Episode 1

On Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday this week Katie Derham presents a series of concerts by the BBC National Orchestra of Wales, including a special focus on music by the twentieth-century French composer Andre Jolivet. Once considered an innovative experimenter, Jolivet combined the influence of Varese with a continued commitment to conventional musical forms like the symphony and concerto. He was the subject of a recent composer portrait in Cardiff, in the presence of his daughter, Christine Jolivet-Erlih.

Pascale Rophe conducts Debussy's study in impressionist orchestral colour, extending his palette to a wordless girls choir in the final movement of his Nocturnes; and the BBC NOW's principal bassoonist Jaroslaw Augustiniak tackles Jolivet's Bassoon Concerto, which has a reputation as one of the toughest works for the instrument. Then Japanese conductor, Kazushi Ono, leads the orchestra through music by two pillars of the Austrian fraternity, Bruckner's towering seventh symphony and Mozart's ebullient C major piano concerto.