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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.

BBC Radio 6 Music

6 Music

Composer of the Week: Iceland

Composer of the Week: Iceland: Episode 3: From the Ancients to Bjork

Iceland

Episode 3

Episode 3: From the Ancients to Bjork

From the Ancients to Bjork

BBC Radio 3 - Composer of the Week, Iceland, From the Ancients to Bjork

Works inspired by the world's oldest parliament and a lullaby sung by Bjork.

Donald Macleod introduces music inspired by the world's oldest parliament and explores the remarkable, genre-crossing voice of the most celebrated Icelandic musician, Bjork.

Donald Macleod visits the site of the world's oldest parliament - and explores the remarkable, genre-crossing voice of the world's most celebrated Icelandic musician: Bjork.

For more than a millennium, Iceland's composers have drawn upon the sounds of its unique geology: sounds created in a glacial, geothermal landscape like nowhere else on earth. Searing water explodes from fissures; the earth steams spongily underfoot; vast, electric-blue hunks of solid ice crack and collide as they bob down otherwise silent fjords. Yet Iceland's classical music tradition remains barely known. This week, Donald Macleod explores the landscapes and vistas of the world's most northerly island nation - to discover its unique musical culture.

The fleeting flute dreams of Atli Heimir Sveinsson's "21 Sounding Minutes" thread together today's story of Iceland's past both ancient and modern. At Thingvellir, historic site of the world's oldest continuous democratic parliament, Donald Macleod introduces a cantata by Jon Leifs that looks back at his hardy Scandinavian forebears, before bringing us into the 20th century with a charming piano concerto by Iceland's leading female composer Jorunn Vidar. He ends by exploring the remarkable, genre-crossing career - and voice - of unquestionably Iceland's most famous musical export: Bjork.

Atli Heimir Sveinsson: Sounds of the Night (21 Sounding Minutes)
Manuela Wiesler (flute)

Atli Heimir Sveinsson: Sounds of Flowers; Sounds of Heaven (21 Sounding Minutes)
Manuela Wiesler (flute)

Jón Leifs: Iceland Cantata, Op 13
Hallgrumskirkja Motet Choir and Schola Cantorum
Iceland SO, Hermann Bäumer (conductor)

Atli Heimir Sveinsson: Sounds of Men; Sounds of Women (21 Sounding Minutes)
Manuela Wiesler (flute)

Jórunn Viðar: Allegro (Slatta - Piano Concerto)
Steinunn Birna Ragnarsdottir (piano)
Iceland Symphony Orchestra, Petter Sundquist (conductor)

Jon Leifs: Viking's Answer, Op 54
Iceland SO, Hermann Baumer (conductor)

Atli Heimir Sveinsson: Sounds of Rain (21 Sounding Minutes)
Manuela Wiesler (flute)

Atli Heimir Sveinsson: Sounds of Sound (21 Sounding Minutes)
Manuela Wiesler (flute)

Jorunn Vidar: Vokuro
Bjork (vocals).

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 discovers the musical culture of Iceland, including the work of Jon Leifs

Donald Macleod explores the landscapes and vistas of Iceland, to discover its unique musical culture, including the work of its greatest 20th-century composer, Jon Leifs

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Episode 3: From the Ancients to Bjork

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