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Mike Brearley

Mike Brearley, one of the most successful cricket captains of all time, talks to Michael Berkeley about the music that inspires him and about his second career as a psychoanalyst.

Mike Brearley, the former England cricket captain, talks to Michael Berkeley about the wide range of classical music that inspires him.

Mike is one of the most successful cricket captains of all time, winning 17 tests for England and losing only four. No one who follows the game will forget the so-called ‘miracle’ of the 1981 Ashes: recalled as captain, Mike galvanised the demoralised team in one of the greatest-ever feats of sporting psychology - and led England to an astonishing 3-1 series victory.

The Australian fast bowler Rodney Hogg famously described Mike as having ‘a degree in people’ – and that’s particularly appropriate as he’s gone on to have a long and successful second career as a psychoanalyst, as well as writing a series of books and working as a cricket journalist.

Mike talks to Michael Berkeley about the close engagement he has with music – he listens with the same intensity and concentration he brought to test cricket and that he brings to his work as a psychoanalyst.

He chooses music by Bach, Monteverdi, and Tchaikovsky, and a Mozart sonata that reminds him of his father, also a first-class cricketer.

Mike is drawn to the complexity and darkness of music written by Beethoven and by Schubert at the very end of their lives and to an opera by Harrison Birtwistle that he finds challenging and difficult but ultimately enlightening.

Producer: Jane Greenwood
A Loftus Media production for ´óÏó´«Ã½ Radio 3

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37 minutes

Last on

Sun 29 Aug 2021 12:00

Music Played

  • Claudio Monteverdi

    Pur ti miro (L'Incoronazione di Poppea)

    Singer: Sylvia McNair. Singer: Dana Hanchard. Orchestra: English Baroque Soloists. Conductor: Sir John Eliot Gardiner.
  • Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart

    Violin Sonata in B flat major, K.454 (1st mvt: Largo - Allegro)

    Performer: Jascha Heifetz. Performer: Brooks Smith.
  • Johann Sebastian Bach

    Goldberg Variations (excerpts)

    Performer: Ralph Kirkpatrick.
  • Ludwig van Beethoven

    String Quartet in C sharp minor, Op.131 (6th mvt: Adagio)

    Ensemble: Endellion Quartet.
  • Franz Schubert

    Piano Sonata in B flat major, D.960 (1st mvt: Molto Moderato)

    Performer: Alfred Brendel.
  • Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky

    Gremin's Aria, Act 3 (Eugene Onegin)

    Singer: Jonathan Lemalu. Orchestra: New Zealand Symphony Orchestra. Conductor: James Judd.
  • Harrison Birtwistle

    Passion Chorale I (Punch and Judy)

    Orchestra: London Sinfonietta. Conductor: David Atherton.

Broadcasts

  • Sun 15 Nov 2020 12:00
  • Sun 29 Aug 2021 12:00

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