Front Row

BBC Radio 4

4.4 (113)
SOCIETY & CULTURE
UPDATED DAILY

Live magazine programme on the worlds of arts, literature, film, media and music

16 HR. AGO

Paul Mescal on Gladiator II, Murakami's latest novel, Test Tube baby drama Joy

Tom Sutcliffe talks to Paul Mescal about slipping into Russell Crowe’s sandals in Gladiator 2 – as well as reviewing the film itself with classically-trained Guardian journalist Charlotte Higgins and film critic Larushka Ivan-Zadeh. They also talk about Haruki Murakami's first new book for six years, The City and Its Uncertain Walls and the Netflix drama Joy, about how beginnings of IVF. Presenter: Tom Sutcliffe Producer: Paula McGrath

43 min
1 DAY AGO

American guitarist Pat Metheny, New initiatives to encourage musical theatre, and Does Glasgow look after its built heritage?

American guitarist Pat Metheny on how the discovery of a particular Argentinian guitar string took his latest album Moondial in a new direction. As a school by the renowned Victorian architect Charles Rennie Mackintosh comes to the open market, we discuss whether Glasgow does enough to look after its built heritage. And we hear from the outgoing artistic director of Pitlochry Festival Theatre and the artistic director of Birmingham Hippodrome about new initiatives to promote musical theatre. Plus we remember actor Timothy West, whose death was announced earlier today. Presenter: Kirsty Wark Producer: Mark Crossan

42 min
2 DAYS AGO

Winner of the 2024 Booker Prize announced live from the ceremony

Samira Ahmed is live from the Booker Prize 2024 ceremony. As well as hearing from the six shortlisted authors, Samira speaks to judges novelist Sara Collins and musician Nitin Sawhney. Campaigner for social justice Baroness Lola Young talks about the transformative power of literature. Chair of judges, artist and writer Edmund de Waal announces the winner of this prestigious award for fiction. Presenter: Samira Ahmed Producer: Claire Bartleet

28 min
2 DAYS AGO

Booker Shortlisted Authors

Ahead of tonight's Booker Prize ceremony, Front Row hears from all of the shortlisted authors: Percival Everett, Samantha Harvey, Rachel Kushner, Anne Michaels, Yael van der Wouden and Charlotte Wood. Then at 9.30pm, in a special extra edition of Front Row, Samira Ahmed hosts the ceremony. Find out who will win the prestigious literary prize. Producer: Claire Bartleet Presenter: Samira Ahmed

41 min
3 DAYS AGO

Ronnie Wood, the rise and fall of boybands, Mishka Momen

Rolling Stones guitarist, Ronnie Wood discusses his parallel career as an artist. As a new exhibition of his work opens at the Andrew Martin showroom in London, Ronnie talks about how he has drawn inspiration from Delacroix, Caravaggio and Picasso. As a new three part series Boybands Forever starts on BBC2 and the iplayer, we explore what was behind the rise and fall of the boybands of the nineties and noughties with Richie Neville of Five and Hannah Verdier from Smash Hits. And, keyboard music from before the invention of the piano. Pianist Mishka Rushdie Momen performs from her new album Reformation, a collection of pieces by Tudor-era composers William Byrd, John Bull, Orlando Gibbons and Jan Pieterszoon Sweelinck. Presenter: Tom Sutcliffe Producer: Ruth Watts

42 min
NOV 7

Review: The Piano Lesson, Florence 1504, Jonathan Coe's The Proof of My Innocence

Nancy Durrant and Nii Ayikwei Parkes join Tom Sutcliffe to review The Piano Lesson, the latest August Wilson play to be adapted for the screen by the family of Denzel Washington. Directed by Malcolm Washington and starring John David Washington, Samuel L Jackson and Danielle Deadwyler, a brother and sister argue over the future of an heirloom piano. We discuss Jonathan Coe's return with new novel The Proof of My Innocence, a satirical murder mystery. Florence in 1504 is the backdrop for the Royal Academy's new exhibition of drawings by Michelangelo, Leonardo and Raphael, and we hear from ceramicist Felicity Aylieff at Kew Gardens where her new exibition featues large scale pots up to five metres high. Presenter: Tom Sutcliffe Producer: Sarah Jane Griffiths

42 min
NOV 6

Pauline Black, Waters Rising at Perth Museum, and Posthumously Completing a Loved One's Creative Work

As a documentary about her life reaches cinemas, musician and activist Pauline Black, the lead singer in 2-tone hit band The Selecter, talks about her career. We hear from the curators of the Waters Rising exhibition at Perth Museum, which features representations of flooding in literature and art over many centuries. And as an unfinished play by award-winning writer Oliver Emanuel comes to Radio 4, and an unstaged play by writer, poet and musician Beldina Odenyo is produced in Glasgow, we discuss posthumously completing a loved one's creative work. Presenter: Kate Molleson Producer: Mark Crossan

42 min
NOV 5

Christopher Reeve documentary, Booker author Samantha Harvey on Orbital, Art auction news

Directors Ian Bonhôte and Peter Ettedgui talk about their new documentary Super/Man: The Christopher Reeve Story, which uses never-seen-before family archive to tell the story of the famed Superman actor. He became a champion of disability rights after being left paralysed from a horse riding accident. The final of Front Row's interviews with the authors on this year's Booker Prize shortlist - Samantha Harvey on her novel Orbital. As a banana stuck to a wall with duct tape is presented for auction with an estimated sale of 1 million dollars, FT columnist Melanie Gerlis, who regularly writes about the art market, explains what you get for the price and why someone would pay that. Councillor Liz Green - Chair of the Culture, Tourism, and Sport Board at the Local Government Association - talks about the impact of the Government's decision to reconsider £100m funding for six cultural regeneration projects across the UK. Presenter: Nick Ahad Producer: Ekene Akalawu

43 min

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4.4

out of 5

113 Ratings

Great Arts Podcast

03/02/2019

SuckeredByItunes

They cover a wide variety from theater to TV to art museums to books, sometimes the interviews are with creators/actors authors and sometimes with critics but there’s always something interesting.
BBC Front Row

12/11/2018

USkaren

Great hosts and guests. The conversation is always intelligent without being pedantic or pretensions.
Leftist elitist from BBC

02/01/2019

#never Viking

Ultra left wing political views interfere with reviews. Elitists just cannot help but offend a large swath of people. I will download different podcasts thank you.
Best interviews and insights

03/13/2018

NotSatisfiedScience

The BBC interviewers get amazing responses from their guests - true insights into the creative process and artistic life.