Programme Information

BBC Radio 2 presenter Aled Jones

At the start of Faith In The World Week on BBC Radio 2, which this year focuses on Growing Up With God and how children are taught about faith, Aled Jones says Good Morning Sunday to former Children's Laureate Michael Morpurgo.

Michael talks about the research and background to his new book, The Kites Are Flying, which is based on a television reporter's extraordinary experience in the West Bank and reveals how children's hopes and dreams for peace and unity can fly higher than any wall built to divide communities and religions.

Deborah Hollamby also discusses the week's news from a faith and ethics perspective and gives the Moment Of Reflection.

Presenter/Aled Jones, Producer/Hilary Robinson

BBC Radio 2 Publicity

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To mark BBC Radio 2's Faith In The World Week, Sunday Half Hour continues exploring the notion of Growing Up With God. Brian D'Arcy finds out how religious faith is passed down to the next generation and through hymns, reflection and prayer, he explores Christianity's core beliefs and discovers how – and what – children are taught today.

Hymns include Now Thank We All Our God, Teach Me My God And King and Loving Shepherd Of Thy Sheep.

Presenter/Brian D'Arcy, Producer/Janet McLarty

BBC Radio 2 Publicity

Legendary Police drummer Stewart Copeland

Michael Berkeley's guest today is Stewart Copeland, legendary drummer with The Police and now a composer. Stewart has written two operas, and recently provided the music and narration for a spectacular performance of Ben Hur at the O2 Arena in London.

In conversation with Michael, Stewart discusses the music that has influenced him throughout his life, from his childhood growing up in Beirut in the Sixties (his American father worked for the CIA) to his years as a rock star with one of the most famous bands of the early Eighties.

He talks about his unusual drumming technique and his interest in chord progressions and rhythmic patterns, illustrating his thoughts with a wide range of music from Ravel's Le tombeau de Couperin and the Prelude to Wagner's Tannhauser, to Paul Simon's Diamonds On The Soles Of Her Shoes and Desmond Dekker's reggae number Israelites which, he says, inspired the style of The Police.

Presenter/Michael Berkeley, Producer/Sarah Cropper

BBC Radio 3 Publicity

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BBC Radio 3 presenter Lucie Skeaping

Today, people think of a "jig" as simply a dance but, back in Shakespeare's time, the word described a short musical farce featuring songs, dancing and slapstick comedy. Performed in the London theatres as "afterpieces", jigs provided light relief at the end of some great drama or tragedy – a satirical, subversive and often downright obscene antidote to the plays which preceded them. Penned by the great comedians of the day and through-sung to popular tunes, jigs had their origins in the clowning, dancing and misrule of rural festivals and folk tradition.

Performing jigs today often requires considerable detective work as tune titles are rarely given, and others are untraceable. The texts are laden with period references and innuendo. What went on between the lines, though – the dance steps, the gestures and instrumental interludes – belonged to each individual performer, much like the ornamentation of baroque concertos.

Lucie Skeaping explores this forgotten, often bawdy world and the music which caused such uproar.

Presenter/Lucie Skeaping, Producer/Sam Phillips

BBC Radio 3 Publicity

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BBC Radio 3 presenter Charles Hazlewood

Following the death of Russian artist Victor Hartmann in 1873, Modest Mussorgsky attended an exhibition of his close friend's work and was inspired to compose a piano suite depicting some of the paintings, drawings and designs that he had seen. Mussorgsky composed the Pictures At An Exhibition suite very quickly and it became a potent example of his Russian nationalist sentiments and his desire to "realistically" capture pictorial ideas in music. The piano suite cried out to be arranged for orchestra and one who took up the challenge was Frenchman Maurice Ravel, who made his remarkable orchestration in 1920. The work has never waned in popularity since.

Charles Hazlewood joins the BBC National Orchestra of Wales and pianist Ashley Wass at the Hoddinott Hall in Cardiff for an examination of both the original and orchestral versions of Pictures. This afternoon's programme looks at the images that so fired Mussorgsky's imagination and finds out more about this complex and often misunderstood 19th-century composer.

This programme will also be filmed for web streaming at bbc.co.uk/radio3.

Presenter/Charles Hazlewood, Producer/Chris Wines

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Matthew Sweet hosts an evening of conversation and debate around BBC Radio 3's Free Thinking festival of ideas, which has taken place this weekend at The Sage, Gateshead. An array of guests including Professor Tanya Byron, Dan Cruickshank, David Miliband, Mike Brearley, Ken Livingstone, Lisa Jardine, William Orbit, Julia Neuberger, Peter Flannery, Gina McKee and many others joined audiences at The Sage for debate, conversation and performance.

Tonight, Matthew is joined by a round table of guests who have been at The Sage all weekend, to reflect on the interviews, lectures and audience comment that they've heard – in particular on this year's key theme at Free Thinking – The 21st-Century Family. They assess if the complex and thought-provoking questions thrown up by the powerful speakers have elicited any answers.

Matthew goes on to introduce this year's Free Thinking drama, specially written for the festival by Newcastle writers Fiona Evans and Karen Laws, and performed at the BALTIC Centre for Contemporary Art. The drama tackles the family theme and explores the line between personal and public responsibility.

Presenter/Matthew Sweet, Producer/Martin Smith

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BBC Radio 3 presenter Ian McMillan

Ian McMillan presents a special edition of this Sony-winning programme recorded in front of an audience at The Sage, Gateshead, as part of BBC Radio 3's Free Thinking festival 2009.

Mixing poetry and music inspired by family life, there are readings from County Durham-born actress Gina McKee (star of Notting Hill and Our Friends In The North) and Live Theatre's Donald McBride, reading poems by Philip Larkin, John Clare, Sylvia Plath and Newcastle's own, Thomas Whittle.

The programme also includes a new commissioned dramatic dialogue by Free Thinking writer-in-residence, Karen Laws. They are joined by members of the Northern Sinfonia playing music by Purcell, Haydn and Dvořák, and by Newcastle-based folk singer Emily Portman and concertina and Northumbrian pipes legend Alistair Anderson.

Presenter/Ian McMillan, Producer/Elzabeth Arno

BBC Radio 3 Publicity

This week's castaway is Professor Colin Pillinger, who is probably best known as the leader of the Beagle 2 project, which set out to land a British-built spacecraft on Mars on Christmas Day, 2003.

The aim of the mission was to search for evidence of life on Mars but it was never certain if the probe made it to the surface of the "Red Planet".

Professor Pillinger has been involved in space exploration for some 40 years since he joined the Nasa Apollo programme in 1968.

He speaks to presenter Kirsty Young about his life, his favourite music and describes how he would cope on BBC Radio 4's mythical island.

Presenter/Kirsty Young, Producer/Leanne Buckle

BBC Radio 4 Publicity

5 Live Sport

Sunday 25 October

12.00noon-6.10pm BBC RADIO 5 LIVE

Colin Murray presents an afternoon of live sport plus the latest sports news and regular updates from the Premier League clash between Bolton and Everton from 1.30pm.

At 2pm there's live commentary of Liverpool versus Manchester United from Anfield with updates from Manchester City versus Fulham.

From 4.15pm there's more Premier League action as West Ham take on Arsenal at Upton Park.

Presenter/Colin Murray, Producer/Adrian Williams

BBC Radio 5 Live Publicity

Football

Sunday 25 October

2.55-4.50pm BBC RADIO 5 LIVE SPORTS EXTRA

BBC Radio 5 Live Sports Extra brings uninterrupted Premier League commentary of Manchester City versus Fulham, live from the City of Manchester Stadium.

Producer/Jen McAllister

BBC Radio 5 Live Sports Extra Publicity

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NFL American Football

Sunday 25 October

4.50-8.00pm BBC RADIO 5 LIVE SPORTS EXTRA

The NFL returns to Wembley Stadium for the third occasion as the New England Patriots take on the Tampa Bay Buccaneers in a regular season clash.

Arlo White presents live commentary with regular contributors NFL journalist Neil Reynolds and Greg Brady.

Presenter/Arlo White

BBC Radio 5 Live Sports Extra Publicity

Jon Richardson is joined by actor and now musician Paddy Considine. The show kicks off with The Happy Hour, which is all about the good things in life, full of reasons to be cheerful and stories of good deeds, all designed to put a smile on listeners' faces on a Sunday morning.

Regular sidekick, the lovable rogue Matt Forde, joins Jon from midday with his top tips and funny noises, and comedian Al Pitcher joins Jon for the last half hour to give the lowdown on the Pitcher Picture Gallery. The show ends with the song that best sums up this week's picture.

Presenter/Jon Richardson, Producer/Adam Hudson

BBC 6 Music Publicity

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BBC 6 Music's resident music journalist supremos, Matt Everitt and Julie Cullen, present highlights from the week of "new musical moments" taking place at Camden's Roundhouse for the BBC Electric Proms, and a celebration of 50 years of the country's most important jazz venue – Ronnie Scott's.

Presenters/Matt Everitt and Julie Cullen, Producer/Tom Green

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BBC 6 Music presenter Huey Morgan

Huey Morgan takes a break from speaking to iconic rockers to invite a new band in to guest on the show.

Signed to Back Yard Recordings (the home of Gossip and Chromeo), Teenagers In Tokyo gained a solid live reputation in their home town of Sydney, supporting the likes of !!!, CSS, The Slits and Gossip.

Darker and more brooding than the aforementioned artists, Teenagers In Tokyo take their cues from punk, grunge and goth with a splash of more uplifting disco to lighten the mood occasionally. The band has recently relocated to London to record their debut long player with Bat For Lashes producer David Kosten. The album is due for release in early 2010.

Consisting of the stylish Samantha Lim on lead vocals, Miska, Linda and Sophie on keys, bass and guitar and lone male Rudy on drums, and coming hot on the heels of the similarly melancholic The XX, the band seem to have a promising 2010 in front of them.

Huey talks to them following their release of double A-side, Isabella/Long Walk Home, and ahead of the release of their second single.

Presenter/Huey Morgan, Producer/Becky Maxted

BBC 6 Music Publicity