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Nick Lane

Evolutionary biochemist Professor Nick Lane tells Michael Berkeley about how Janacek helped him get his PhD, and the joys of busking on his fiddle with his teenage son.

Nick Lane is a scientist who peers down microscopes at incredibly small cells in order to ask really big questions. How did life on Earth begin? Why is life the way it is? Why do we have sex? Why do we die?

He is Professor of Evolutionary Biochemistry at University College London and the Co-Director of UCL鈥檚 Centre for Life鈥檚 Origins and Evolution. He is also the award-winning author of five books, and his next 鈥 Transformer: The Deep Chemistry of Life and Death 鈥 is due out in May.

Nick Lane tells Michael Berkeley about his youthful ambition to be a violinist and how he funded his biochemistry studies by busking on the streets of London. He explains how his passion for the music of Janacek helped win him a place to study for his PhD, and how he unwound each evening to the sound of the early-twentieth-century American folk and blues musician Lead Belly.

Nick Lane still plays the fiddle with his band in pubs and now also busks with his teenage son. He chooses folk music inspired by Handel; Bach played by his hero, the violinist Nathan Milstein; and music by Peter Maxwell Davies that brings back an unforgettable jamming session in a pub in Orkney.

Producer: Jane Greenwood
A Loftus Media production for 成人快手 Radio 3

Available now

38 minutes

Last on

Sun 21 Nov 2021 12:00

Music Played

  • Max Bruch

    Scottish Fantasy (1st mvt)

    Performer: Nicola Benedetti. Orchestra: 成人快手 Scottish Symphony Orchestra. Conductor: Rory MacDonald.
  • Leos Jan谩膷ek

    String Quartet no.2 (Intimate Letters) (3rd mvt: Moderato)

    Ensemble: Smetana Quartet.
  • Lead Belly

    Alabama Bound

  • Franz Leh谩r

    The Merry Widow (Act 3: Duet)

    Singer: Cheryl Studer. Singer: Bo Skovhus. Orchestra: Vienna Philharmonic. Conductor: Sir John Eliot Gardiner.
  • De Dannan

    The Arrival of the Queen of Sheba to Galway

  • Johann Sebastian Bach

    Chaconne (Partita no.2 in D minor, BWV.1004)

    Performer: Nathan Milstein.
  • Peter Maxwell Davies

    Farewell To Stromness

    Performer: Peter Maxwell Davies.

Broadcast

  • Sun 21 Nov 2021 12:00

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