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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: Giuseppe Verdi (1813-1901)

Composer of the Week: Giuseppe Verdi (1813-1901): Episode 3: The Gentleman Farmer

Giuseppe Verdi (1813-1901)

Episode 3

Episode 3: The Gentleman Farmer

The Gentleman Farmer

BBC Radio 3 - Composer of the Week, Giuseppe Verdi (1813-1901), The Gentleman Farmer

Verdi's agreeing to supply a new work for the Paris Opera, based on Schiller's Don Carlos.

Donald Macleod discusses Verdi's agreement to supply a new work for the Paris Opera, based on Friedrich Schiller's Don Carlos.

Donald Macleod explores Giuseppe Verdi's "middle period". Verdi often said that he felt he was without honour in his native Italy. Perhaps that's why he accepted another commission abroad. Despite his previous very negative experiences writing for the Paris Opera, it was for the "Grand Boutique" that he agreed to supply a new work. The subject agreed on was Friedrich Schiller's Don Carlos. A German play on a Spanish subject - that makes very free with history - prepared for the opera stage by a pair of Frenchmen, and set to music by an Italian, doesn't sound like a recipe for success, but Verdi created from those ingredients one of the great operatic dramas of all time: Verdi's Don Carlos.

Adagio for Trumpet and Orchestra
Gianluigi Petrarulo (trumpet)
Symphony Orchestra of Milan
Riccardo Chailly (Conductor)

Don Carlos, Act II, Sc 2 (Nel Giardin del bello)
Chorus and Orchestra of the Royal Swedish Opera
Alberto Hold-Garrido, Conductor

Don Carlos, Act III (Il Grand Inquisitor!/ Nell'ispano suol mai)
Royal Opera Chorus & Orchestra of the Royal Opera House
Robin Leggate, Tenor (Count of Lerma). 
Robert Lloyd, Tenor (The Grand Inquisitor) 
Roberto Scandiuzzi, Bass (Filippo) 
Bernard Haitink, Conductor

Don Carlos, Act III (Ballet of the Queen)
Chorus and Orchestra of La Scala, Milan
Claudio Abbado (Conductor)


Don Carlo, Act IV (Tu che le vanita / E dessa... Si, per sempre)
Wiener Phiharmonic
Sena Jurinac, Soprano (Elisabetta)
Eugenio Fernandi, Tenor (Carlo) 
Herbert von Karajan, Conductor.

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 'middle period'

Donald Macleod explores Verdi's 'middle period', when he wrote some of his best-loved operas

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Composer of the Week

Giuseppe Verdi (1813-1901)

Episode 3: The Gentleman Farmer

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