today’s radio

ART OF NOW: CHRISTCHURCH

11.30AM, RADIO 4 HHH

New Zealand’s poet laureate from 2017-19, Selina Tusitala Marsh, is among the artists and musicians who are trying to help their country to heal after the carnage of the mass shootings at a mosque and Islamic centre in Christchurch.

ABILITY

6.30PM, RADIO 4 HHHH

Lee Ridley is the comedian who bills himself as Lost Voice Guy, and won Britain’s Got Talent in 2018. Lee has cerebral palsy, and ‘talks’ through an app on his ipad. Lee has overcome this problem, made a name for himself on the comedy circuit and now stars in this comedy show, based more than a little on his life. In this episode, we listen in as Lee’s alter ego, Matt, goes in search of a girlfriend.

Lee Ridley (6.30pm, Radio 4)

THE FULL WORKS CONCERT

8PM, CLASSIC FM HHH

Figaro makes his first entrance in Rossini’s opera The Barber Of Seville singing a tongue-twisting song of fiendish difficulty. Largo Al Factotum is a song about how busy Figaro is kept, running around town fixing people’s hair, shaving beards or discreetly helping ageing lotharios with their wigs. It’s a crowd-pleaser and, in this selection of recordings from the Philharmonia Orchestra, we can hear the great tenor

Dmitri Hvorostovsky making this patter song sound easy.

WELCOME TO WHEREVER YOU ARE

11PM, RADIO 4 HHHH You would think everything was stacked against making this comedy show work. The audience is in London with Andrew Maxwell, while co-host Alice Fraser is in Sydney. The two of them then contact comedians from around the world, who perform to an audience they can’t see. Despite all this, the show delivers lots of laughs and, in these isolated times, scores some points for the uniting power of humour. SJ