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Photo credit: Marco Borggreve

Sara Mohr-Pietsch talks to viola virtuoso Tabea Zimmermann about her dazzling career on the concert platform. She first picked up a viola at the age of three, and in the decades since she’s performed with the world’s greatest orchestras and has become a hugely respected chamber musician and teacher. She discusses the music that means the most to her, the curiosity that comes from working with young performers, and the future of classical music.

Theatre artist Femi Elufowoju jr is making his debut as an opera director with a new production of Verdi’s gruesome tragic opera, Rigoletto at Opera North. He’s drawn on his own life as a British Nigerian to update the drama and the staging, dealing with issues of identity and discrimination, as a way to open up and illuminate the story. He joins Sara along with baritone Eric Greene (Rigoletto) and soprano Jasmine Habersham (Gilda) as they discuss the new staging and their relationship to Verdi’s music.

We explore the extraordinary story of the 20th century Russian pianist Maria Yudina, brought to life in a new biography ‘Playing with Fire’ by Elizabeth Wilson. Maria Yudina became one of the most respected and famous, but also controversial Soviet pianists and was a friend and champion to the great composers of her day such as Shostakovich, Prokofiev, Stravinsky and Boulez. She was also an active revolutionary, an advocate for the oppressed, and a carer for the sick. Sara talks to Elizabeth Wilson and composer Gerard McBurney about the musician, her recordings, and the urban myths which surround her life.

Plus, Sara is joined by composer Nitin Sawhney and Coventry's Poet Laureate Emilie Lauren Jones to discuss 'Ghosts in the Ruins' - a new site-specific work to mark the 60th anniversary of Coventry Cathedral. The project was commissioned as part of Coventry UK City of Culture and takes Britten’s War Requiem, written for the consecration of the new cathedral, as the starting point. We find out about how the new piece brings together local musicians, choirs, poets and projections.