On Bass... Tina Weymouth! • 2019 • episode "S1E2" • Guitar, Drum and Bass

95:39

'My personal lullaby for a frenetic world. A manifesto for a slower pace of existence' - Max Richter. Max Richter's Sleep is a meditative respite from the rush and chaos of modern life that studies a universal experience. This documentary film follows acclaimed composer and musician Max Richter and his creative partner, artist and Bafta-winning film-maker Yulia Mahr, as they navigate an ambitious performance of his celebrated eight-hour opus Sleep at an open-air concert in Los Angeles. Emmy-nominated director Natalie Johns weaves in Mahr's personal archive and performance footage from Berlin, Sydney and Paris to create a rich portrait of a shared artistic process, along with contributions that illuminate both the science and the story behind the work.

2020 • Music

58:59

DJ and broadcaster Rita Ray travels to Nigeria, home of some of the most influential African music of the last 60 years. The country's extraordinary polyrhythms have powered highlife, funk and Afrobeat for decades, and can still be heard in modern pop music. Travelling to Lagos and beyond, Rita traces the importance of rhythm in Nigeria's music and discovers the many different musical styles it has created, from Yoruba juju music, to acoustic singer-songwriters and world-class pop.

1 • Africa: A Journey into Music • 2018 • Music

3:00

We don't know much about the human brain on music. Do people instinctively know the sound patterns of the pentatonic scale? Is there a base level of musical knowledge in all of us, just waiting to be tapped? Or is the pentatonic scale simply so common in Western music that it has become ingrained in all of our minds? Improvisational genius Bobby McFerrin uses audience participation to demonstrate the power of the pentatonic scale - or at least the audience's familiarity with it.

2011 • Music

59:08

Suzy Klein takes us back to the volatile years following the Russian Revolution and World War I, when music was seen as a tool to change society. Suzy explores the gender-bending cabarets of 1920s Berlin and smashes a piano in the spirit of the Bolshevik revolution. She also reveals why one orchestra decided to work without a conductor, uncovers the dark politics behind Mack the Knife and probes the satirical songs which tried to puncture the rise of the Nazis. Suzy's musical stories are brought to life with the help of the BBC National Orchestra of Wales and its Chorus, as well as solo performers. This was a golden age for music, and its jazz, popular songs, experimental symphonies and classics like Rachmaninoff all provoke debate - what kind of culture do we want? Is music for the elite or for the people? Was this a new age of liberal freedom to be relished - or were we hurtling towards the apocalypse?

S1E1 • Tunes for Tyrants • 2017 • Music

4:44

When you listen to music, multiple areas of your brain become engaged and active. But when you actually play an instrument, that activity becomes more like a full-body brain workout. What's going on? Anita Collins explains the fireworks that go off in musicians' brains when they play, and examines some of the long-term positive effects of this mental workout.

TED-Ed • Music

89:13

John Eliot Gardiner goes in search of Bach the man and the musician. The famous portrait of Bach portrays a grumpy 62-year-old man in a wig and formal coat, yet his greatest works were composed 20 years earlier in an almost unrivalled blaze of creativity. We reveal a complex and passionate artist; a warm and convivial family man at the same time a rebellious spirit struggling with the hierarchies of state and church who wrote timeless music that is today known world-wide. Gardiner undertakes a 'Bach Tour' of Germany, and sifts the relatively few clues we have - some newly-found. Most of all, he uses the music to reveal the real Bach.

2013 • Music