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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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Essential Classics

Music: Classical

Refresh your morning with a great selection of classical music

Refresh your morning with a great selection of classical music, presented by Suzy Klein and Ian Skelly

Essential Classics: Friday - Rob Cowan, plus Sarah Walker with Rick Wakeman

Friday - Sarah Walker with Rick Wakeman

14/08/2015

Friday - Rob Cowan, plus Sarah Walker with Rick Wakeman

BBC Radio 3 - Essential Classics, Friday - Rob Cowan, plus Sarah Walker with Rick Wakemansearch

Artist of the Week: Evelyn Glennie, featured in an excerpt from Michael Daugherty's UFO.

With Rob Cowan. Five Reasons to Love the Harpsichord; Musical challenge; Artist of the Week: percussionist Evelyn Glennie, featured in an excerpt from Michael Daugherty's UFO.

9am
A selection of music including '5 reasons to love... the harpsichord'. Rob explores the range of styles of this characterful instrument, including Spanish flavoured pieces by Soler and Scarlatti, works by Couperin with a sense of nobility, Bach's intricate Fantasia and Fugue and the percussive excitement of a concerto by Henryk Gorecki. 

9.30am
Take part in today's music-related challenge: trace the classical theme behind a well-known song. 

10am 
Throughout the week Sarah talks to the musician Rick Wakeman, who shares a selection of his favourite classical music. Rick abandoned his piano studies at the Royal College of Music to pursue a career in rock, both as a solo performer and in the prog-rock group Yes. He has since become a familiar face on television through his appearances in the BBC television series Grumpy Old Men. Rick's music choices range from Bach to Shostakovich, and his conversations with Sarah cover topics including his friendship with the harpsichord maker Thomas Goff, as well as the everyday business of being a rock legend.

10.30am
This week Rob features recordings by BBC Proms artist Dame Evelyn Glennie, one of the UK's best loved solo musicians who celebrates her 50th birthday this summer. Glennie was born in Aberdeenshire, trained at the Royal Academy of Music, and swiftly became the world's most successful virtuoso percussionist. She has recorded over thirty CDs and, as well as commissioning new works, has written percussion pieces of her own to perform. Her range of instruments is huge; from her beloved marimba to ones she's developed herself including the Simtak, made from an old car exhaust pipe.

Michael Daugherty 
Flying (3rd mvmt of UFO for solo percussion and orchestra)
Evelyn Glennie (percussion)
Colorado Symphony Orchestra
Marin Alsop (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.

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Essential Classics

Friday - Rob Cowan, plus Sarah Walker with Rick Wakeman

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