The Daily Telegraph - Saturday - Review
Gerard O’Donovan On My Wavelength
If you’re not up for four sumptuous hours of Wagner in tonight’s Opera on 3: Tannhäuser (Radio 3, 6.30pm), recorded at the Met in December, alternative musical delights are available in Connecting Notes (Classic FM, 9pm). Best known for his Adiemus project and knighted for services to “composing and crossing musical genres”, Karl Jenkins celebrates his 80th birthday in an hour-long interview with fellow Welsh octogenarian John Humphrys, talking about humble beginnings and career highlights, and showcasing some of his best-loved work.
David Mamet’s incendiary two-hander Oleanna (Sunday, Radio 3, 7.30pm) feels almost as relevant to today’s culture wars as it did when it first got people fighting in the theatre aisles back in 1992. Mark Bonnar and Cecilia Appiah are superb as the college professor and student whose communication breakdown has brutally explosive consequences. For those in search of a less bruising listen to round off the weekend, prepare to be moved (both spiritually and otherwise) by a fine adaptation of Hermann Hesse’s classic novel Siddhartha (Radio 4, 3pm).
Aleks Krotoski’s series The Digital Human meticulously explores the challenges of humanity’s complex relationship with technology. In The Artificial Human (Monday, Radio 4, 4.30pm) she joins forces with Professor Kevin Fong for a focused look at the challenges, opportunities and quandaries posed by the rise of artificial intelligence. Will AI take our jobs, corrupt our children, make life easier or enslave us?
Andrew Harding’s mesmerising tale of how residents of the small
Ukrainian town of Voznesensk resisted the advance of the
Russian army was one of The Telegraph’s Top 10 Books of 2023. Drama: A Small, Stubborn
Town (Tuesday, Radio 4, 2.15pm) vividly brings Harding’s book to life for listeners in the run-up to the second anniversary of Putin’s shameful invasion. In related territory, in The Documentary: Russia After Ukraine (Tue, World Service, 9.30am), Oleg Boldyrev reports on how ordinary Russians are dealing with their country being at war with their neighbour.
Actress Oona Chaplin weaves a spellbinding tale in The Documentary: Hollywood Exiles (Wednesday, World Service, 11.30am). Over 10 episodes, she takes a look back at why hundreds of actors and directors were hounded out of Hollywood in the 1950s, including her famous grandfather Charlie. She begins with a visit to the Cinema Museum in Kennington which, she’s moved to discover, once – in its former role as the Lambeth Workhouse – gave shelter to her grandfather as a destitute six-year-old.
The week’s most welcome radio return is Jan Etherington’s sparkling comedy Conversations from a Long Marriage (Thursday, Radio 4, 6.30pm). As ever, the writing is sharp as a tack. Joanna Lumley and Roger Allam effortlessly reprise their roles as a still-in-love couple shrewdly negotiating the emotional minefield of a decades-long relationship.
On Friday, Pet Shop Boys bring Vernon Kay’s (Radio 2, 9.30am) month of terrific Piano Room sessions to a close. Just as special is Radio 3 in Concert (7.30pm), in which the London Mozart Players are joined at Croydon’s Fairfield Halls by the Viennese soprano Anna Prohaska and pianist Imogen Cooper. Their aim: to re-create Mozart’s concert at Vienna’s Burgtheater in March 1783.