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Broadcast programme:
Pergolesi - Stabat Mater

Carolyn Sampson (soprano)
Tim Mead (counter-tenor)
´óÏó´«Ã½ Scottish Symphony Orchestra
Martyn Brabbins (conductor)

The ´óÏó´«Ã½ Proms are back in the Royal Albert Hall in London with a six-week season of concerts featuring leading British orchestras as well as international soloists and conductors.

The works of Giovanni Battista Pergolesi became so popular in the later 18th century that music publishers sometimes printed compositions by other people under Pergolesi's name to increase sales. Sadly, the composer didn't live to enjoy his Europe-wide popularity, having succumbed to illness at the age of just 26. His Stabat Mater, composed towards the end of his life but only published a dozen years later, became widely praised – and imitated - for the strikingly beautiful yet harmonically daring lines that the two vocal soloists sing. Over the centuries, many composers have set the medieval Latin text about the suffering of the Virgin Mary but Pergolesi's 1736 version remains the benchmark to this day.

Presenter Andrew McGregor is joined by professor Suzanne Aspden from Oxford University.

[Photo: Soprano Carolyn Sampson performs Pergolesi with ´óÏó´«Ã½ Scottish Symphony Orchestra at the Royal Albert Hall. Credit: Chris Christodoulou/´óÏó´«Ã½]