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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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Afternoon Concert

Music: Classical

Unique performances with BBC Orchestras, Choirs and other great orchestras

Unique performances with BBC Orchestras, Choirs and other great orchestras from around the world

Afternoon on 3: Thursday Opera Matinee

Afternoon Concert: Thursday Opera Matinee: Purcell - The Fairy Queen

Performances & Events

Music: Classical: Opera

Total Immersion: Thea Musgrave

23/04/2015

Purcell - The Fairy Queen

BBC Radio 3 - Afternoon Concert

Katie Derham presents a performance of Purcell's opera The Fairy Queen given in Graz.

Katie Derham presents a performance of Purcell's opera The Fairy Queen given in Graz in 2014. Plus the BBC NOW in B Tommy Andersson's Death in Venice.

Katie Derham presents today's Thursday Opera Matinee, Purcell's The Fairy Queen. Described as a semi-opera, the Fairy Queen was based on Shakespeare's A Midsummer Night's Dream and premiered at the Drury Lane Theatre in 1692. Unlike what we now think of as opera, this was an opulant mixture of spoken dialogue, incidental music and masques. In this performance from Graz recorded last year, Nikolaus Harnoncourt conducts a top cast including Dorothea Roschmann, and Florian Boesch. Plus more from the BBC National Orchestra of Wales: Composer in Association B Tommy Andersson's tribute to Wagner called Death in Venice.

2pm
Purcell: The Fairy Queen
Dorothea Roschmann (soprano)
Martina Jankova (soprano)
Elisabeth von Magnus (mezzo-soprano)
Terry Wey (countertenor)
Joshua Ellicot (tenor)
Florian Boesch (bass)
Arnold Schoenberg Chorus
Concentus Musicus Vienna
Nikolaus Harnoncourt (conductor)

c.4.10pm
Andersson: Death in Venice
BBC National Orchestra of Wales
Thomas Sondergard (conductor).

Afternoon Concert: Thursday Opera Matinee

Thursday Opera Matinee

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.

Afternoon on 3

Series of fifteen operas recently recorded at some of world's greatest opera houses

Series of operas performed at venues around the world. Singers such as Bryn Terfel, Anna Netrebko, Simon Keenlyside and Joyce DiDonato perform under conductors including Seiji Ozawa and Simon Rattle

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Purcell - The Fairy Queen

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