Everything You Ever Wanted to Know about Classical Music - Sunday 30 March 2014

Sir Neville Marriner goes to the opera - in the company of Catherine Bott.

Sunday 30 March 2014, 9pm-10pm

Catherine Bott joins in Classic FM’s 90th birthday celebrations for the great conductor Sir Neville Marriner. 

She's focusing on Sir Neville and his orchestra - the Academy of St. Martin in the Fields - at the opera, showcasing some of the fabulous recordings they have worked on, featuring great singers such as Sir Thomas Allen and Sylvia McNair. 

There'll be extracts from Mozart's The Marriage of Figaro - the opera with which Sir Neville made his opera debut at the Aix-en-Provence Festival. There'll also be an exquisite aria from Mozart's Il Re Pastore, which Sir Neville conducted at the Salzburg Mozarteum.

The conductor made his U.S. debut conducting Rossini's La Cenerentola in Los Angeles; we'll hear the overture. And there'll be the Queen of the Night's dazzling aria from Mozart's The Magic Flute - the opera with which Sir Neville opened the Athens Opera House in 2005.

Catherine herself worked with Sir Neville on an album of William Walton’s music for Shakespeare and shares some personal stories tonight.