Hinterland
Olivia Williams and Michael Pennington with readings that explore hinterland, an area lying beyond what is visible or known. Music by Debussy, Dowland, Mendelssohn and Britten.
We travel to an area beyond what is visible or known, and to remote areas of a country away from the coast or the banks of major rivers in this evocation of hinterland.
Olivia Williams and Michael Pennington read poetry and prose from the travel writing of Bruce Chatwin about the lost mythical city of riches hidden in the Andes to the sinister underworld of Virgil鈥檚 Aeneid, via contemporary urban byways examined in the Edgelands project of Paul Farley and Michael Symmons Roberts, childhood dreams remembered by Australian poet Les Murray and the remote island which the sailor Enoch Arden ends up on in the poem by Alfred, Lord Tennyson - a poem which has given name to the principle in law that after being missing a certain number of years (typically seven), a person could be declared dead for purposes of remarriage and inheritance. The music includes John Luther Adams' environmentally inspired piece Under the Ice and Walking Song from Meredith Monk, Mussorgsky's Great Gate at Kiev from his Pictures at an Exhibition and Felix Mendelssohn's Scherzo from A Midsummer Night's Dream.
Producer: Felix Carey
Readings:
William Wordsmith - Tintern Abbey
Bruce Chatwin - In Patagonia
Virgil, translated by John Dryden - Aeneid, Book VI
Plato translated by Benjamin Jowett - Republic, Book VII
Christina Rossetti - Somewhere or Other
Les Murray - The Sleepout
Thomas Hardy - The Dead Drummer
Slavomir Rawicz - The Long Walk
Robert Byron - The Road to Oxiana
Paul Farley and Michael Symmons Roberts - Edgelands
Rudyard Kipling - A Song for Travel
Judith Schalansky - Atlas of Remote Islands
Alfred Tennyson - From Enoch Arden
Robert Frost - Once by the Pacific
Last on
Music Played
Timings (where shown) are from the start of the programme in hours and minutes
-
00:00
Leos Jan谩膷ek
They Chattered Like Swallows (from On an Overgrown Path)
Performer: Marc-Andre Hamelin (piano).- Hyperion CDA68030.
- 5.
-
William Wordsmith
Tintern Abbey, read by Olivia Williams
00:01George Butterworth
The Banks of Green Willow
Performer: Neville Marriner (conductor), Academy of St Martin in the Fields.- Decca 452 707.
- 2.
00:07John Luther Adams
Under the Ice
Performer: John Luther Adams.- Cantoloupe Music CA21112.
- 2.
Bruce Chatwin
In Patagonia, read by Michael Pennington
00:10Alberto Ginastera
Piano Sonata No.1: mvt Presto misterioso
Performer: Gabriela Montero (piano).- EMI 6411442.
- 19.
Virgil, translated by John Dryden
Aeneid book VI, read by Olivia Williams
00:13John Dowland
In Darkness Let Me Dwell
Performer: Dorothee Mields (soprano), Hille Perl (viola de gamba), Sirius Viols.- DHM 88697362132.
- 14.
Plato translated by Benjamin Jowett
Republic Book VII read by Michael Pennington
00:20Steve Reich
Nagoya Marimbas
Performer: Bob Becker. Performer: James Preiss.- Nonesuch 7559-79430-2.
- 1.
Christina Rossetti
Somewhere or Other read by Olivia Williams
00:24Christian Wallumr酶d
A Year from Easter
Performer: Christian Wallumr酶d Ensemble.- ECM 1801 982 4132.
- 9.
Les Murray
The Sleepout read by Michael Pennington
00:28Felix Mendelssohn
Midsummer Night聮s Dream - Scherzo
Performer: Vladimir Ashkenazy (conductor), German Symphony Orchestra Berlin.- Decca 440 296-2.
- 2.
Thomas Hardy
The Dead Drummer read by Olivia Williams
00:33Claude Vivier
Chanson d聮adieu 聳 from Cinq chansons pour percussion
Performer: Christian Dierstein (percussion).- Kairos 0012472KAI.
- 7.
Slavomir Rawicz
The Long Walk read by Michael Pennington
00:38Trad
Peshnawazi from 3 raga Khamaj
Performer: Khalde Arman (rubab).- Arion Arn 64681.
- 1.
Robert Byron
The Road to Oxiana read by Olivia Williams
00:41Modest Mussorgsky
Pictures at an Exhibition 聳 The Great Gate at Kiev
Performer: Herbert von Karajan (conductor), Berlin Philharmonic Orchestra.- DG 429 162-2.
- 1.
00:47Charles Amirkhanian
Walking Tune 聳 A Room Music for Percy Grainger
Performer: Charles Amirkhanian.- Starkland ST 206.
- 5.
Paul Farley and Michael Symmons Roberts
Edgelands read by Olivia Williams
00:51Meredith Monk
Walking Song
Performer: Meredith Monk.- Mercury 5369032.
- 9.
Rudyard Kipling
A Song for Travel read by Michael Pennington
00:54Arthur Honegger
Pacific 231
Performer: Charles Dutoit (conductor), Bavarian Radio Symphony Orchestra.- Erato ECD88171.
- 1.
01:01John Luther Adams
Under the Ice
Performer: John Luther Adams.- Cantoloupe Music CA21112.
- 2.
Judith Schalansky
Atlas of Remote Islands read by Olivia Williams
Alfred Tennyson
From Enoch Arden read by Michael Pennington
01:05Johann Sebastian Bach
Canon a 2 per Tonos from Musikalisches Opfer BWV 1079
Performer: Ton Koopman and members of the Amsterdam Baroque Orchestra.- Challenge Classics CC72309.
- 6.
Robert Frost
Once by the Pacific read by Olivia Williams
01:09Benjamin Britten
Storm from Four Sea Interludes
Performer: Edward Gardner (conductor), 成人快手 Philharmonic.- Chandos CHAN 10658.
- 12.
Producer note
The texts and music in this programme relate to the idea of hinterland both as a geographical location - peripheral or remote - and hinterland as something beyond that which is immediately knowable or perceivable.
From Bruce Chatwin鈥檚 In Patagonia, we hear the tale of Trapalanda, the lost mythical city of riches hidden in the Andes, before the mysterious and skittering second movement of Argentinian composer Alberto Ginastera鈥檚 Piano Sonata No.1.
John Dryden鈥檚 translation of the Aeneid takes us to Virgil鈥檚 underworld, at a murky fork in the road between the heaven and hell of Elysium and Tartarus, as Aeneas and the Sybil part ways with the ill-fated ghost of Deophobus.
Plato鈥檚 cave allegory outlines the notion that the world we experience through our senses is just a shadow of the real thing - a kind of philosophical hinterland - the shadows in the cave manifested musically in Reich鈥檚 phasing marimba duo.
Dreams could be said to occupy the hinterland of our everyday lives, and Les Murray鈥檚 poem describes the sensuality of childhood dreams, drawing on his own experience of sleeping on the verandah of his family dairy farm in New South Wales.
Hardy鈥檚 The Dead Drummer tells of a young life lost in a strange land - a West Country boy fighting in the Boer War. Buried unceremoniously in the remote plains of South Africa he becomes a part of his new surroundings. This poignant poem is paired with the sparse, exotic soundworld of Claude Vivier鈥檚 Chanson d鈥橝dieu.
The fearsome Gobi Desert is the backdrop for Slawomir Rawicz in The Long Walk, the Polish author's controversial account of his escape from a Siberian gulag and subsequent 4,000 mile journey through Asia to India.
Then in a passage from The Road to Oxiana, celebrated travel writer Robert Byron describes his arrival at the city Balkh in northern Afghanistan, 鈥渂alm to eyes bruised by the monstrous antiquity of the preceding landscape鈥.
Topographical observations of a different kind come from Paul Farley and Michael Symmons Roberts in their study of Edgelands, the urban hinterland of town planners. In it they make a link between the muddy desire paths of city parkland and the nomadic songlines of the Australian Aboriginals. Two contemporary songlines accompany this text: Charles Amirkhanian鈥檚 homage to Percy Grainger and Meredith Monk鈥檚 Inuit-like Walking Song.
With Tennyson鈥檚 Enoch Arden we return to the idea of hinterland as a place of solitude or remote isolation, with the stranded sailor immersed in the riches of the natural environment but longing for home.
Producer: Felix CareyBroadcasts
- Sun 23 Oct 2016 17:30成人快手 Radio 3
- Sun 3 Jan 2021 17:30成人快手 Radio 3
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