Composer of the Week: Clementi

Original version

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

BBC Radio 3

Radio 3

Migrated podcast image for: Composer Of The Week

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: Muzio Clementi (1752-1832): Prodigy for Sale

Muzio Clementi (1752-1832)

Prodigy for Sale

BBC Radio 3 - Composer of the Week, Muzio Clementi (1752-1832), Prodigy for Sale

Donald Macleod explores the circumstances that brought Muzio Clementi to England.

Donald Macleod examines the musicians who influenced Muzio Clementi in his formative years and the circumstances that brought him to live in his adopted land of England.

Muzio Clementi was one of the 18th and 19th century’s most revered musicians – a star performer, a composer admired by Czerny, Beethoven and Chopin and an astute musical businessman. However, he also had his detractors in his own time and history hasn’t been as kind to him as to the greater names of his time – Haydn, Mozart and Beethoven. Today his name is unfamiliar to most but it is certainly better known than the music he wrote. He was fortunate to have interactions with perhaps the world's three greatest composers, but this fortune may have also worked against him - putting him in direct competition with them. Over this week of programmes, Donald Macleod explores Clementi’s contact with the greatest composers of his day, reassessing the life and music of the man known as the “father of the piano” in the light of these encounters. 

In Monday’s programme, Donald examines the musicians who impacted Clementi in his formative years and explores the remarkable circumstances which brought the child prodigy Clementi to live in his adopted land of England.

Symphony No 3 (finale)
Mozarteum Orchester Salzburg
Ivor Bolton, conductor

Musical Characteristics, Op 19
Pietro Spada, piano

Piano Sonata in A flat Major, WoO 13 
Dominic Cheli, piano

Sonata for piano, Op 2 No 4
Howard Shelley, piano

Duetto in C Major, Op 3 No 3 (Presto)
Pietro Spada, piano
Giorgio Cozzolino, piano

Produced by Sam Phillips for BBC Wales

Composer of the Week: Muzio Clementi (1752-1832)

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 Clementi's contact with the greatest composers of his day.

Donald Macleod explores Clementi's contact with the greatest composers of his day, reassessing the life and music of the man known as the 'father of the piano'.

Accessibility links

Programme Index

Composer of the Week

Muzio Clementi (1752-1832)

Prodigy for Sale

Genres

Brand

Series

BBC Radio 3

About BBC Radio 3