Sounds of Shakespeare Live

Radio 3 is broadcasting a live weekend of music and performance inspired by Shakespeare from our pop-up studio at the RSCs The Other Place and at historic venues across Stratford-upon-Avon. Come and join the Radio 3 presenters and performers!

ALL EVENTS ARE FREE.

22nd – 24th April

In Tune: Live Broadcast
The Other Place Studio Theatre
1615 – 1830
Sean Rafferty launches Radio 3’s Shakespeare anniversary weekend with a live showcase of musicians and performer, including the Chelys Consort of Viols, students from the Royal Academy of Music, the Nola Jazz Band from New Orleans and the world premiere of Love Sought – a brand new setting of text from Shakespeare’s A Winter's Tale by Roxanna Panufnik sung by Radio 3 New Generation Artist Kathryn Rudge.

World on 3: Live Music
The Other Place Studio Theatre
2015 – 2230
Verity Sharp celebrates the global influence of Shakespeare’s work – with live performances including English folk music and jazz inspired by The Bard, performed by Wes Finch and friends, as well as by the Peter Knight Trio, musicians currently performing in the RSC’s Hamlet, and guest Andrew Dickson, author of “World Elsewhere: Journeys Around Shakespeare's Globe.”

The Verb: Live Broadcast
Pop-up studio, The Other Place Foyer
2145-2245
Poet Ian McMillan hosts late night entertainment with a roundtable of writers celebrating Shakespeare's linguistic fireworks. Benet Brandreth, a rhetoric coach, has written a new novel imagining Shakespeare’s lost years and Nell Lyshon imagines a fictional meeting with Spanish literary titan Cervantes who died on the same day in 1616. Plus actor Ben Crystal and poet Wendy Cope with her new poems, commissioned by the Shakespeare Birthplace Trust.

Record Review on stage: Live Broadcast
The Other Place Studio Theatre
0945-1100
Actors Samuel West and scholar Kate Kennedy join presenter Andrew McGregor on stage to guide us through archive recordings of the greatest Shakespearean interpreters of the last hundred years, including the likes of Sybil Thorndike, Johnston Forbes-Robertson, John Gielgud and Laurence Olivier.

Saturday Classics: Live Broadcast
The Other Place Studio Theatre
1230-1400
“Brevity is the soul of wit.”
The composer and pianist Richard Sisson, the BBC Singers and friends launch a playful attempt to perform music from every single Shakespeare play – in just 75 minutes! With solo performances from mezzo-soprano Kitty Whately, baritone Mark Stone and pianist Ashley Wass.

Early Music Show: Live Broadcast
The Other Place Studio Theatre
1400-1500
Lucie Skeaping introduces soprano Ruby Hughes and lute player Jon Nordberg in a 16th century recital specially created for today, Lute songs and Pavans in Shakespeare’s England. Includes works by John Dowland and Robert Johnson.

FULL DIARY OF EVENTS

FRIDAY 22ND APRIL

In Tune: Live Broadcast
The Other Place Studio Theatre
1615 – 1830
Sean Rafferty launches Radio 3’s Shakespeare anniversary weekend with a live showcase of musicians and performer, including the Chelys Consort of Viols, students from the Royal Academy of Music, the Nola Jazz Band from New Orleans and the world premiere of Love Sought – a brand new setting of text from Shakespeare’s A Winter's Tale by Roxanna Panufnik sung by Radio 3 New Generation Artist Kathryn Rudge.

The Sounds of Shakespeare
Pop-up studio, The Other Place Foyer
1830-1930
Radio 3 presenter Tom Service charts the magical chemistry between Shakespeare’s language and the music it has given life to over the last 400 years - from Romeo and Juliet to The Tempest.

Live Concert: Shakespeare Odes
Holy Trinity Church
1930 – 2130
Paid tickets via Birmingham Town Hall.
A world premiere commemorative concert in the church where Shakespeare was baptised and buried. Ex Cathedra and City Musick perform Thomas Arne’s 18th century musical setting of An Ode to Shakespeare by David Garrick, and A Shakespeare Masque, written by the Poet Laureate Dame Carol Ann Duffy, and composed by Sally Beamish.

Shakespeare and Stratford: Live Broadcast
Pop-up studio, The Other Place Foyer
2015-2045
When did Stratford and the country at large really begin to celebrate Shakespeare? Radio 3 presenter Suzy Klein is in conversation with Professors Michael Dobson and Ewan Fernie of the Shakespeare Institute to tell the story of how Stratford and Britain grew to love the memory of the man and revived his writing.

World on 3: Live Music
The Other Place Studio Theatre
2015 – 2230
Verity Sharp celebrates the global influence of Shakespeare’s work – with live performances including English folk music and jazz inspired by The Bard, performed by Wes Finch and friends, as well as by the Peter Knight Trio, musicians currently performing in the RSC’s Hamlet, and guest Andrew Dickson, author of “World Elsewhere: Journeys Around Shakespeare's Globe.”

The Verb: Live Broadcast
Pop-up studio, The Other Place Foyer
2145-2245
Poet Ian McMillan hosts late night entertainment with a roundtable of writers celebrating Shakespeare's linguistic fireworks. Benet Brandreth, a rhetoric coach, has written a new novel imagining Shakespeare’s lost years and Nell Lyshon imagines a fictional meeting with Spanish literary titan Cervantes who died on the same day in 1616. Plus actor Ben Crystal and poet Wendy Cope with her new poems, commissioned by the Shakespeare Birthplace Trust.

SATURDAY 23RD APRIL

Breakfast: Live Broadcast
Pop-up studio, The Other Place Foyer
0800-0900
Join Martin Handley and guest poet Ian McMillan as he plays great music to begin a very special day for Stratford.

Record Review: Live Broadcast
Pop-up studio, The Other Place Foyer
0900-1000
Andrew McGregor and Roger Parker compare recordings of one of opera’s greatest re-incarnations of Shakespeare’s work: Verdi’s Falstaff.

Record Review on stage: Live Broadcast
The Other Place Studio Theatre
0945-1100
Actors Samuel West and scholar Kate Kennedy join presenter Andrew McGregor on stage to guide us through archive recordings of the greatest Shakespearean interpreters of the last hundred years, including the likes of Sybil Thorndike, Johnston Forbes-Robertson, John Gielgud and Laurence Olivier.

Words and Music: The Power of Royalty
Radio Pop-up studio, The Other Place Foyer
1100-1200
“Uneasy lies the head that wears a crown.”
Acclaimed actors Juliet Stevenson and Tim Pigott-Smith perform readings accompanied by centuries of music inspired by one of Shakespeare’s favourite themes: the power of royalty.

Music Matters: Live Broadcast
Pop-up studio, The Other Place Foyer
1200-1245
Tom Service presents Radio 3’s music magazine, exploring the music in Shakespeare’s plays and Shakespearean music from the BBC archives, with composer Gary Carpenter and theatre historian Sarah Lenton.

Saturday Classics: Live Broadcast
The Other Place Studio Theatre
1230-1400
“Brevity is the soul of wit.”
The composer and pianist Richard Sisson, the BBC Singers and friends launch a playful attempt to perform music from every single Shakespeare play – in just 75 minutes! With solo performances from mezzo-soprano Kitty Whately, baritone Mark Stone and pianist Ashley Wass.

Early Music Show: Live Broadcast
The Other Place Studio Theatre
1400-1500
Lucie Skeaping introduces soprano Ruby Hughes and lute player Jon Nordberg in a 16th century recital specially created for today, Lute songs and Pavans in Shakespeare’s England. Includes works by John Dowland and Robert Johnson.

Sound of Cinema: Live Broadcast
King Edward VI School, Main Hall
1445 - 1600
The BBC Concert Orchestra join presenter Matthew Sweet live on stage for 60 action-packed minutes of music from Shakespeare on film. Including music from one of the great Shakespeare collaborations of the 20th century, William Walton and Laurence Olivier's Henry V.

Jazz Record Requests: Live Broadcast
Pop-up studio, The Other Place Foyer
1600-1700
Alyn Shipton plays listeners' choices, including Duke Ellington’s homage to Shakespeare, Such Sweet Thunder, and takes up his double bass to play live with visiting American Jazz clarinettist Tom Sancton.

Words and Music: Jealousy
Pop-up studio, The Other Place Foyer
1700-1740
"O, beware, my lord, of jealousy; It is the green-eyed monster which doth mock the meat it feeds on."
Actors Juliet Stevenson and Tim Pigott-Smith perform readings accompanied by centuries of music inspired by one of Shakespeare’s darker themes: jealousy.

Serenade to Music: Live Broadcast
Guild Chapel, Chapel Lane
1725-1800
“Here will we sit and let the sounds of music, creep in our ears.”
The BBC Singers, conducted by James Morgan, give a live performance of Vaughan Williams’ Serenade to Music, the famously beautiful setting of part of The Merchant of Venice.

Free Thinking: The Winter’s Tale
Pop-up studio, The Other Place Foyer
1830-1930
“To unpathed waters, undreamed shores.”
Matthew Sweet is joined by a roundtable of actors, directors and scholars to explore The Winter’s Tale, written just 6 years before Shakespeare died and still regarded today as one of his most intriguing and multi-layered works.

Early Music Show in concert
Guild Chapel, Chapel Lane
18.30 – 19.45
The choir Ex Cathedra with a special concert of English and Italian madrigals celebrating the explosion of interest in singing in England during the most creative part of Shakespeare’s lifetime.

Hear and Now
King Edward VI School, Main Hall
1945- 2200
Sara Mohr-Pietsch and Tom Service introduce adventurous 21st century responses to Shakespeare’s work. Sound artist Martin Parker and viola da gamba player Liam Byrne take music and texts from 1616 and remix them for 2016. Saxophonist Trish Clowes and her trio improvise an anniversary homage using Shakespearean phrases. Plus contemporary music group Apartment House.

SUNDAY 24TH APRIL

Breakfast: Live Broadcast
Pop-up studio, The Other Place Foyer
0800-0900
Start the day in the Radio 3 pop-up studio with Martin Handley and captivating music. With guest global Shakespeare expert Andrew Dickson

Sunday Moring: Live Broadcast
Pop-up studio, The Other Place Foyer
0900 - 1100
James Jolly with his personal choice of music connected with Shakespeare – from famous classics like Nicolai’s Merry Wives of Windsor, to the unjustly overlooked, like the Hamlet Overture by Felix Woyrsch.With guest Kate Kennedy to explore the RSC music archives.

Inspired by Shakespeare: Ashley Wass: Live Broadcast
The Other Place Studio Theatre
1045 - 1200
When asked about his Piano Sonata, Beethoven is said to have remarked "Just read Shakespeare's The Tempest."
A former BBC Radio 3 New Generation Artist, Ashley Wass performs a morning concert of piano music inspired by the bard, including Macbeth and the Witches by Smetana; pieces from Prokofiev’s Romeo and Juliet and Beethoven’s Piano Sonata Op. 31, No. 2, Tempest.

Words and Music: Youth and Age
Pop-up studio, The Other Place Foyer
1300-1400
“I would there were no age between sixteen and three-and-twenty, or that youth would sleep out the rest.”
Student actors from Stratford’s Shakespeare Institute are live in the pop-up studio to perform prose and poetry on the theme of – what else? Youth!

Free Thinking
Pop-up studio, The Other Place Foyer
1400-1500
What books were on Shakespeare’s bookshelf? The Bible, Greek classics, Geoffrey Chaucer? And were these texts the real source of his great stories and masterful language? Rana Mitter discusses Shakespeare’s reading list with Professor of Classics Edith Hall, New Generation Thinker Nandini Das and Renaissance English specialist Beatrice Groves.

The Shakespeare Essays
Old School Room, The Guildhall
1530 – 1630; 1645 – 1730
From the classroom where the boy Shakespeare took his lessons, five leading scholars present the very latest research findings on his life and works – including Tudor food, Shakespeare in India and the Shakespearean Suffragettes. With Sophie Duncan, James Loxley, Joan Fitzpatrick, Preti Taneja and Siobhan Keenan.

The Choir: Live Broadcast
Pop-up studio, The Other Place Foyer
1600 – 1730
Sara Mohr-Pietsch with live performance from the Stratford-Upon-Avon Chamber Choir and news on Shakespeare Sings From the Shakespeare Birthplace Trust.

Words and Music: Live Broadcast
The Other Place Studio Theatre
1715 - 1845
All the World’s A Stage: Poems, songs, readings and music on the theme of Shakespeare’s legacy in theatre and the art of acting. With performers including actors Rory Kinnear and Adjoa Andoh, baritone Roderick Williams, pianist Iain Burnside and lutenist Elizabeth Kennedy. Performed live at the RSC’s The Other Place studio theatre.

For more information on booking tickets, visit the Royal Shakespeare Company and BBC Shows and Tours websites.