In Their Own Words: 20th Century Composers
1. Radical Movements (1912-1941)
Remarkable rare footage of Stravinsky, Schoenberg, Copland, Walton, Elisabeth Lutyens, Richard Strauss, Shostakovich, Messiaen and Tippett gives a first-hand account of the revolution that classical music underwent in the first half of the century. As we see Schoenberg play tennis, Strauss and Shostakovich play with their grandchildren and hear Messiaen tell the story of how he wrote his most significant work in a German PoW camp, we get a vivid picture of what it took to be a composer during the most turbulent time in modern history.

2. But Is It Music? (1945-1989)
We discover how the crisis of writing music in a post-war world was met in very different ways by the likes of Britten, Bernstein, Cage, Boulez, Stockhausen, Maxwell Davies, the BBC Radiophonic Workshop, Tavener, Reich, Adams and Glass. Tavener plays badminton whilst drunk, Cage defends his 4'33" of 'silence' and Delia Derbyshire, co-creator of the Doctor Who theme tune, reveals how British techno music has its roots in the bowels of the BBC.

First shown: March 2014
Duration: 60 minutes (each)
Media info:-
Part 1:
General
Format : MPEG-4
Format profile : Base Media
Codec ID : isom (isom/iso2/avc1/mp41)
File size : 1 018 MiB
Duration : 59mn 16s
Overall bit rate mode : Variable
Overall bit rate : 2 400 Kbps
Part II:
Format : MPEG-4
Format profile : Base Media
Codec ID : isom (isom/iso2/avc1/mp41)
File size : 633 MiB
Duration : 58mn 50s
Overall bit rate mode : Constant
Overall bit rate : 1 503 Kbps