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7:00 News

Robbie Ellis has been announced the University of Otago's new Mozart Fellow

ELLIS: Three Sibilants
Anna McGregor (cl)

Jenny McLeod's music, performed by the NZSO, released on Naxos

MCLEOD : The Emperor & the Nightingale
Helen Medlyn (narr), New Zealand SO/Uwe Grodd
Naxos 8.572671

Probably the world's most famous mezzo, Anne Sofie von Otter is visiting New Zealand in November to perform a recital in Auckland and with the Vector Wellington Orchestra

SCULTHORPE: String Quartet No 13, Island Dreaming
Brodsky Quartet, Anne Sofie von Otter (mezzo)
Challenge CC 72007

VON KOCH: In the Month of Tjaitra; Of Lotus Scent & Moonlight; Spring Night’s Rain; Mankind’s Lot; The Wild Swans
Anne Sofie von Otter (mezzo), Bengt Forsberg (pno)
DG 449 189-2

8:00 The Nerve

(2 of 6) In the Key of DNA (Music & Evolution)

Jowi Taylor asks the question why? Why did music evolve in the first place? Some people think music is merely an evolutionary frill, a by-product – delicious cheesecake for our ears that has no evolutionary purpose. Darwin himself was puzzled by music. Observing songbirds, he suggested music’s role was in sexual selection (which may explain why rock stars from Franz Liszt to Tommy Lee have had such busy sex lives). Others believe music’s origins may be found in the mother-infant interactions we call baby talk, and others consider the importance of the lullaby – a need to pacify infants. Others theorize that music developed in tandem with the social cohesion necessary to the survival of bands of early humans, critical to them through its power to strengthen social bonds. Cheesecake? Or sex, baby talk, and social interaction? Set in the Key of DNA, Taylor examines what the purpose of music is and has been, yesterday and today. (CBC)

9:00 Argentina

ROSSI: Ancestral Rites of a Forgotten Culture
Olga Szwajgier (sop), Cracow Percussion Ensemble/Stanislaw Welanik
Q Disc 97006

PIAZZOLLA: 3 Tangos for bandoneon & orchestra
Astor Piazzolla (bandoneon), Orch of St Luke’s/Lalo Schifrin
Nonesuch 7559 79174

RATKJE: No Title Tango & Milonga
Jazzaway JARCD 019

VINAO: Arcanum
Janet Youngdahl (sop), Absolute Ensemble/Kristjan Jarvi
BIS SACD 1187

11:00 New Music Dreams

TORKE: Fiji & Tahiti
10/10 Ensemble of the Royal Liverpool Phil/Clark Rundell
Ecstatic Records ER 092231