Viola: The Unsung Hero

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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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Viola: The Unsung Hero: The Human Viola

The Human Viola

BBC Radio 3 - Viola: The Unsung Hero, The Human Viola

Ruth Gibson explores the viola's unique voice and repertoire that has been written for it.

Violist Ruth Gibson stands up for her overlooked and underestimated instrument - its vocal qualities, its ability to represent human emotions, and its unapologetic rebelliousness.

Violist Ruth Gibson explores her instrument's unique voice across three programmes full of intriguing musical choices. The viola may have less solo repertoire than its string siblings, the violin and the cello, and its awkward mid-range sound might be harder for listeners to hear, but Ruth believes it’s undoubtedly the unsung hero of orchestras and chamber ensembles. This butt of musical jokes has a long history of being overlooked, and Ruth will be encouraging it into the limelight at last. 

In this first episode, she unpicks the viola’s human qualities, admiring how composers write for it in ways that highlight the different sides of its personality. Her choices include one of the first viola concertos, film music that makes the most of voices in the middle of the texture, an improvisation featuring a viola d’amore, and an extremely demanding duet for two violas.

There’s also a piece by Morton Feldman where the viola’s voice adds pathos to a tragic story, and a set of variations by Paganini arranged for viola that brings out the instrument’s agility and playfulness.

A Tandem Production for BBC Radio 3

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.

Music: Classical: Orchestral

Violist Ruth Gibson explores how composers write for the the unsung hero of the orchestra.

Violist Ruth Gibson explores how composers write for the the unsung hero of orchestras and chamber ensembles, discovering pieces that maximise its unique tonal qualities.

The viola is an acoustically imperfect instrument, built too small to achieve its full acoustic potential. For violist Ruth Gibson, this awkwardness coupled with the mournful sound that it often produces is part of the viola's appeal. It may have less solo repertoire than its string siblings, and its alto voice might find it harder to cut through dense textures, but Ruth believes that the viola is undoubtedly the unsung hero of orchestras and chamber ensembles.

Ruth will explore how composers write for the viola, discovering pieces that maximise its unique tonal qualities or play with its range (which happens to be close to that of the human voice). From its role in orchestras and string quartets to contemporary solo repertoire and film and TV scores, Ruth analyses the rich, dark, warm and nasal sounds of the viola and wonders why this butt of musical jokes has such a long history of being undeservedly overlooked.

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