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BBC Radio 3 is a radio channel that started transmitting on the 30th September 1967. It replaced Third Programme.

BBC Radio 3

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The Essay Podcast

The Essay

Discussion & Talk

Factual: Arts, Culture & the Media

Essays from leading writers on arts, history, philosophy, science, religion and beyond.

Leading writers on arts, history, philosophy, science, religion and beyond, themed across a week - insight, opinion and intellectual surprise.

The Essay: Get Playing

The Essay: Get Playing: Episode 2: Get Playing: Joanne Harris on playing the flute and bass guitar

Get Playing: Joanne Harris on playing the flute and bass guitar

Episode 2

Episode 2: Get Playing: Joanne Harris on playing the flute and bass guitar

Get Playing

BBC Radio 3 - The Essay, Get Playing, Get Playing: Joanne Harris on playing the flute and bass guitarClose menu

Writer Joanne Harris discusses her love of playing the flute and bass guitar.

As part of BBC Music Get Playing, writer Joanne Harris explains her love of playing the flute and bass guitar and explores the origin of their importance to her.

As part of BBC Music Get Playing, supporting amateur music making around the UK, 5 leading writers and artists contribute an Essay in this series, in which they talk about their little-known passions for playing an instrument.

In the second programme, the award-winning novelist Joanne Harris (best known for her novel "Chocolat") describes how she learned to play the flute as a child. This was followed by the bass guitar which she began after falling in love with a drummer in a band and wanting to join. 

When she heard the story told by her grandfather of how he had refused to hand his double bass over to a Nazi soldier in occupied France, the young Joanne Harris realised that a musical instrument could be a powerful force. She began playing herself, first the flute and then, as a 16 year old, the bass guitar. She's continued to play both instruments and is now developing a way of telling stories in performances which incorporates music. 

In this Essay, Joanne tells the story of her performing life and considers the way in which music can be an essential part of storytelling. 

for more information visit bbc.co.uk/getplaying 

Producer: Emma Kingsley.

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.

Writers and artists they talk about their little-known passions for playing an instrument.

As part of the BBC Music Get Playing scheme, leading writers and artists they talk about their little-known passions for playing an instrument

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