Front Row

The 2019 BBC Cardiff Singer of the World competition has been won by the Ukrainian baritone Andrei Kymach. The week-long competition held every two years is one of the most significant competitions in the classical calendar and has helped make stars of many participants since its inception in 1983. We hear from this year's winner Andrei Kymach and from music critic Anna Picard.This week marks the 50th anniversary since the 1969 Stonewall Riots in New York, a key moment in the birth of the gay rights movement. Each night this week Front Row will be reflecting on the best examples of queer fiction since then, one night for each decade. We begin with the 1970s and our guide to the decade is poet and critic Gregory Woods.As we head into the final weeks of this year's prestigious Art Fund Museum of the Year competition, Front Row looks at the five shortlisted institutions vying for the top prize of £100,000. Today it’s the turn of the Pitt Rivers Museum in Oxford, whose director Dr Laura Van Broekhoven explains wh

Richard Curtis talks to John Wilson about The Beatles, the rom-com and time itself. He's written Yesterday, a musical fantasy comedy directed by Danny Boyle in which a musician, after an accident, finds himself in another world. Here he is the only person who remembers The Beatles, a fact he turns to his advantage. He takes the credit and becomes famous for writing and performing their songs. Himesh Patel stars as the singer and Lily James, Kate McKinnon, and Ed Sheeran also appear. Several writers and commentators have now withdrawn from the Bradford Literature Festival because of the funding of a pre-festival programme by Building a Stronger Britain Together, a Home Office counter extremism programme. Front Row hears from one of them, Hussein Kesvani, author of Follow Me, Akhi : the Online World of British Muslims, and discusses the reasons for the withdrawals.It's the summer solstice and Radio 4 has been celebrating with new poems throughout the day. In Front Row Mona Arshi reads her specially written

Ben Platt has been acting or singing for most of his life, and after winning critical acclaim, and a Tony for the title role in Dear Evan Hansen, and also for playing the loveable, if quirky, Benji, in Pitch Perfect, he’s now shed his characters and written his debut album, very much from the heart. He tells Shahidha why he felt compelled to write an autobiographical album and why it was important not to hetero-wash it. American artist Lee Krasner was a true innovator working with bold colours in an abstract expressionist style from the 1940s onwards. She struggled to find recognition in her own lifetime, working mainly in the shadow of her husband Jackson Pollock. As the Barbican in London holds a huge retrospective of Krasner’s work, Shahidha asks the artist’s biographer and friend Gail Levin and art critic Jacky Klein how far this exhibition goes to give Krasner the recognition she deserves. Shahidha visits Hoxton Hall, a beautiful old music hall in East London to talk to the makers of Chasing Rainbows, a

Producer Mark Ronson releases his fifth studio album ‘Late Night Feelings’ which features female singers from an eclectic range of pop music including Miley Cyrus and Alicia Keys. A ‘breakup album’ consisting of songs charting the disintegration of a relationship, Mark talks about how collaboration works on such personal material.In the past weeks, both the National Portrait Gallery and the Royal Opera House have faced protests from climate campaigners over BP sponsorship, and more look set for the summer months. Author and academic Tiffany Jenkins and Chris Garrard co-founder of campaigning organisation Culture Unstained discuss the ethics of arts sponsorship.Toy Story 4 sees Woody, Buzz Lightyear and the rest of the gang back and heading off on a road trip with Bonnie and a new toy named Forky. Front Row talks to Josh Cooley about directing the latest episode in the mega-franchise, the fourth instalment that some argue is a risky post-script to a hugely successful trilogy. Presenter: John Wilson Pr

The CILIP Carnegie Medal, and CILIP Kate Greenaway Medal are the most prestigious prizes for literature for children and young people. Both winners were announced today and are on tonight's Front Row. Elizabeth Acevedo’s Carnegie-winning novel tells the story of Xiomara, a Dominican-American girl growing up modern-day Harlem. Elizabeth explains why she chose to unfold the story of The Poet X in a long series of short lyrics. The Lost Words, for which illustrator Jackie Morris has won the Kate Greenaway Medal, is also a poetry book. It's her collaboration with writer Robert Macfarlane, inspired by the words left out of a new children’s dictionary, words such as bluebell and acorn. Jackie tells Stig how she approached illustrating the poems with three very different images, but of the same subject.As we head into the final weeks of this year’s prestigious Art Fund Museum of the Year competition, Front Row begins looking at the five shortlisted institutions vying for the top prize of £100,000. Today it’s the tu

Joseph O’Connor, whose book Star of the Sea was critically acclaimed and a global bestseller, talks about his latest novel Shadowplay. Taking the well-known presumption that Bram Stoker based the character of Dracula on the Shakespearean actor Henry Irving, Shadowplay is about the close collaboration and intense friendship between Stoker, Irving and his famous acting partner Ellen Terry. Portuguese-born artist Dame Paula Rego's work across paint, pastel, etching and fabric is often based on children's folktales. But the animals and people that populate her work convey tough political messages. A new exhibition at the recently extended and remodelled MK gallery in Milton Keynes offers an edited retrospective of the 84 year old artist's substantial body of work. Art critic Louisa Buck reviews. Pauline Kael was a film critic renowned for her personal writing style that combined scathing wit and passion. In the week she would have turned 100, film critics Tim Robey and Gavia Baker Whitelaw consider her work, wha

Tracy K. Smith has just completed her time as the Poet Laureate of the United States and published Eternity, her selected poems. For Front Row she reads poems reflecting the variety of her work: the story of a clandestine border crossing; a poem linking David Bowie with the cosmos; another that she did not write so much as discover, a letter to Abraham Lincoln from a mother appealing for the release of her son from the Union army in the American Civil War. Political commentator Helen Lewis joins Front Row to look at what the Tory leadership election might mean for the arts, considering the arts track records of the remaining candidates and exploring the value of a cultural hinterland in modern politics. Today sees the release of new albums by Bruce Springsteen and Madonna. Kate Mossman reviews Western Stars and Madame X, as well as the posthumous new album Tim by Avicii.Presenter: Stig Abell Producer: Sarah Johnson

Rob Lowe, the Brat Pack Hollywood heart-throb who went on to star in hit American series such as The West Wing and Parks and Recreation, talks to Kirsty Lang about his surprising role as a Chief Constable in Boston, Lincolnshire in ITV’s darkly comic new series Wild Bill. Live in Moscow Maria Kornienko outlines the repression and harassment faced by artists making work publicly critical of Vladimir Putin's regime, and the moves they are taking to counter this.Keith Haring was also an artist and activist, in 1980s New York. He was prolific and commercially successful with his signature black line images of crawling babies, dancing figures, and barking dogs. A friend of Andy Warhol, Madonna, and Jean-Michel Basquiat, he used art to make political points about apartheid, nuclear weapons and the AIDS crisis. The first major retrospective of his work in the UK is about to open at Tate Liverpool. Co-curator Tamar Hemmes, and artist Samantha McEwen who became friends with Haring at art school in New York, discuss

Bill Nighy on his latest film Sometimes Always Never, about a family torn apart and then reunited by a love of the board game Scrabble, written by Frank Cotterell Boyce and directed by Carl Hunter. The unreliable narrator is a much loved staple of fiction but it's now a key ingredient in videogame storytelling. Ragnar Tornquist, author of the mystery game Draugen, which features an unreliable narrator, discusses with games writer Jordan Erica Webber.Stig, who has always been intimidated by classical ballet, decides to confront his fear and learn how to watch ballet. He talks to English National Ballet artistic director Tamara Rojo and goes to watch their new production of Cinderella at the Royal Albert Hall. Presenter: Stig Abell Producer: Timothy Prosser

Artist and activist Ai Weiwei has designed a flag to be flown across the UK from 24th June to mark the 70th anniversary of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. He has also just screened his latest documentary The Rest, which focuses on the plight of individual refugees in 23 countries. John Wilson visits the artist in his Berlin studio to discuss art, activism and his current relationship with China.Yacht Rock might be a term you’ve never heard of but you’ll definitely know the bands – Toto, Joni Mitchell, The Doobie Brothers and The Pointer Sisters. Katie Puckrik explains what characterises the genre and what it says about America in the 70s and 80s ahead of her two-part documentary broadcast on BBC Four.Presenter: John Wilson Producer: Hannah Robins

Gwendoline Christie, famous for playing warrior Brienne of Tarth in Game of Thrones, discusses her new stage role as the fairy queen Titania in Nicholas Hytner’s immersive new production of A Midsummer Night’s Dream.Works by Steve McQueen, Lubaina Himid and Yinka Shonibare feature in a new exhibition Get Up, Stand Up Now at Somerset House in London, which explores the impact of 50 years of Black creativity in Britain and beyond. Curator and artist Zak Ové and artist Zoe Bedeaux discuss the themes and goals of the exhibition.The Youth Poet Laureate of the United States, Kara Jackson, and Aisling Fahey, who was London’s Youth Poet Laureate in 2014, discuss what they’ve discovered about each others' cities and the poetry being created there, on an exchange between young Poets Laureate in Chicago and London. Presenter Kirsty Lang Producer Jerome Weatherald

Oscar winner Julianne Moore talks about her starring role in Gloria Bell, Chilean director Sebastian Lelio's English-language remake of his celebrated 2013 film Gloria, about a divorcee looking for love on the dance floors of Los Angeles. The much anticipated return of two TV series: Armistead Maupin's Tales of the City and the second season of Big Little Lies, in which Meryl Streep joins Reese Witherspoon and Nicole Kidman. Angie Errigo reviews.Jools Holland pays tribute to Dr John, the New Orleans-born singer and pianist whose Grammy award winning music combined blues, pop, jazz, boogie woogie and rock and roll.Presenter: Stig Abell Producer: Timothy Prosser

Dulcet-toned comedian Matt Berry joins us to discuss two new projects: a BBC TV spin-off of the 2014 cult mockumentary What We Do in the Shadows in which Berry plays a jaded 700 year-old vampire, and his new role as Detective Inspector Rabbit, a hardened Victorian booze-hound, in Channel 4’s period comedy Year of the Rabbit. Men make a mess of the world with the First World War. Afterwards a female messiah emerges to lead humanity to salvation, through the work of a community of women in Bedford. That is the milieu of Claire McGlasson’s first book, The Rapture. Her work of fiction, though, is based on fact: the real-life Panacea Society. Claire tells Front Row about her strange love story psychological thriller escape novel. Yesterday the National Trust announced they had bought Brackenthwaite Hows, the Lake District viewpoint that inspired JMW Turner’s watercolour Crummock Water, Looking Towards Buttermere. The site, which is 77 acres and includes a stone viewing-platform, is the first bought by charity spe

Emma Thompson discusses her role as a TV chat show host in her new film Late Night and, as she embarks on her first stand-up show, talks about politics, performing , and how much things have changed for women in comedy.As the winner of the Women’s Prize for Fiction 2019 is announced, we talk to her live from the ceremony. The books are: It’s The Silence of the Girls by Pat Barker; My Sister, the Serial Killer by Oyinkan Braithwaite; Milkman by Anna Burns; Ordinary People by Diana Evans; An American Marriage by Tayari Jones; Circe by Madeline Miller.Anthony McCarten's screenplay credits include Bohemian Rhapsody, The Theory of Everything and Darkest Hour. He is also a prolific novelist and playwright. McCarten discusses his new play, The Pope, about Pope Benedict XVI who in 2013 became the first pontiff in seven centuries to resign. The title role of The Pope has tempted Anton Lesser (Thomas More in Wolf Hall) back to the UK stage for the first time in a decade. This morning in Portsmouth, as part of the D-Da

Samira talks to Nigerian American performer, choreographer and writer Okwui Okpokwasili about the UK premiere of Bronx Gothic at London’s Young Vic. How does the piece delve into one woman’s attempt to shake loose memory in a performance at the intersection of dance, theatre and visual installation.Musical acts always used to be the headliners and sole draw for music festivals. Recently we have seen the rise of alternative stages at these events – often including literary events. But what make them different to what you might find at mainstream literature festivals? We speak to Laura Barton who programmes Green Man’s literary space and Colin Midson, the main programmer for Port Eliot Festival’s literary stage. Thirty years ago today the name Tiananmen, which means the Gate of Heavenly Peace, assumed a tragic irony when the (also ironically named) People’s Liberation Army, massacred the crowd of young people peacefully calling for democracy in the Square. We'll look at the role of writers and musicians in cre

Live magazine programme on the worlds of arts, literature, film, media and music

Elizabeth Gilbert’s memoir Eat Pray Love has sold fifteen million copies around the world and was made into a film with Julia Roberts. Her new novel is City of Girls, the story of a young woman discovering an exhilarating life in a theatre in New York in the summer of 1940. She talks about why she was unafraid of writing about a young woman’s sexual desire and about the dramatic and difficult events in her personal life that shaped the writing of the book.“The biggest thing since the Beatles” has become something of a pop cliché, but in the case of the south Korean boy band BTS it might be justified. This year they became the first group since The Beatles to earn three US Billboard number one albums in less than 12 months and this weekend they’re playing in London. Haekyung Um explains the BTS and K pop phenomenon.Natalia Goncharova was a Russian avant-garde artist known for her large scale abstract canvases, performance art and textile and theatre design. Ahead of a retrospective of her work at Tate Modern,

At the piano, composer Alan Menken discusses his music which led the rebirth of Disney animation with hits such as The Little Mermaid, Beauty and the Beast and Aladdin, which he’s reworked for the new live-action version currently top of the box office. Georgia's state governor has signed legislation banning abortion once a fetal heartbeat is detected (except in reported cases of rape or incest). In response, several major production companies including Netflix and Disney have said they are considering a boycott of the state. Last year 455 film and television productions were made in Georgia, where film companies enjoy a 30% tax rebate and 92,000 people work in the industry so the impact could be significant. American film writer, Michael Carlson, considers the story.In Amitav Ghosh’s new novel Gun Island, the protagonist Deen Datta finds himself on a journey from the muddy Sunderbans of Bangladesh – the world’s largest mangrove forest – to Los Angeles and Venice, to solve a linguistic mystery. Ghosh discuss

The long awaited adaptation of Terry Pratchett and Neil Gaiman’s cult fantasy novel Good Omens arrives on Amazon on Friday. Samira talks to Michael Sheen and David Tennant who play a fussy Angel and a loose-living Demon forced into an unlikely alliance to stop Armageddon. Brìghde Chaimbeul is a young Gaelic speaking piper from the Isle of Skye and one of Scotland’s rising stars. Brìghde won the BBC Radio 2 Young Folk Award in 2016 and her debut album, The Reeling, has received rave reviews. The pipes she plays, though, aren't the familiar Highland bagpipes but the Scottish Smallpipes. She explains her unusual instrument to Samira Ahmed, and how her style is rooted in her indigenous language and culture, yet draws inspiration from elsewhere - Bulgaria, for instance. And she plays.The charity Youth Music has undertaken research showing that allowing vulnerable students to choose what music they study and play improves their outcomes in school. This has been reported as 'exchanging Mozart for Stormzy', but Ma

Lenny Henry discusses his latest role as Elmore in August Wilson’s play King Hedley II. King is a young black man, just out of prison, who dreams of starting a business and a family. Then the smooth-talking, crap-shooting hustler Elmore wanders in and changes the dynamic in the yard. Artistic director Nadia Fall tells Samira why she has brought this epic, set in Pittsburgh in the Reagan era, to the Theatre Royal, Stratford East, and announces her plans for her second season there.The celebrated comic artist and graphic novelist Posy Simmonds, famous for her satirical long-running comic strips Gemma Bovary and Tamara Drewe in The Guardian, and books including Cassandra Darke, discusses her first major UK retrospective covering a 50-year career.The Central Park Five are the subject of a new true crime drama from Netflix. When They See Us centres on the wrongful conviction of five teenagers of colour for violent rape in New York in 1989 and their following 25-year fight to prove their innocence. The show is dire