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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: Steve Reich (b.1936)

Composer of the Week: Steve Reich (b.1936): Episode 2

Steve Reich (b.1936)

Episode 2

BBC Radio 3 - Composer of the Week, Steve Reich (b.1936), Episode 2

Donald Macleod explores the perils and pitfalls of writing for orchestra with Steve Reich.

Donald Macleod discusses the perils and pitfalls of writing for the orchestra with Steve Reich, and presents a rare performance of the composer's sensuous piece The Four Sections.

By the late 1970s and 80s, Steve Reich - a one-time radical - was increasingly acclaimed across the musical world - his pieces performed in concert halls, his presence in demand across the world. Yet as commissions began to flood in, the composer found himself writing for ever larger, and ever more unwieldy, orchestral ensembles - a situation that threw up all sorts of challenges.and frustrations. After all, what's an American composer living in the last quarter of the 20th century got in common with the medium of Beethoven, Brahms and Mahler?

Donald Macleod discusses the perils and pitfalls of writing for the orchestra with the composer, including a rare performance of his most extended orchestral piece, the sensuous "The Four Sections". The programme also features excerpts from Reich's first major vocal piece, "Tehillim", for which he drew on his own Jewish heritage.

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 talks to one of the world's most celebrated living composers, Steve Reich

Donald Macleod talks exclusively to one of the world's most celebrated living composers, Steve Reich, and presents music spanning his remarkable musical career

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Steve Reich (b.1936)

Episode 2

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