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±«Óãtv
Young Musician Of The Year 2008 –
Concerto Final
Tuesday 30 December
7.00-9.10pm ±«Óãtv FOUR
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±«Óãtv Young Musician Of The Year is the UK's most established and prestigious contest for young classical performers. In 2008, the competition celebrated its 30th anniversary, with the Grand Final weekend taking place in May at Cardiff's iconic Wales Millennium Centre.
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Five exceptionally talented young musicians (already category winners in string, brass, woodwind, percussion and keyboard) competed across two days in front of an enthusiastic audience and a panel of expert judges, which included Ben Foster, Catrin Finch, Paul Daniel, Nicola Benedetti and Richard Morrison.
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Presented by Gethin Jones and Nicola Loud, this programme offers viewers a chance to see the concerto performances as the finalists battled it out for the coveted title of ±«Óãtv Young Musician of the Year 2008.
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Crooked
House – The Wainscoting Ep 1/3
Monday 22 December
10.30-11.00pm ±«Óãtv FOUR
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 Mark Gatiss promises a ghostly
Christmas on ±«Óãtv Four as he
plays the curator in Crooked
House, a three-part drama he
has written, alongside Lee
Ingleby as Ben
There's a ghostly Christmas in store for viewers this festive season in the form of Crooked House – a trilogy of haunting tales written by, and starring, Mark Gatiss.
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The first of these spine-chilling tales opens in the present day. Ben, a school teacher, has recently moved into a new house and found a door-knocker in his garden. The local museum curator identifies it as having once belonged to Geap Manor, a now-demolished Tudor mansion with a ghostly reputation. Intrigued, Ben asks if there are any "juicy stories" to be told, and the curator obliges. He begins to recount stories of the manor's curious past...
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It's 1786, and Joseph Bloxham Esq is a self-made man and something of a star in fashionable coffee-house society. But Bloxham has used his ill-gotten gains to buy Geap Manor, paying no heed to the warnings of Noakes and his friend, Duncalfe. When Bloxham starts to hear ghastly sounds in the newly installed panelling of his drawing room, it seems that he might have more than just a mouse hiding in his wainscoting...
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Ben is played by Lee Ingleby, the curator by Mark Gatiss, Joseph Bloxham by Philip Jackson, Noakes by Julian Rhind-Tutt and Duncalfe by Andy Nyman.
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Crooked House is also being simulcast on the ±«Óãtv HD channel – the ±«Óãtv's High Definition channel available through Freesat, Sky and Virgin Media. With up to five times more detail than standard definition television, HD gives you exceptionally vivid colours and crisp pictures to make Crooked House a truly cinematic TV experience.
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Crooked
House – Something Old Ep 2/3
Tuesday 23 December
10.30-11.00pm ±«Óãtv FOUR
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The curator tells Ben about an incident at Geap Manor in the Twenties, as Crooked House, written by and starring Mark Gatiss, continues.
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Lady Constance de Momery presides over a lavish, glittering costume ball, which she is hosting for her grandson. Bright young things throng the old manor house, but all is not quite as it seems. When young heir to the estate Felix de Momery announces his engagement to his sweetheart, Ruth, his grandmother seems uneasy about the match. Is her disapproval really a case of snobbery, as Ruth believes, or does the old lady have a more chilling reason to fear the prospect of a wedding at Geap Manor?
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The curator is played by Mark Gatiss,
Ben by Lee Ingleby,
Lady Constance de Momery by Jean Marsh,
Felix de Momery by Ian Hallard and
Ruth by Jennifer Higham.
This episode also features Samuel Barnett as Billy and
Anna Madeley as Katherine.
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Crooked House is also being simulcast on the ±«Óãtv HD channel – the ±«Óãtv's High Definition channel available through Freesat, Sky and Virgin Media. With up to five times more detail than standard definition television, HD gives you exceptionally vivid colours and crisp pictures to make Crooked House a truly cinematic TV experience.
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Crooked
House – The Knocker Ep 3/3
Wednesday 24 December
10.30-11.00pm ±«Óãtv FOUR
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Mark Gatiss's three-part ghost story for Christmas reaches its dramatic conclusion with The Knocker. Back in the present day, commitment-shy Ben begins to discover that, though demolished, Geap Manor still casts a shadow.
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Having recently left his girlfriend, Hannah, for a life of freedom over cosy domesticity, Ben is captivated by the curator's stories and screws the ancient door-knocker to his new front door. But he soon finds himself getting more excitement than he bargained for as the past intrudes with a loud knock at the door and draws him back into Geap Manor's bloody past...
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Ben is played by Lee Ingleby, Hannah by Daniela Denby-Ashe and the curator by Mark Gatiss. Derren Brown also makes a guest appearance in his debut dramatic role as Sir Roger Widdowson.
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Crooked House is also being simulcast on the ±«Óãtv HD channel – the ±«Óãtv's High Definition channel available through Freesat, Sky and Virgin Media. With up to five times more detail than standard definition television, HD gives you exceptionally vivid colours and crisp pictures to make Crooked House a truly cinematic TV experience.
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Crooked
House Special
Saturday 27 December
9.00-10.30pm ±«Óãtv FOUR
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This Crooked House Special weaves together Mark Gatiss's spooky three-part tale into a single intriguing ghost story for Christmas.
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When school teacher Ben unearths an old door-knocker in the garden of his new home, the curator suggests it may come from the now-demolished manor house – a house reputed to be haunted...
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Intrigued, Ben prompts the curator to tell him some of the stories about the house, and so begins a journey through time.
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As the drama begins, corrupt Georgian businessman Joseph Bloxham finds something unexpected in the woodwork of his new home.
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Back in the Twenties, the happy engagement party of young couple Felix de Momery and Ruth is spoiled by the spectre of a ghostly bride.
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And, back in the present day, Ben soon finds himself in darker, more dangerous waters than he could possibly have foreseen...
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Ben is played by Lee Ingleby, the curator by Mark Gatiss, Joseph Bloxham by Philip Jackson, Felix de Momery by Ian Hallard and Ruth by Jennifer Higham. Crooked House Special also stars Julian Rhind-Tutt as Noakes, Andy Nyman as Duncalfe, Jean Marsh as Lady Constance de Momery, Samuel Barnett as Billy, Anna Madeley as Katherine, Daniela Denby-Ashe as Hannah and Derren Brown as Sir Roger Widdowson.
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Crooked House is also being simulcast on the ±«Óãtv HD channel – the ±«Óãtv's High Definition channel available through Freesat, Sky and Virgin Media. With up to five times more detail than standard definition television, HD gives you exceptionally vivid colours and crisp pictures to make Crooked House a truly cinematic TV experience.
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New
Year's Day Concert 2009 From Vienna
Thursday 1 January
7.00-9.00pm ±«Óãtv FOUR |
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±«Óãtv Four features extensive highlights of the Vienna Philharmonic's annual New Year's Day concert. The celebratory programme of waltzes, polkas and marches is conducted for the first time by Argentinean-Israeli pianist and conductor Daniel Barenboim.
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Viewers can see the second half of the New Year's Day 2009 Concert From Vienna live on ±«Óãtv Two earlier in the day.
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Prog
Rock Brittania –
An Observation In Three Movements
Friday 2 January
10.00-11.30pm ±«Óãtv FOUR
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Prog Rock Britannia is the first comprehensive, feature-length documentary about progressive music and the generation of bands that made it – from the international success stories of Yes, Genesis, ELP, King Crimson and Jethro Tull, to the trials and tribulations of lesser-known bands such as Caravan and Egg.
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Narrated by Nigel Planer, the film is structured in three parts – charting the birth, rise and decline of a movement famed for complex musical structures, weird time signatures, technical virtuosity and strange – quintessentially English – literary influences.
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It looks at the psychedelic pop scene that gave birth to progressive rock in the late Sixties, the golden age of progressive music in the early Seventies – complete with drum solos and gatefold record sleeves – and the over-ambition, commercialisation and eventual fall from grace of this rarefied musical experiment at the hands of punk in 1977.
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The documentary is a provocative, humorous but affectionate re-appraisal of a music that was the value system of an all-too-brief period in British popular music.
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Contributors include Robert Wyatt, Mike Oldfield, Pete Sinfield, Rick Wakeman, Phil Collins, Arthur Brown, Carl Palmer and Ian Anderson.
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Sacred
Music – The Story Of Allegri's Miserere
Sunday 21 December
7.30-8.00pm ±«Óãtv FOUR
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Simon Russell Beale tells the story behind Allegri's Miserere, one of the most popular pieces of sacred music ever written. The programme features a full performance of the piece by the award-winning choir The Sixteen, conducted by Harry Christophers.
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Once decreed by the Pope to be too beautiful to be heard outside the Sistine Chapel, Allegri's Miserere has become one of the best-loved and most recognisable pieces of choral music, famous for its soaring high notes.
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The 300 years of history behind the piece are as captivating as the music itself. An English organist, a choirmaster from Worcester and the great composers Mozart and Mendelssohn all play a part in the transformation of Allegri's original 17th-century composition into the haunting music known today.
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Simon explores how the piece achieved legendary status as the unworldly sounds of the castrati – adult male singers castrated in boyhood to preserve their unbroken voices – would ring through the Sistine Chapel, embellishing the music with their increasingly daring virtuosity. The famous "abbellimenti" – secret musical decoration – of the Papal Chapel was never written down. Instead, it was passed from performer to performer in the Papal Chapel.
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Harry Christophers pieces together the music that Allegri himself originally wrote, which is rarely heard today. Sir David Willcocks recalls conducting the successful Sixties recording of the work with the Choir of King's College Cambridge, when the boy chorister Roy Goodman famously sung the impossibly high notes after rushing into chapel late following a game of "rugger".
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The programme finishes with a full performance given by The Sixteen from LSO St Luke's, conducted by founder Harry Christophers.
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Viewers have another chance to see the much-talked-about, four-part Sacred Music series for ±«Óãtv Four, which is also presented by Simon Russell Beale and features performances from Harry Christophers and The Sixteen.
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Sacred
Music
From Monday 22 December
7.00-8.00pm ±«Óãtv FOUR
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±«Óãtv Four offers viewers another chance to see acclaimed actor and former chorister Simon Russell Beale exploring the flowering of Western church music in a landmark series, first broadcast earlier this year. In four episodes (The Gothic Revolution, Palestrina And The Popes, Tallis Byrd And The Tudor and Bach And The Lutheran Legacy) and in a story spanning six centuries, Simon uncovers the personal, political and musical stories behind some of the greatest music ever written.
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Throughout the series, Simon is joined by award-winning choir The Sixteen, conducted by founder and music director Harry Christophers.
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This series was first broadcast in the spring of 2008. This festive airing coincides with Sacred Music – The Story Of Allegri's Miserere, in which Simon tells the story behind one of the most popular pieces of sacred music ever written and in which The Sixteen, conducted by Harry Christophers, give a full performance of the piece.
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Ten
Best Sacred Christmas Classics
Thursday 25 December
1.30-2.30am ±«Óãtv FOUR
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A fascinating line-up of musicians and music-lovers talk engagingly about 10 much-loved pieces of Christmas music. The diverse list of contributors includes Billy Bragg, Katherine Jenkins, Reverend Giles Fraser, Michael Portillo, Trevor Pinnock, Stephen Cleobury, Jonathan Ansell, Sharon Clarke, Robert Saxton and David Soul, all of whom talk about what the music means to them and the importance of music at Christmas.
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On the menu is a sumptuous feast of music which ranges from historic carols such as Once In Royal David's City, Silent Night and In The Bleak Midwinter to great masterpieces including Handel's Messiah, Vivaldi's Gloria and Bach's Christmas Oratorio.
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The programme mixes performances of the full works (or most famous excerpts) drawn from the ±«Óãtv archives. Highlights include Bach's Christmas Oratorio, conducted by John Eliot Gardiner in the Herderkirche in Weimar in 1999, Handel's Messiah from the ±«Óãtv Proms, carols from King's College, Cambridge, and a famous recording of Britten's Ceremony Of Carols, recorded in a Christmas edition of André Previn's Music Night during the Seventies.
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