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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: Claudio Monteverdi (1567-1643)

Composer of the Week: Claudio Monteverdi (1567-1643): Episode 4: In Time of Plague

Claudio Monteverdi (1567-1643)

Episode 4

Episode 4: In Time of Plague

In Time of Plague

BBC Radio 3 - Composer of the Week, Claudio Monteverdi (1567-1643), In Time of Plague

Focusing on Monteverdi's acquiring a pet monkey as well as a plague outbreak in Venice.

Donald Macleod focuses on Monteverdi's acquiring the dubious gift of a pet monkey as well as the consequences for music of the outbreak of plague in Venice.

To mark 450 years since the composer's birth, Donald Macleod traces Claudio Monteverdi's remarkable rise from relatively humble origins in Cremona (he was the son of a barber-surgeon) to his subsequent career as instrumentalist and composer at the court of Vincenzo Gonzaga at Mantua, and his later promotion to the role of Director of Music at the Basilica of St Mark's in Venice. 

In today's episode, Monteverdi acquires the dubious gift of a pet monkey, and finds himself coming under the suspicious eye of the Inquisition, following an anonymous denunciation - possibly from a member of his choir! To add to his misfortunes, Venice is stricken by plague following the collapse of Mantua. The deadly pestilence will have far-reaching effects for the Republic - and as Donald recounts, it will even create a public taste for light music. 

Maladetto sia l'aspetto
Emanuela Galli, soprano
La Venexiana

Non è di gentil core 
Interotte speranze
Delitiae Musicae
Marco Longhini, director

Tancredi e Clorinda 
Andrew King (tenor), narrator
Emma Kirkby (soprano), Clorinda
Paul Agnew (tenor), Tancredi
The Consort of Musicke
Anthony Rooley, director

Laetaniae della Beata Vergine, SV204 
The Sixteen
Harry Christophers, director

Zefiro torna 
Nuria Rial, soprano
Philippe Jaroussky, countertenor
L'Arpeggiata
Christina Pluhar, director.

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 traces Monteverdi's rise from relatively humble origins in Cremona

Donald Macleod traces Claudio Monteverdi's remarkable rise from relatively humble origins in Cremona to his subsequent career as instrumentalist and composer in Mantua

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Composer of the Week

Claudio Monteverdi (1567-1643)

Episode 4: In Time of Plague

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