BBC Radio 4 FM

BBC Radio 4 is a radio channel that started transmitting on the 30th September 1967. It replaced BBC Home Service.

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Tales from the Stave

Documentaries

Music: Classical

Series that tracks down the stories behind the scores of well-known pieces of music

Tales From the Stave: Series 13

Tales from the Stave: Series 13: Episode 2: Haydn's Drum Roll Symphony No 103

Episode 2

Episode 2: Haydn's Drum Roll Symphony No 103

Series 13

Haydn's Drum Roll Symphony No 103

BBC Radio 4 - Tales from the Stave, Series 13, Haydn's Drum Roll Symphony No 103

Frances Fyfield and team explore the handwritten manuscript of Haydn's Drum Roll Symphony.

Frances Fyfield is in the British Library to look at the handwritten manuscript of one of Josef Haydn's London Symphonies, the Drum Roll.

Josef Haydn's two visits to London produced the final flourish of his symphonic writing. His fame, established in the Esterhazy Court in the Austro-Hungarian Empire had travelled before him and once in the UK he was something of a celebrity. But on his final departure in 1795 he took most of his music with him. The fact that the handwritten manuscript of the Drumroll Symphony, his 103rd and penultimate, is in the hands of the British Library is due to its journey by way of the French composer Luigi Cherubini.
Frances is joined by the British Library's Richard Chesser, Percussionist Mick Doran, Co-leader of the Orchestra of the Age of Enlightenment Maggie Faultless and music scholar David Wynn Jones to tell the story of that journey. They're also inspired by the careful and clear penmanship of the composer, the small but telling instructions to players and the brilliance of his creativity under the pressure of the London celebrity spotlight.

Producer: Tom Alban.

Tales from the Stave: Series 13

Intelligent speech, the most insightful journalism, the wittiest comedy, the most fascinating features and the most compelling drama and readings anywhere in UK radio.

Frances Fyfield tracks down the stories behind the scores of well-known pieces of music

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Tales from the Stave

Series 13

Episode 2: Haydn's Drum Roll Symphony No 103

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