Main content
Sorry, this episode is not currently available

Who Has Seen the Wind?

Texts and music on the theme of the wind, with readings by Cheryl Campbell and Neil Pearson. With Defoe, Melville and Roethke, plus Mozart, Debussy, Bach and Nina Simone.

Who Has Seen the Wind? Poets, writers and composers have sought its company many times. Today Cheryl Campbell and Neil Pearson read from Christina Rossetti and Daniel Defoe, Herman Melville, George Macdonald and Theodore Roethke with music from Mozart and Debussy and Bach, The Chieftains and Nina Simone. The wind roars, breezes and just occasionally holds its breath in a story of tempestuous emotion involving a drunk and a cat, rooftop-rides and madness at sea. Wild, strange, maddening and exhilarating - the winds are passing by.

Reader: Cheryl Campbell
Reader: Neil Pearson
Producer: Jacqueline Smith.

1 hour, 15 minutes

Last on

Sun 1 May 2016 17:30
麻豆社 Radio 3

More episodes

Previous

The Play's the Thing

Next

Once upon a Time...

See all episodes from Words and Music

Music Played

Timings (where shown) are from the start of the programme in hours and minutes

  • 00:00

    Claude Debussy

    Pr茅ludes, Book 1 - Le vent dans la plaine

    Performer: Paul Crossley (piano).
    • SONY CLASSICAL SK52583.
    • Tr3.

  • Christina Rossetti

    Who Has Seen The Wind, read by Cheryl Campbell

  • 00:02

    Michael Tippett

    Symphony No.4 聳 Tempo 1

    Performer: Chicago Symphony Orchestra, George Solti (conductor).
    • DECCA 4336682.
    • Tr6.

  • Aldhelm translated by Michael Lapidge and James Rosier

    Anglo Saxon Riddle, read by Neil Pearson

  • 00:03

    Arnold Bax

    November Woods

    Performer: Ulster Orchestra, Bryden Thomson (conductor).
    • CHANDOS CHAN 8307.
    • Tr1.

  • A. E. Housman

    extract from poem 'A Shropshire Lad', read by Cheryl Campbell

  • Daniel DeFoe

    The Storm: Or, A Collection of the Most Remarkable Casualties and Disasters Which Happened in the Late Dreadful Tempest Both By Sea and Land, read by Neil Pearson

  • 00:12

    Johann Sebastian Bach

    Sonate (Trio) G-Dur BWV 1039 - Allegro

    Performer: Jean-Claude Gerard, flute; David Formisano, flute; Sergio Azzolini, Daniel Blumentahl, Walter Forchert, Boris Kleiner.
    • HANSSLER CLASSIC 92121.
    • CD1 Tr2.

  • Daniel DeFoe

    The Storm: Or, A Collection of the Most Remarkable Casualties and Disasters Which Happened in the Late Dreadful Tempest Both By Sea and Land, read by Neil Pearson

  • W. B. Yeats

    poem 'Leda and The Swan', read by Cheryl Campbell

  • 00:15

    Dimitri Tiomkin, Ned Washington

    Wild Is The Wind

    Performer: Nina Simone.
    • Virgin ?7243 8 48590 2 2.
    • CD1 Tr28.

  • Gerald Manley Hopkins

    poem 'The Windhover To Christ Our Lord', read by Neil Pearson

  • 00:19

    Richard Strauss

    Don Quixote - The Ride through the Air

    Performer: New Philharmonia Orchestra, Sir Adrian Boult (conductor).
    • EMI 5555282.
    • Tr9.

  • James Stephens

    poem 'Tree and Wind', read by Cheryl Campbell

  • 00:21

    Fr茅d茅ric Chopin

    Etudes, Opus 25 聳 Etude No.11 in A Minor

    Performer: Murray Perahia.
    • SONY CLASSICAL SK 61885.
    • Tr23.
  • 00:25

    Jean鈥怭hilippe Rameau

    Castor & Pollux 聳 Acte premier 聳 Scene I

    Performer: Les Arts Florissants, William Christie (director).
    • HARMONIA MUNDI HMC90143537 (3).
    • CD1 Tr8.

  • Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

    extract from poem My Lost Youth, read by Neil Pearson

  • 00:29

    Claude Debussy

    La Mer, 3 esquisses symphoniques 聳 III. Dialogue du vent et de la mer

    Performer: Toulouse Orchestra, Michel Plasson (conductor).
    • EMI CDC7494722.
    • Tr9.

  • Charles Kingsley

    The Water-Babies, read by Cheryl Campbell

  • Charles Kingsley

    The Water-Babies, read by Cheryl Campbell

  • Charles Kingsley

    The Water-Babies, read by Cheryl Campbell

  • Herman Melville

    extract from 'Moby Dick', read by Neil Pearson

  • Herman Melville

    extract from 'Moby Dick', read by Neil Pearson

  • 00:35

    Bob Dylan

    When The Ship Comes In

    Performer: Bob Dylan.
    • Columbia Legacy 5099751989226.
    • Tr8.

  • Theodore Roethkoe

    poem 'Child on Top of Greenhouse', read by Neil Pearson

  • 00:39

    Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart

    Cosi Fan Tutte - Terzettino 'Soave Sia Il Vento'

    Performer: Sir Simon Rattle.
    • EMI Classics ?聳 7243 5 86501 2 9.
    • Tr2.
  • 00:42

    Traditional/Tubridy (arranger)

    The Wind That Shakes the Barley/The Reel With The Beryle

    Performer: The Chieftains.
    • Columbia ?COL 506368.
    • Tr11.

  • George Macdonald

    short passage from novel 'At The Back of the North Wind', read by Cheryl Campbell

  • 00:46

    Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart

    Concerto in C for Flute and Harp, K. 299 -Rondo Allegro

    Performer: Jean-Pierre Rampal (flute), Lilly Laskine (harp), Paillard Chamber Orchestra, Jean-Fran莽ois Paillard (conductor).
    • RCA GD60013.
    • Tr6.

  • Carl Sandburg

    poem 'Wind Song', read by Neil Pearson

  • 00:51

    Maurice Ravel

    Daphnis and Chloe: Suite No. 2

    Performer: Czech Philharmonic Orchestra, Jiri Belohlavek (conductor).
    • CHANDOS CHAN9462.
    • Tr6.

  • Robert Louis Stevenson

    poem 'To S.R. Crockett', read by Cheryl Campbell

  • 00:57

    (Reid/Jacob)

    The Wild Geese

    Performer: Jim Reid.
    • World Music Network RGNET 1235 CD.
    • Tr4.

  • James Joyce

    Poem 'Watching The Needleboats at San Sabba', read by Neil Pearson

  • 01:00

    Ludwig van Beethoven

    Symphony No.6 in F major, op.68 "Pastoral" 聳 IV Allegro

    Performer: West-Eastern Divan Orchestra, Daniel Barenboim (conductor).
    • DECCA 4783511 (5).
    • CD3 Tr8.

  • The King James Bible

    Line about the Lord and the Wind from Jeremiah, read by Cheryl Campbell

  • 01:04

    Johann Sebastian Bach

    Sonate (Trio) G-Dur BWV 1039 - Allegro

    Performer: Jean-Claude Gerard, flute; David Formisano, flute; Sergio Azzolini, Daniel Blumentahl, Walter Forchert, Boris Kleiner.
    • HANSSLER CLASSIC 92121.
    • CD1 Tr2.

  • Daniel Defoe

    The Storm: Or, A Collection of the Most Remarkable Casualties and Disasters Which Happened in the Late Dreadful Tempest Both By Sea and Land, read by Neil Pearson

  • Daniel Defoe

    The Storm: Or, A Collection of the Most Remarkable Casualties and Disasters Which Happened in the Late Dreadful Tempest Both By Sea and Land, read by Cheryl Campbell

  • Daniel Defoe

    The Storm: Or, A Collection of the Most Remarkable Casualties and Disasters Which Happened in the Late Dreadful Tempest Both By Sea and Land, read by Neil Pearson

  • 01:06

    Claude Debussy

    Pr茅ludes, Book 1 聳 Ce qu'a vu le vent d'Ouest

    Performer: Paul Crossley (piano).
    • SONY CLASSICAL SK52583.
    • Tr7.

  • Philip Larkin

    extract from poem 'Autumn', read by Cheryl Campbell

  • E. E. Cummings

    poem ' A Wind Has Blown The Rain Away And Blown', read by Neil Pearson

  • 01:11

    Michael Tippett

    Symphony No.4 聳 fig. 160

    Performer: Chicago Symphony Orchestra, George Solti (conductor).
    • DECCA 4336682.
    • Tr12.

Producer's Notes:

My Wind Story is This.听 I was out walking along the ridge of a small Scottish island.听 It was a beautiful day.听 Soft mossy turf springing under my feet, tiny early Spring flowers scattered across it 鈥� the sun out and the gentlest breeze breathing warmly over my face 鈥� a wonderful day - think the sound of Mozart and Soave Sia Il Vento or perhaps Ravel and the ravishing Daphnis et Chloe.听 Then, a minuscule dimming of light; looking back there鈥檚 a gaping black maw instead of sky 鈥� it races from the north and already, sea and horizon have been swallowed up.听 The light goes out.听 A sudden blow.听 I鈥檓 off my feet, burling over and over, and finally off the ridge down into a small sheltered cutaway by a track.听 I shelter In its lee for the next ten, maybe twenty minutes.听 I鈥檓 not alone 鈥� there are five of us for company; as well as myself, two sheep, one hare and a small speckly bird.听 (I like to think it was a Twite, just the kind of bird that turns up before and after high winds.)听 Above we five roared a northern blast in full attack mode.听 It made me think of a fiendishly difficult Chopin piece I once tried very hard to learn to play鈥�. Beethoven or Bax would have enjoyed that brief tempest. Britain鈥檚 Atlantic climate is to the wind, what the Serengeti is to the lion or wildebeest, vulture or zebra.听 So much wind, so many winds, hunting across the land and talking endlessly with the Sea.


So Who Has Seen The Wind?听 There are many stories, so much music.听 Daniel Defoe鈥檚 tongue-in-cheek rehearsal of the application of scientific enquiry to the nature of wind, Yeats鈥� wonderful evocation of the conception of the gods of the wind, Rampal鈥檚 funeral march for a wind god, harp and flute and wind machine, whaups about the graves of the martyrs crying, wild geese calling to the homesick and swallows and river and wind in a nursery rhyme for a sick child鈥� while a small boy screams his delight at a gale from the top of a greenhouse roof.


A final thanks to Debussy who holds a magical tuning fork to the wind and all the life it blows.

听

Producer: Jacqueline Smith

Broadcast

  • Sun 1 May 2016 17:30
    麻豆社 Radio 3

Featured in...

The hidden history of plant-based diets

The hidden history of plant-based diets

Forget social media influencers - the meat-free movement started with the Victorians.

Books website

Get closer to books with in-depth articles, quizzes and our picks from radio & TV.

Gallery