We're pleased to resume Album of the Week during Black History Month by featuring the wonderfully talented family of musicians: the Kanneh-Masons. They recently released a recording of Carnival of the Animals by Camille Saint-Saëns, along with several other animal-themed classical works.
The Carnival of the Animals features a new text by author Michael Morpurgo, narrated by him and Academy Award-winning actor Olivia Colman (of The Crown fame). Listen all week for portions of the Carnival as well as several full performances.
Here is a note from the seven talented Kanneh-Masons who are featured in this recording:
The idea for this album grew from our special connection with music as young children. Music that speaks to the young, brought to life in the creative dialogue between narrative and sound has an impact that lasts a lifetime. As very young children, our parents introduced us to Prokofiev’s Peter and the Wolf, and we listened to this obsessively every morning before Primary school. (We still love the way the music illustrates the words spoken in that recording by the Melbourne Symphony Orchestra and Dame Edna Everage!)
We were all similarly fascinated by the magical world of story and music created in Carnival of the Animals by Saint-Saëns. The drama, the picture-painting and the humour which is packed into the music has been brought into vivid colour by Michael Morpurgo’s story poems, – also narrated by the extraordinary Olivia Colman – which are funny, exciting and at times incredibly moving.