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Presenter：Stacey Rodda 盧廸思
The Culture Show has been making direct connections between art inspired by music and music inspired by art. Now it’s time for more - unexpected connections...The Culture Show is continuing its look at how the visual arts and music are so connected - sometimes directly, sometimes indirectly. We have unearthed a wealth of examples, yet we have so much more to explore. I hope that for those of you who join me for the music – much of which has never been, or is very seldom played on Radio 4 – you will also develop my passion for art. Join me, Stacey Rodda, Sunday nights at 7 pm for The Culture Show.
TWO RARE RECORDINGS AS WE REVISIT POULENC’S WORKS INSPIRED BY ART
In this episode, Poulenc’s Les Biches, a work inspired by a painting by Watteau written for a ballet of the same name. Poulenc’s models were Watteau’s depictions of Louis XIV flirting with various women in his Parc aux biche at Versailles. Diaghilev, realising the potential of this ballet, produced it for the Ballet Russes in 1924.
Poulenc responded with a light-hearted and witty series of dances, neo-classical in style. The ballet does not present a story, but rather situations or the dynamics of certain sexual relationships and is a work that brilliantly evokes its post-war world.
We are going to hear the world première recording of Poulenc’s own piano version of his ‘ballet of atmosphere’ Les Biches, performed by Jean-Pierre Armengaud. Piano scores are an essential part of rehearsing and choreographing any ballet, but the piano was also indispensable to Poulenc’s compositional process.
Among Poulenc's social and artistic acquaintances, there were as many painters as musicians or poets. 1957 saw the premiere of Le travail du peintre - The Work of a Painter, a setting of texts by Paul Éluard that pay tribute to the greatest painters/artists of the time: Picasso, Chagall, Braque, Gris, Klee, Miro and Villon. Poulenc wrote: ‘I thought it would stimulate my work to paint musically’. This piece is performed by Poulenc at the piano accompanied by Pierre Bernac, vocals.
Presenter：Stacey Rodda 盧廸思
SAINT CECILIA
The first part of a 3 part series on St. Cecilia, the patron saint of music. The series showcases diverse interpretations of music from Baroque grandeur to 21st-century reverence, and looks at a selection of the many visual masterpieces that have been created to honour her.
On this programme:
ART
French artist Gustave Moreau’s stunningly beautiful gouache and watercolor over graphite on woven paper mounted to wood panel; British artist Kate Bunce’s Pre-Raphaelite work in vibrant colours, with detail of medieval and early Renaissance art; one of the Pre-Raphaelite influenced stained glass windows created by British artist Edward Burne-Jones and designer William Morris
MUSIC
Gabriel Jackson’s La Musique - a setting of poems by Elizabeth Bishop and Charles Baudelaire on the transformative power of music; Gerald Finzi’s ceremonial ode For St Cecilia; Benjamin Britten’s response to Auden’s extraordinary imagery in his Hymn to St Cecilia
