大象传媒

Listen to Thursday's programme:Chinese pianist Lang Lang joins Mark Coles at the piano to discuss his approach to music, and how imagining the composer Franz Liszt as Elvis, and Mozart playing in a playground has improved his performance.

As the world mark's the 200th anniversary of the great playwright and novelist Nicolai Gogol's birth rival neighbours Russia and Ukraine are involved in a literary tug of war, both countries laying claim to the writer. Although he wrote in Russian, many Ukrainians regard him as one of their own and both countries staging rival events to mark the aniversary. And Russia two weeks ago released a lavish new $20 million film adaptation of Gogol's novel about Cossack legend Taras Bulba. David Stern, in Ukraine, tells us more.

74 year old Pedro Peret is Barcelona's most popular and best loved singer and is simply known as the King of Rhumba. Mixing flamenco guitar with Latin American rhythms, he pioneered what became known as Rumba Catalana that has influenced many young artists today like Manu Chau and Ojos de Brujos. Now, back with a new album and his first every concert in the UK this weekend, Garth Cartwright went to meet Pedro Peret at home in Catalonia.