The BBC Beethoven Experience

from Gramaphone:

This week BBC Radio 3 broadcasts every note Beethoven wrote – totalling over 100 hours of music.

Taking listeners through ‘The Beethoven Experience’ will be a panel of experts including Alfred Brendel (the guide for the piano sonatas), Peter Cropper of The Lindsays (the string quartets) and Sir Roger Norrington (the symphonies). In between, John Hurt will read from the composer’s letters and John Suchet will present excerpts from his Beethoven biography.

As part of the event all nine of Beethoven’s symphonies are being made available to download. Beginning today with Symphonies Nos 1 and 3, Radio 3 will broadcast throughout the week a complete cycle from the BBC Philharmonic under Gianandrea Noseda, recorded in the orchestra’s Manchester home, the Bridgewater Hall. The day after broadcast, the performances are then available for download for the subsequent week.

For more information, visit: www.bbc.co.uk/radio3/beethoven

[via Beethoven News]

And Norman Labrecht writes about the Beethoven experience:

The Beethoven week is a robust reminder that there is life yet in the
Reithian principle: that broadcasting must educate and inform, and that there is
no better way in the 21st century for nation to speak peace unto nation.

Beethoven, music, podcasts