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Leslie Caron

Michael Berkeley's guest is French actress and former dancer Leslie Caron. Her choices include music from her early dancing years and favourite songs, as well as a Bach cello suite.

Michael Berkeley's guest is French actress and former dancer Leslie Caron, who got her big break starring with Gene Kelly in An American in Paris, and went on to become one of the most successful Hollywood musical stars of the 1950s. Her acting career has continued with films such as The L-Shaped Room, Damage and Chocolat, and she is about to return to the musical stage in Sondheim's A Little Night Music.

Leslie's choices include music from her early years as a dancer, including excerpts from Stravinsky's Petrushka, Henri Sauguet's les forains. There are some of her favourite songs - Loesser's Baby it's cold outside, Weill's Alabama Song and Yves Montand's ballad A bicyclette. There is also an excerpt from Bach's Cello Suite in C, BWV1009, played by Yo-Yo Ma, as well as Madame Armfeldt's song Liaisons from Sondheim's A Little Night Music.

M Berkeley The Wakeful Poet (Music from Chaucer) (pub OUP)
Beaux-Arts Brass Quintet
BBQ BBQ 003 Track 10
Dur: 25s

Stravinsky: Petrushka (Scene 3 - At the Moor's house)
London Symphony Orchestra
Claudio Abbado (conductor)
Stravinsky DG 435 085 CD Tracks 4-5
Dur: 6m31s

Frank Loesser: Baby it's cold outside
Ella Fitzgerald with Louis Jordan and his Tympany Five
Ella Fitzgerald CLASSICS 1134 Track 15
Dur: 2m40s

Sauguet: Les forains (Petite fille a la chaise and Galop final)
Toulose Capitole Orchestra
Michel Plasson (conductor)
Sauguet Les forains EMI 763204-2 Tracks 5, 11
Dur: 2m22s

Kurt Weill: Alabama Song (Rise and Fall of the State of Mahagonny)
Lotte Lenya (voice)
orchestra conducted by Roger Bean
Lotte Lenya CBS MK 42658 Track 17
Dur: 4m09s

Yves Montand: A bicyclette (Pierre Barouh/Francis Lai)
A bicyclette MERCURY 536 157-2 Track 1

Gershwin: An American in Paris (excerpt)
New York Philharmonic
Michael Tilson Thomas (conductor)
Gershwin SONY MK 52240 Track 2
Dur: 4m48d

Stephen Sondheim: A Weekend in the Country (A Little Night Music)
The Original London Cast recording
Ray Cook (musical director)
A Little Night Music RCA RCD 15090 Track 9
Dur: 6m22s

Bach: Bourrees 1 and 2 (Cello Suite in C, BWV1009)
Paul Tortelier (cello)
HMV 572749-2 CD1 Track 17
Dur: 4m03s.

1 hour

Last on

Sun 10 Jan 2010 12:00

Broadcast

  • Sun 10 Jan 2010 12:00

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