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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

Kate Molleson

An informative guide to composers' lives and their music.

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

Composer of the Week: Arvo Part (1935-)

Composer of the Week: Arvo Part (1935-): Episode 3: Silence Is Like Fertile Soil

Arvo Part (1935-)

Episode 3

Episode 3: Silence Is Like Fertile Soil

Silence Is Like Fertile Soil

BBC Radio 3 - Composer of the Week, Arvo Part (1935-), Silence Is Like Fertile Soil

Donald Macleod focuses on the composition of Part's work For Alina.

Donald Macleod focuses on Part's work For Alina, which came after a nine-year period of virtual musical silence and heralded a new direction in his career.

Donald Macleod continues his exploration of the life and music of Estonian composer Arvo Pärt.

Pärt had been listening, looking, reading, studying, probing, observing through some nine years of virtual silence, searching for a new style, when, one sunny morning in February 1976, he came through on the other side as he wrote down a piano piece which was to be called, in Estonian, Aliinale: For Alina. The music has no fixed metre or tempo. It's marked: "Calm, exalted, listening to one's inner self." It's seemingly so simple - timeless - but it answered many questions for Pärt. He says of this point in his life, as if he were describing the music of For Alina itself: "Begin from zero, from nothing. It's like if there is fresh snow and nobody has walked [on it], and you take the first steps on this snow. And this is the beginning of new life." Part of the BBC's Classical Voice Season, celebrating the art of singing.

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 the life and work of Estonian composer Arvo Part

Donald Macleod explores the life and work of Estonian composer Arvo Part, considered to be the most popular contemporary composer.

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Arvo Part (1935-)

Episode 3: Silence Is Like Fertile Soil

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