Words and Music - Winter

This week’s Words and Music is devoted to the season Emily Dickinson described as the time when the sky is low and the clouds are mean: winter. Winter in the countryside is celebrated in Wordsworth’s ‘The Prelude’ when, as a child, he and his friends skated along the ice, flying through the cold in the darkness. With this you’ll hear Peter Maxwell Davies’ ‘At the lochan’ from his ‘Seven Songs Home’, the series of songs which tell the story of children in the Orkneys making their way home from school on a winter’s afternoon. Mark Doty’s walk with his dogs as the sun sets is heard alongside the Finnish composer Rautavaara’s concerto for birds and orchestra, ‘Cantus Arcticus’. The memory of winter past is heard in David Hartnett’s ‘Two winters’ in which a man, now a parent himself, remembers his father shovelling snow outside his childhood home, a time in which he dreamed that the snow fell for years ‘and the ray of stars like birds’ feet flecked the white’. Winters in California and Tangiers are evoked by the poets Karl Shapiro and Sarah Maguire – in one the pink camellias line the paths, in the other ‘hibiscus blooms burn, scarlet, cerise, tangerine’. The programme ends with Robert Frost’s ‘Stopping by woods on a snowy evening’ and Wayne Barlow’s rhapsody for oboe and strings inspired by Appalachian folk songs, ‘Winter’s Passed’. Fiona McLean - Producer. Playlist. ALEKSANDER GLAZUNOV The Seasons – Winter Yevgeny Svetlanov – conductor Philharmonia Orchestra EMI CDC7478472 EMILY DICKINSON The Sky is Low Cheryl Campbell (reader) EINAR ENGLUND The Reindeer Race Northern Pictures Kuopio Symphony Orchestra Shuntaro Sato – conductor FINLANDIA 8573855732 WILLIAM WORDSWORTH from The Prelude Struan Rodger (reader) CLAUDE DEBUSSY Children’s Corner - The Snow is Dancing Children’s Weekend Pascal Roge – piano DECCA 4216262 PETER MAXWELL DAVIES Seven Songs Home – At the Lochan The Choir of St Mary’s Music School Sir Peter Maxwell Davies – conductor UNICORN DKPCD9070 MARK DOTY In the Same Space Cheryl Campbell (reader) EINOJUHANI RAUTAVAARA Cantus Arcticus Richard Stoltzman – clarinet Helsinki Philharmonic Orchestra Leif Segerstam – conductor ONDINE ODE10412 ALICE OSWALD Sonnet Cheryl Campbell (reader) TCHAIKOVSKY Symphony no 1 - Winter Dreams Berliner Philharmoniker Herbert von Karajan – conductor DEUTSCHE GRAMMOPHON 4191762 WILLIAM CARLOS WILLIAMS Winter Trees Cheryl Campbell (reader) BENJAMIN BRITTEN Winter Words – At Close of Day in November Song Cycles Robert Tear – tenor Sir Philip Ledger – piano EMI CZS5739952 KARL SHAPIRO Winter in California Struan Rodger (reader) MAMAS AND THE PAPAS California Dreamin’ Complete Anthology MCA 982 168 0 SARAH MAGUIRE Wintering in Tangier Cheryl Campbell (reader) OLIVER MESSIAEN Catalogue d’oiseaux - Robin Hakan Austbo – piano NAXOS 855353234 THOMAS CAMPION Now winter nights enlarge Struan Rodger (reader) ANTONIO VIVALDI The Seasons – Winter in F Minor Nigel Kennedy – violin Berliner Philharmoniker EMI 5576660 PERCY BYSSHE SHELLEY The Cold Earth Slept Below Chery Campbell (reader) JEAN SIBELIUS Arioso Soile Isokoski – soprano Helsinki Philharmonic Orchestra Leif Segerstam – conductor ONDINE ODE10805 JEAN REDPATH Snow Goose Leaving the Land GREENTRAX CDTRAX039 DAVID HARTNETT Two Winters Struan Rodger (reader) FREDERICK DELIUS North Country Sketches – Winter Landscape Works for Piano Four Hands Noriko Ogawa and Kathryn Stott – piano BIS BISCD 1347 EMILY DICKINSON Winter is Good Cheryl Campbell (reader) FRANK BRIDGE Christmas Dance ‘Sir Roger de Coverley’ English Seasons Academy of St Martin in the Fields Sir Neville Marriner – conductor PHILIPS 454442 WALLACE STEVENS The Snow Man Struan Rodger (reader) FRANCIS POULENC Un soir de neige Figure Humaine and other Secular Choral Music New London Chamber Choir James Wood – conductor HELIOS CDH55179 EMILY BRONTE The night is darker Cheryl Campbell (reader) ROBERT FROST Stopping by woods WAYNE BARLOW The Winter’s Past Music for Quiet Listening Eastman Philharmonia Howard Hanson – conductor MERCURY 4343472