Released to celebrate his 50th birthday, King of Pop is Michael Jackson's third major compilation in just five years, following 2003's million-selling Number Ones and 2005's The Essential Collection. With a track listing chosen by fans via the GMTV and The Sun websites, it could, and should, have been the ideal opportunity to showcase his lesser-known singles and standout album tracks…
Following the death of Michael Jackson in Los Angeles 25 June 2009, Natasha Kaplinsky presents a special programme looking back at the life and career of the pop star.
Among all his remarkable and varied compositional talents, Purcell was the supreme craftsman when it came to setting his native language to music. Addison wrote of Purcell’s ‘Tunes so wonderfully adapted to his Words’ and Playford, in his introduction to the first volume of Orpheus Britannicus (1706) commented that ‘The Author’s extraordinary Tallent in all sorts of music, is sufficiently known; but he was particularly admir’d for his Vocal, having a peculiar Genius to express the Energy of English Words, whereby he mov’d the Passions as well as caused Admiration in all his Auditors’. Purcell combined an innate sense of the natural rhythms of speech and a wonderful melodic flair with a richness of harmonic language that few composers have ever matched.