a child, and her musical private passions begin with Shostakovich's Second Piano Concerto, played by Leonard Bernstein. She has also chosen one of Josef Suk's Love Songs for piano, written for his wife, Dvorak's daughter Ottilie. Celia Imrie's mother was a violinist, and her choices include the finale of Brahms's Violin Concerto played by NIgel Kennedy. A great opera-lover, she has selected arias from Charpentier's opera Louise, sung by Montserrat Caballe, and Puccini's Tosca, sung by Maria Callas and Tito Gobbi, which she loves for its dramatic intensity. Celia wanted to be a dancer, and finds it hard to sit still while listening to the waltz from Act I of Prokofiev's ballet Cinderella. Her final choice is Shirley Bassey singing 'Diamonds Are Forever'.

First broadcast in June 2012.

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.

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