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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

Composer of the Week - Brand

An informative guide to composers' lives and their music.

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

Composer of the Week: Verdi 200

Composer of the Week: Verdi 200: Episode 2: The Gentleman Farmer

Episode 2

Episode 2: The Gentleman Farmer

Verdi 200

The Gentleman Farmer

BBC Radio 3 - Composer of the Week, Verdi 200, The Gentleman Farmer

Donald Macleod focuses on Verdi's activities in the 1860s.

Donald Macleod focuses on Verdi's activities in the 1860s, in the build-up to writing Aida. These included politics, a mid-life crisis and possibly a love affair.

[Donald Macleod explores Verdi's later life and music when, after years of honing his craft, he unleashed an outpouring of innovative masterworks that would propel opera from the world of the 19th century into the modern age. It wasn't a smooth road, though, and the aging composer had to be persuaded out of retirement several times as he found himself increasingly at odds with the world around him.]

Donald Macleod looks at Verdi's activities in the build-up to writing Aida, by which time he had become a major landowner. His life as a 'gentleman farmer' distracted him from composition - instead of writing music, he wrote to a friend, 'I only plant beans and cabbages'. In addition he tried his hand at a political career, had a mid-life crisis, and possibly an affair. But in the midst of all this he completed Aida for the opening of the Suez canal, and the eyes of the world were on him once more.

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 Verdi's later life and music

Donald Macleod explores Verdi's later life and music when, after years of honing his craft, he propelled opera from the world of the 19th century into the modern age

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Composer of the Week

Verdi 200

Episode 2: The Gentleman Farmer

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