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Greta Scacchi

Michael Berkeley talks to actress Greta Scacchi about the music that reminds her of the places she loves – Sussex, Italy and Australia.

From Hollywood to European art house cinema, from Shakespeare to contemporary drama, Greta Scacchi is one of our most versatile actors.

She talks to Michael Berkeley about the film that made her name in 1983 – Heat and Dust – and chooses music from the soundtrack featuring Zakir Hussain.

She reveals how her musical training as a child – learning ballet, piano and singing - has been invaluable when she’s been called on to play and sing on film. She particularly loved the character she played in Jefferson in Paris, the eighteenth-century Anglo-Italian artist and musician Maria Cosway, and explains how difficult it was to pretend the play the harp on screen. We hear some of Maria Cosway’s music from that film.

Greta chooses music by Satie which reminds her of her mother’s ballet school when she was a child. Her mother is still dancing at 87! And we hear one of Canteloube’s Chants d’Auvergne, and a Handel aria which illustrate Greta’s passion for the theatre; she chooses pieces which remind her of the places she loves – Sussex, Italy and Australia. We get an insight into her passion for jazz with music from Jimmy Guiffre and Fats Waller.

And Greta speaks out about the importance of actors campaigning for causes they believe in – she’s passionate about the environment and even posed naked with a cod to draw attention to unsustainable fishing.

Producer: Jane Greenwood
A Loftus production for ³ÉÈË¿ìÊÖ Radio 3

Available now

37 minutes

Last on

Sun 8 Nov 2020 12:00

Music Played

  • George Frideric Handel

    Ombra mai fu (Serse)

    Orchestra: Orchestra of the Age of Enlightenment. Conductor: Sir Roger Norrington. Singer: Andreas Scholl.
  • Maria Cosway

    Mormora

    Performer: Mary Nichols. Performer: Jan Walters.
  • Erik Satie

    Gnossienne no.1

    Performer: Lang Lang.
  • Vivian Ellis

    I'm on a See-Saw

    Performer: Fats Waller.
  • Jimmy Giuffre

    Gotta Dance

    Ensemble: The Jimmy Giuffre Trio.
  • Richard Robbins

    To the Monastery/End Titles (Heat and Dust)

    Performer: Nishat Khan.
  • Johann Sebastian Bach

    Toccata in C minor BWV.911

    Performer: Martha Argerich.
  • Joseph Canteloube

    Bailero (Songs of the Auvergne)

    Singer: Frederica von Stade.

Broadcasts

  • Sun 10 Mar 2019 12:00
  • Sun 8 Nov 2020 12:00

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