BBC Radio 3 to play non-stop Schubert

BBC Radio 3 is to play nothing but Schubert for eight days – from 23 – 31 March 2012.

The station will offer over 200 continuous hours of Schubert’s music to celebrate the 215th anniversary of the composer’s birth.

The Spirit of Schubert Season will cover all of his ‘performable’ pieces, many of the scraps, and finished versions of incomplete works. Each day the station will explore a different aspect of Franz Schubert’s life.

There will be 24 live performances broadcast and the network will also recreate the spirit of Schubert’s time through lunchtime gatherings in intimate venues around the UK known in Schubert’s day as Schubertiades and featuring artists Imogen Cooper, Melvyn Tan, Michael Collins and many of BBC Radio 3’s New Generation Artists.

Controller of Radio 3, Roger Wright, says: “I am delighted that BBC Radio 3 is uniquely able to dedicate our whole schedule to the celebration of a single composer through distinctive and engaging programming spanning live performance, documentary and expert comment. We hope that our exploration of every performable Schubert work across 200 hours of programming will bring new and old audiences together alike, to explore and celebrate the spirit of this truly remarkable composer.”