Private Passions

BBC Radio 3
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  • EVERY TWO WEEKS
Private Passions

Guests from all walks of life discuss their musical loves and hates, and talk about the influence music has had on their lives

  1. 6 DAYS AGO

    Lola Young, Baroness Young of Hornsey

    Lola Young, Baroness Young of Hornsey, grew up in care, and when she left school, she worked first for the gas board, then as a social worker and as an actor on stage and television. The idea that she would one day sit in the House of Lords never crossed her mind. When she was in her early 30s she decided to study for a degree. That led to a PhD, academic posts and eventually a Professorship in Cultural Studies at Middlesex University. She entered the House of Lords as a crossbench peer 20 years ago, where she has campaigned for change in areas such as modern slavery and fast fashion. She recently wrote a memoir called Eight Weeks, in which she pieces together her upbringing, drawing on care records and her own reflections on her childhood. Her music choices include works by Ravel, Errolyn Wallen, Philip Glass and Puccini. Presenter Michael Berkeley Producer Clare Walker

    49 min

  2. 17 NOV

    Rupert Everett

    Rupert Everett left school at 16 to train as an actor and first shot to wider fame in 1984 as a dashing public schoolboy in the film Another Country. Since then his career has been defiantly unpredictable: he’s starred in Hollywood films, taken leading roles on stage in the West End and on Broadway, and directed, written and played the lead in a passion project about Oscar Wilde’s final years. He’s made documentaries and written three candid and acclaimed memoirs. Most recently he’s turned to short stories with a collection called The American No, drawing on ideas he had pitched to film producers, all of which were rejected. His musical passions include works by Handel, Purcell, Wagner and Mahler. Presenter Michael Berkeley Producer Clare Walker

    46 min

  3. 10 NOV

    Dame Maggie Aderin-Pocock

    Dame Maggie Aderin-Pocock readily admits that her childhood television viewing played a vital role in her eventual choice of career: she loved Star Trek and The Clangers - the animated children’s show featuring little whistling mice living on a moon-like planet. Along with coverage of the Apollo missions, they helped to inspire a journey which led her to become one of the UK’s leading space experts. She’s also a passionate science communicator, and a familiar face on our screens, as co-presenter of The Sky at Night. Maggie is an authority on telescopes and space imaging, and was part of the James Webb Space Telescope team, launched by NASA in 2021. This telescope used ground-breaking technology to produce strikingly clear pictures of stars we’ve never seen before, changing how we understand the universe. Her musical passions include works by Bach, Dvorak and Purcell, as well as music inspired by the moon and by distant planets. Presenter Michael Berkeley Producer Clare Walker

    47 min

  4. 3 NOV

    Bryan Ferry

    Bryan Ferry has been a very familiar voice for more than 50 years, as the co-founder of Roxy Music and as a solo artist and songwriter. When Roxy Music first appeared on Top of the Pops in 1972, millions of viewers suddenly saw something new: an extravagantly dressed band, featuring an early synthesizer, an oboe, and Bryan leading from an upright piano, wearing a sparkling black and green jacket. 'This one definitely arrived from Planet Mars', according to one critic. It was a performance which helped to propel Bryan to stardom, and a career which has produced two dozen studio albums, and numerous international hits, as well as explorations of jazz and the songs of Bob Dylan: his most recent release, Retrospective, includes a new version of Dylan’s 1965 song She Belongs to Me. In conversation with Michael Berkeley, Bryan reflects on his early days in County Durham, the role of his art school education and his approach to song writing. His musical choices include works by Prokofiev, Elgar, Mahler and Charlie Parker. Presenter Michael Berkeley Producer Clare Walker

    49 min

  5. 27 OCT

    Brian Cox

    Brian Cox has enjoyed a prolific career in theatre, film and television over the last 60 years. Born in Dundee, he was obsessed by film from an early age and when he left school he worked behind the scenes at Dundee Rep theatre. He soon fell in love with the life he saw there and moved to London to train as an actor. Over the years he’s never been afraid to take on difficult, unlikeable characters, including Hannibal Lecter in Manhunter, Hermann Goering in Nuremberg and most recently the terrifying media tycoon and patriarch Logan Roy in the TV series Succession, for which he won a Golden Globe. On stage Brian has played King Lear at the National Theatre and won Olivier awards for his performances in Titus Andronicus and Rat in the Skull. In 2023 he portrayed the composer J S Bach in a play called The Score at the Theatre Royal, Bath. His musical choices include Bach, Mahler, Verdi and Joni Mitchell. Presenter Michael Berkeley Producer Clare Walker (This is an extended version of a programme first broadcast in 2023.)

    37 min

  6. 20 OCT

    Garth Greenwell

    The American writer Garth Greenwell won widespread acclaim for his first novel, What Belongs to You, including the British Book Award for the Debut of the Year in 2016. This success would have surprised his high-school teachers in Kentucky. As a teenager, he failed English and decided to follow a very different path: he turned to singing and eventually trained as an opera singer. Studying music led him back to literature – writing poems, novels and working as a teacher in Bulgaria. His most recent novel, Small Rain, focuses on a severe medical emergency which leads to deep meditations on our vulnerability, life and love. Garth's musical passions include works by Mahler, Britten, Richard Strauss and the 16th century English composer John Taverner. Presenter Michael Berkeley Producer Clare Walker

    47 min

  7. 13 OCT

    Sarah Ogilvie

    Sarah Ogilvie is a lexicographer and a proud and self-confessed word nerd: languages are her passion and are at the heart of her writing and scholarship. She worked as an editor at the Oxford English Dictionary and went on to write a book about the thousands of volunteers around the world who submitted words for its first edition. She has researched endangered languages in Australia, North America and most recently Indonesia. She is also the co-author of Gen Z Explained, where she analysed how 16-25-year-olds communicate with each other, in words, images and emojis. She’s currently a senior research fellow at the University of Oxford. Her musical choices include Monteverdi, Allegri, Mozart and Nina Simone. Presenter: Michael Berkeley Producer: Clare Walker

    48 min

  8. 6 OCT

    Jenny Beavan

    The costume designer Jenny Beavan has won three Academy Awards for three very different films: the elegant Merchant Ivory drama Room with a View; the post-apocalyptic Mad Max: Fury Road; and most recently the Disney film Cruella, for which she created a huge, vibrant parade of 1970s-inspired fashion. She’s received a further nine Oscar nominations across her 40 year career. She found just the right top hat for Colin Firth in the King’s Speech and ditched the deerstalker in favour of a bowler for Robert Downey Jr in Sherlock Holmes. And despite claiming she has “never been interested in fashion”, she re-created striking Dior outfits for Mrs Harris Goes to Paris. Jenny's music choices include Handel, Mendelssohn, Sondheim and - with a nod to the film the King's Speech - Beethoven. Presenter Michael Berkeley Producer Clare Walker

    48 min
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About

Guests from all walks of life discuss their musical loves and hates, and talk about the influence music has had on their lives

Information

  • Creator
    BBC Radio 3
  • Years Active
    2013 - 2024
  • Episodes
    444
  • Rating
    Explicit
  • Copyright
    © (C) BBC 2024
  • Show Website
    Private Passions

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