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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: Michael Tippett (1905-1998): Christopher and David

Michael Tippett (1905-1998)

Christopher and David

BBC Radio 3 - Composer of the Week, Michael Tippett (1905-1998), Christopher and David

Exploring Tippett's life via his intense personal relationships. Today, two friends.

Donald Macleod explores Tippett's life via his intense personal relationships. Today, his lifelong friends Christopher Fry and David Ayerst.

Michael Tippett was a particularly absorbent composer, soaking up an incredibly wide range of inspirations and influences from the world around him, and perhaps most often from outside the field of music. His huge intellectual capacity and endless interest in other people combined with immense charisma to make him a personality to which everyone who met him seemed irresistibly drawn. His - often complex - relationships were particularly intense ones, and frequently blurred the lines between professional and personal, artistic and sexual. 

This week Composer of the week looks at some of the people closest to Tippett and asks what influence they had on the life and music of a man whose story has still never been fully told. Joining Donald Macleod to explore sometimes uncharted territory is Oliver Soden, the author of a new - and the first complete - biography of the composer.

Today, Donald Macleod looks at Tippett's lifelong friendships with the poet and playwright Christopher Fry and the journalist and writer David Ayerst.

Tippett: Dance, Clarion Air 
Christ Church Cathedral Choir, Oxford 
Medici String Quartet 
Stephen Darlington, Director 

Tippett: Piano Concerto – 1: Allegro non troppo 
Benjamin Frith, Piano 
BBC Scottish Symphony Orchestra 
George Hurst, conductor 

Tippett: Crown of the Year – Prelude (Autumn); Victoria rules an autumn land  
Christ Church Cathedral Choir, Oxford 
Medici String Quartet 
Stephen Darlington, Director 

Tippett: The Blue Guitar – 3: Dreaming 
Craig Ogden, guitar 

Tippett: The Rose Lake 
BBC National Orchestra of Wales 
Richard Hickox, conductor

Composer of the Week: Michael Tippett (1905-1998)

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 explores Tippett's life via his intense personal relationships.

Donald Macleod explores Tippett's life via his intense personal relationships. He is joined by Oliver Soden,  author of a new - and the first complete - biography of the composer.

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Composer of the Week

Michael Tippett (1905-1998)

Christopher and David

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