Private Passions

After working as a chef for 30 years, Louise Kennedy changed course and became a writer.

Her first novel Trespasses enjoyed the kind of success every author dreams of. It won widespread acclaim and prizes, including best debut novel at the British Book Awards in 2023. It was also adapted as a drama series for Channel 4.

Louise was born in Belfast, and her writing draws on the world she grew up in: Trespasses is set in the 1970s and focuses on a love affair across the religious divide between a young Catholic teacher and a married Protestant lawyer.

Her most recent book, Stations, is set in the 1980s and is inspired by the young people who left Ireland to look for a new life in London – a path Louise herself followed.

Her musical passions include Mozart, Bach and Charlie Parker.

Presenter Michael Berkeley

Eric Idle has been making audiences around the world laugh for nearly 60 years. As a member of the legendary Monty Python group, he helped redefine British television comedy – followed by three highly successful original Python films.

Eric also wrote numerous songs for the Pythons, including Always Look on the Bright Side of Life, which has become highly popular at British funerals.

He also created and co-wrote the hit stage musical Spamalot, which brought the anarchic Monty Python spirit to Broadway, the West End and beyond.

His most recent book is called Idle in Provence: A Brief History of Thyme. It’s a memoir focusing on his house in southern France - originally a crumbling stone ruin, now a lifelong retreat and source of inspiration.

His musical passions include works by Elgar, Haydn and Dvorak.

Presenter Michael Berkeley

Elif Shafak is a best-selling writer who is as happy telling a story from the point of view of a fig tree or a water droplet as a fellow human being.

She began writing in her native Turkish and now writes in English, and her 13 novels have been translated into dozens of languages. Her books cross continents and centuries. Her novel There Are Rivers in the Sky moves from ancient Mesopotamia to 21st-century London, and she loves uncovering forgotten histories and giving voices to the silenced.

In her most recent book, In One Brief Moment All Eternity, she tells the story of the great French writer Gustave Flaubert, author of Madame Bovary, from the perspective of the women, both real and imagined, who influenced him.

Elif is also a passionate campaigner for books and freedom of expression, and is the President of the Royal Society of Literature.

Her musical passions include Rachmaninov, Chopin and Hildegard of Bingen.

Presenter Michael Berkeley

As part of the BBC's collaboration with The Music is Black, the V&A East Museum exhibition celebrating Black British music and musicians, Michael Berkeley talks to the saxophonist and composer Courtney Pine, whose work is recognised at the exhibition.

Courtney Pine released his first album 40 years ago, and it became the first British jazz album to enter the UK Top 40, competing at the time with the likes of Madonna, Paul Simon and the Pet Shop Boys. In the decades since, he has become one of the most influential figures in British jazz. As a performer, his musical passions are wide-ranging, embracing acoustic jazz and electronics as well as the Jamaican sounds he heard when he was growing up. He has also been a tireless musical ambassador through broadcasting and education and has earned both an OBE and a CBE for his services to music. He learned piano and clarinet at school, where he established musical roots in the classical tradition. His music choices include Bach, Ravel, Stravinsky, and Florence Price.

Presented by Michael Berkeley.

The American political scientist Francis Fukuyama loves big ideas, and his 1992 book The End of History and the Last Man was an international best-seller.

It argued that – after the collapse of the Soviet Union - Western liberal democracy was the best system of governance. It wasn’t perfect and hadn’t achieved everything, but it was the most humanly satisfying model.

He also stated that “the end of history will be a very sad time” – predicting that safe, prosperous "last men" would grow bored and restless. Eventually this would fuel a rage against the establishment that would invite populism.

Francis’s most recent book is a memoir called In the Realm of the Last Man, in which he reflects on his political evolution over five decades, and also writes about some of his favourite music. His choices for Private Passions include works by Bach, Handel, Mozart and Carl Orff.

Presenter Michael Berkeley

Family is at the heart of the work of the writer Louisa Young. Her first book was about her grandmother, Kathleen, a sculptor who was also the widow of the Antarctic explorer Captain Scott.

She’s written five books for younger readers with her daughter Isabel, under the pen-name Zizou Corder, including the best-selling Lionboy trilogy.

She’s also written an acclaimed memoir, You Left Early: A True Story of Love and Alcohol, about her relationship with the composer Robert Lockhart.

And her most recent book, The Golden Hours, continues much-loved The Cazalet Chronicles, the sequence of novels written by her aunt Elizabeth Jane Howard.

Louisa's music includes works by Chopin, Franck and Puccini.

The actor Sylvester McCoy was a familiar face to millions of TV viewers when he played the Seventh Doctor in Doctor Who in the 1980s. On the big screen, he has played the eccentric wizard Radagast the Brown in Peter Jackson’s Hobbit trilogy, and on stage, he has played the Fool opposite Ian McKellen’s King Lear for the Royal Shakespeare Company.

His route into acting was unconventional. He spent his teenage years preparing for the priesthood, then later honed his physical comedy skills in Ken Campbell's maverick Roadshow. His music choices include tracks by Stravinsky, Satie, Beethoven, and Britten's Shakespearean opera A Midsummer Night's Dream.

Presenter Michael Berkeley.

Producer Graham Rogers

When Lyse Doucet was a child growing up in a small town in eastern Canada, she borrowed a library book called How to Become a Journalist. It clearly made an impact. She is now the BBC’s chief international correspondent and has reported from some of the world’s most challenging countries, including Afghanistan and Iran, for more than 40 years.

This year she won the Women’s Prize for non-fiction for her first book, The Finest Hotel in Kabul: A People's History of Afghanistan, in which she explores the country’s recent history through the story of Kabul’s landmark Inter-Continental Hotel.

Lyse's choices include music by Elgar, Sibelius, Bach and Einaudi.

In the world of dance, Carlos Acosta is a superstar. He grew up in a poor part of Havana, where he was the 11th child in his family, and began his training at the National Ballet School of Cuba.

At the age of just 18, he became the youngest principal dancer at the English National Ballet. After gaining further international experience, he joined the Royal Ballet in 1998 and made it his home for nearly two decades, dancing almost every major classical role.

He’s now Director of Birmingham Royal Ballet, where he’s fostered some unexpected collaborations, including a ballet danced to the music of local heavy rock legends Black Sabbath as well as productions of classics such as Swan Lake and the Nutcracker. And this summer, he returns to the stage of the Royal Ballet in London with a programme called Myths and Modern Masters.

Carlos' music choices include works by Prokofiev, Khachaturian, Massenet and Ennio Morricone.

Leslie Cavendish left school at the age of 15 years, without any artistic qualifications, and decided to become a hairdresser. Within three years, his clients included Terence Stamp, Keith Moon, the Bee Gees, Jane Asher – and the Beatles.

He began by cutting Paul McCartney’s hair - and soon became part of the band’s inner circle. He attended Beatles recording sessions and joined them on their Magical Mystery Tour. They even invited him to open a salon at their Apple Tailoring boutique on the Kings Road in Chelsea.

Leslie's music includes Tchaikovsky, Mendelssohn and Beethoven.