Saturday Classics

Cerys Matthews takes us on a personal guided tour of the musical world, taking in Bellini and Blind Snooks Eaglin, Max Richter and the Rhos Male Voice Choir, with poetry too from Rumi, Dylan Thomas and W B Yeats.

Conductor Yan Pascal Tortelier chooses music from Paris in the Belle Époque as part of "Debussy's Paris" marking the 100th anniversary of the death of Debussy this weekend. His choices include music by Maurice Ravel, Paul Dukas, Florent Schmitt, Jacques Offenbach, Camille Saint-Saens, Lili Boulanger, and Claude Debussy. 1.30-1.40 Debussy's Paris 4: "The Paris Expositions and Art Nouveau" Georgia Mann continues her journey through fin-de-siècle Paris at the Eiffel Tower and the Grand Palais with French art curator Emanuel Coquery and a look at the impact of the Great Paris Expositions and the explosion of the Art Nouveau.

Rosalind Plowright introduces the music that has been most influential on her life and operatic career. Including John Ogdon playing Beethoven, Maria Callas singing Puccini and Bernhard Klee conducting Mahler.

Baritone Roderick Williams chooses music concerned with different modes of transport, including works by Schubert, Wagner, Stanford, Liszt, Honegger, Vaughan Williams and John Adams.

Clarinettist Julian Bliss, who plays both classical and jazz clarinet, chooses pieces that show the influence of jazz on classical music. With compositions by Gershwin, Bartok, Bernstein, Copland and Stravinsky, who once agreed to write an 'easy-listening' piece for the Paul Whiteman band.

To mark Australia Day on 26th January, Artistic Director of the Australian Chamber Orchestra Richard Tognetti chooses some of his favourite pieces and performers, including works by Bach, Haydn, Mozart, Beethoven, Grainger, Lutoslawski, Peter Sculthorpe and Brett Dean.

The composer, pianist and producer Max Richter introduces some of the music that has inspired him.

The trumpeter Tine Thing Helseth with her personal choices, including music that inspired her when she was growing up in Norway.

Baritone Sir Thomas Allen shares some of his favourite musical moments: works by Beethoven, Wagner and Humperdinck; treasured voices such as Nicolai Ghiaurov in Verdi's Don Carlo and Kenneth McKellar in Handel's Messiah; and festive treats, including Finzi's Christmas Scene, In Terra Pax.

Soprano Ailish Tynan explores the effect different languages have on songs and vocal works. Ailish feels that words are the foundation blocks to unlocking a song, and explores the fascinating way different languages (English, French, German) very often dictate the style of a song or vocal work. Her music choices include Reynaldo Hahn's Bach-flavoured A Chloris, the Irish folk-song The Last Rose of Summer, Handel's Messiah and the Ode to Joy from Beethoven's Ninth Symphony, as well as works by Stanford, Poulenc and Carl Orff.

Sakari Oramo, Chief Conductor of the BBC Symphony Orchestra, introduces a selection of music from his home country of Finland. His choices include piano music by the great symphonist Sibelius, music for orchestra and birds by Rautavaara, early choral music, a fine symphony by the little-known composer Ernst Mielck, and Songs from the Sea by Sallinen.

Soprano Ailish Tynan shares great moments in opera, including music by Handel, Mozart, Humperdinck, Wagner, Richard Strauss, Janacek and Benjamin Britten.

As part of the BBC Opera Season, one of the greatest singers of his generation, bass Robert Lloyd charts the cultural, social and technological changes of the opera stage through the music he has performed and experienced over the past 50 years.

In a special show in front of a live audience at Wellcome Collection, star soprano Lesley Garrett presents music that brings back memories for her - from the people, places and events that have shaped her life and career. Part of Why Music? The Key to Memory, a weekend of live events, concerts and discussions exploring the implications of music's unique capacity to be remembered, produced by Radio 3 in partnership with Wellcome Collection.

In the second of two programmes Rachel Podger, described by The Sunday Times as "Queen of the Baroque violin", shares the music that has helped to define her musical personality - much of it encountered during her childhood years in Kassel. Rachel's choices range from Tallis to Stravinsky via Monteverdi, Mozart, Schubert, Brahms and Vaughan Williams, and not forgetting her beloved Bach, of whose music she says "I don't think a day goes by when I don't play some or listen to some'. She talks engagingly about singing in her father's choir, The William Byrd Singers, where she absorbed Renaissance polyphony "by osmosis"; a memorable school-chamber orchestra trip round Eastern Europe in the declining years of the Ostblock; her love of Glenn Gould's idiosyncratic approach to the performance of Bach's music; her revelatory first encounter with 'authentic' performance practice; and much more.

In the first of two programmes, Rachel Podger, "queen of the Baroque violin", introduces some of the music that inspires her.

As part of the BBC's autumn Opera Season, Danielle de Niese, hailed as "opera's coolest soprano" by New York Times Magazine presents a personal selection of the music closest to her heart.

Rob's selection this week includes music by Bartok, Verdi, Prokofiev and Monteverdi performed by Janos Starker, Margaret Price and Paul McCreesh.

Chi-chi Nwanoku profiles black composers and performers down the centuries, with their friends and contemporaries.

Rob presents works by Mozart, Saint-Saens, Wagner and Dvorak from performers including Arturo Toscanini, Christian Zacharias, David Oistrakh and Il Giardino Armonico.

Pianist James Rhodes continues his series of three consecutive Saturday Classics, sharing the music, recordings and musicians he's most passionate about. Today's show includes Teodor Currentzis, the Russian-Greek conductor who once claimed 'I will save Classical Music', in Stravinsky and Shostakovich, chamber music by Schubert and Tchaikovsky, and the iconic Herbert Von Karajan with the Vienna Philharmonic Orchestra in Bruckner.

Pianist James Rhodes is back with the first of three consecutive Saturday Classics, choosing the music, recordings and musicians he's most passionate about. Today's show includes the iconic pianists Martha Argerich, Vladimir Horowitz, and Mikhail Pletnev, plus violinist James Ehnes in Bach and Mendelssohn, and Mariss Jansons conducting Wagner.

James Rhodes has been obsessed with the iconic Canadian pianist Glenn Gould for as long as he can remember. Ahead of his Sunday Feature tomorrow, this afternoon he selects his pick of Gould's idiosyncratic and often controversial recordings - from his distinctive Bach, to Beethoven with the Columbia Symphony Orchestra, his own transcription of the Meistersingers Overture, and Prokofiev's 7th Piano Sonata, which the New York Times described as 'an explosive burst of rock and roll with a chromatic edge'. James presents his documentary Geeking Glenn Gould on Sunday 25th June at 1845. CANADA 150: a week of programmes from across Canada, marking the 150th anniversary of the founding of the nation and exploring the range and diversity of Canadian music and arts.

Rob Cowan with music by Richard Strauss, Debussy, Verdi and Copland from performers including Mirella Freni, Gérard Souzay and Maurizio Pollini.

Pianist James Rhodes presents a personal selection of music including works by Stravinsky, Sibelius and Schumann, and performances by Arcadi Volodos and Radu Lupu. James will be back with a Saturday Classics devoted to Glenn Gould on the 24th June.

Pianist James Rhodes presents a personal selection of music including works by Chopin, Saint-Saëns and Beethoven, and performances by Krystian Zimerman and Garrick Ohlsson. Plus extracts of Don Giovanni conducted by Teodor Currentzis. James is back with more choices next Saturday at 1pm.

Live from Free Thinking at Sage Gateshead the composer and pianist Richard Sisson brings his infectious enthusiasm to an idiosyncratic journey through music articulated by the boundless, cyclic, remorseless unfolding of Time; from the clock's ominous striking of midnight in Prokofiev's Cinderella to vivid evocations of heady times past in Berlioz's Symphonie Fantastique, with works by Finzi, Tchaikovsky and Beethoven along the way. For many years the piano playing half of cabaret act Kit and the Widow, Richard has composed extensively, particularly for the theatre, including the music for Alan Bennett's The History Boys.

CBeebies presenter Chris Jarvis chooses music composed for, and about, children - including pieces by Mozart, Britten, Debussy, Mussorgsky, Humperdinck, Poulenc, Tchaikovsky, Delibes, Paul Paterson and Jim Parker's "Captain Beaky and his Band"!

Rob presents a specially chosen selection of music including works by Franck, Bach and Bartok, performed by Ernest Ansermet, Zuzana Ruzickova and Stanley Drucker.

On the eve of the BAFTA awards, film critic Peter Bradshaw presents a personal selection of music from cinema and beyond: from Hannibal Lecter's favourite Bach, to Katharine Hepburn as Clara Schumann, and a Handel aria used in a chilling Michael Haneke horror film. Plus Peter's memories of his days at Cambridge University alongside star student George Benjamin, and his own youthful endeavours with composition lessons and the classical guitar.

Rob Cowan with music by Beethoven, Arnold, Chopin and Debussy, in classic recordings from artists including Fritz Wunderlich, Emil Gilels, Thomas Beecham and Arturo Benedetti Michelangeli.

Music from Finzi, Mozart, Prokofiev and Elgar with performers including David Oistrakh, Eugene Ormandy, Fritz Reiner and Karl Richter.

Conductor Jessica Cottis was born in Australia and grew up there. Now based in the UK she regularly returns to conduct in Sydney, Queensland and Adelaide. Ahead of Australia Day later this week she presents a personal selection of contemporary music from her homeland, including orchestral works by Peter Sculthorpe and Richard Meale, and the didgeridoo playing of the virtuosic William Barton. Image Credit: MJ Cruz.

Rob Cowan's hand-picked selection this afternoon includes Smetana's Czech Song and a work by Brahms for the unusual combination of choir, two horns and harp, as well as Bach from pianist Friedrich Gulda and a major orchestral piece by Edward Gregson.

Dance critic Mark Monahan presents music for the ballet from the 1930s to the present day. Including music by Prokofiev, Stravinsky, Khachaturian and Philip Glass.

Michel Roux Jr does not allow music in his restaurants nor in their kitchens. For him the food is the music. However, he is a great music lover - of both classical music and, in particular, of the mainly French chanson tradition. In this edition of Saturday Classics he presents a selection of music including Wagner, Vivaldi, Mozart, Brassens, Piaf, Brel and Trenet. First broadcast in December 2013.

Dance critic Mark Monahan goes on a whistle-stop tour through the first 100 years of the ballet as we know it today, looking at the ground-breaking works that took cities such as Paris and St Petersburg by storm. He traces the history of ballets such as The Nutcracker and Swan Lake which were - surprisingly - both resounding flops when Tchaikovsky premiered them, only being rescued later by the dance-maker Marius Petipa. And he looks at the enormous influence of Sergei Diaghilev and the Ballets Russes, beginning with Mikhail Fokine's 1907 ballet Chopiniana, leading to famous scores by Stravinsky and Ravel. Image of Mark Monahan courtesy of David Rose.

Rob Cowan's selection this week includes Arturo Benedetti Michelangeli playing Liszt, Vaclav Neumann conducting Milhaud and George Szell in Mozart.

Deborah Bull is a former Royal Ballet principal dancer and was a Creative Director of the Royal Opera House. She is currently assistant principal at King's College London. Deborah chooses music which was not originally written for the ballet but was later appropriated by choreographers for the ballet stage. Her choices include music by Tchaikovsky, Bach, Ravel, Schubert, Stravinsky and Max Richter.

In the second of two programmes, journalist Simon Heffer charts a chronological profile of the life and music of the French composer Maurice Ravel. Today's programme includes "Le Tombeau de Couperin" and "La Valse", plus excerpts from Ravel's two piano concertos and the opera "L'Enfant et les sortilèges".

In the first of two programmes, journalist Simon Heffer offers a chronological profile of the life and music of the French composer Maurice Ravel. Today's programme includes recordings of some of Ravel's early songs and piano pieces as well as chamber music, including his String Quartet and Piano Trio, and his first forays into the orchestral world with excerpts from Daphnis et Chloé and Ma Mere L'Oye.

Rob Cowan's hand-picked selection this week includes music by Zelenka, Ravel, Handel and Shostakovich. There's also piano music by Chopin and dances from Renaissance Hungary.