The Listening Service

Tom Service looks for the essence of Spain in the music of later centuries. Why was so much "Spanish" music written by Russian, French or German composers, and how do we recognise a "Spanish" sound in music now?

From nocturnes and nightmares to dreams and dances - music loves the night. Tom discovers the music and sounds found after the sun sets, from Wagner and Mozart to Faithless and Aerosmith via the songs of nightingales and crickets.

He explores the nocturnal sounds of the natural world with sound recordist Ellie Williams and sees how composers like Bartok have tried to incorporate those sounds in their music.

Music is full of dreamscapes as well as nightmares, so science writer Alice Robb is on hand to explain why we dream and how we might be at our most creative when we close our eyes to dream.

Hannah Thorne (producer)

What links pre-war picker George Formby and Wagner, US rock duo The White Stripes and Bruckner, crooning legend Barry Manilow and Chopin? The surprising answer is that they've all shared tunes. Is that because, after 1,000 years of written music, there are no tunes left? What are the essential ingredients of a great tune and how difficult is it to write one?

Tom Service seeks answers with the help of maths man Marcus du Sautoy and composer Jessica Curry.

David Papp (producer)

In a live edition of The Listening Service, Tom Service hears and responds to composer Olivier Messiaen’s ‘Interstellar Call’, sent out in his epic "From the canyons to the stars..." The music is inspired by the wild beauty of Arizona, filled with birdsong and the sounds of nature, but also with a cosmic sense of awe - where does Messiaen's visionary work fit in the culture of the early 70s and in the present day?

Tom Service looks at complexity in music. From Bach fugues to contemporary pop production, musicians and composers love to elaborate ideas to the limits of their imaginations. But when we listen, we only have one chance to hear all that's going on in their music. According to physicist Marvin Minsky, the human brain can only register a maximum of three different musical ideas going on at the same time. So how do we manage to enjoy listening to the rich counterpoint of a Mozart symphony, a Beethoven string quartet, even a highly produced pop song by Janelle Monae? Tom wrestles with ideas of detail versus texture, emotion versus intellectual design and asks, can we hear the wood for the trees?

Why do we seem to love music from the day we're born? Are we born musical or do we learn it along the way?

Whether it's melodies by Mozart, Queen, nursery rhymes or Baby Shark, music seems to captivate our babies - but what is it about these tunes that they're enjoying?

Tom is joined by infant psychology expert Dr Laurel Trainor to find out how babies really interact with music - what are they hearing in the womb? Do they have musical preferences? Does participating in music have any developmental benefits? And is there any truth in the so-called Mozart effect?

How do you go about writing music for tiny people? Andrew Davenport, creator and composer of iconic pre-school hit In the Night Garden and Moon and Me explains how babies and music go hand in hand.

And Tom finds out why we've sung lullabies to our infants all over the world since Babylonian times.

Hannah Thorne - producer

From ancient Greek drama until today, music has often been an integral part of the theatre and it's where many concert hall staples - think Beethoven's Egmont... Schubert's Rosamunde... Mendelssohn's A Midsummer Night's Dream.... Grieg's Peer Gynt - began life. But does the very act of collaboration make incidental music a sort of anaemic, second rate cousin to symphonies, string quartets and sonatas? To help find answers, Tom Service enlists the help of theatre director Elle While and Harrison Birtwistle, whose music was so vital to the 1983 landmark Peter Hall National Theatre production of Aeschylus's The Oresteia.

David Papp (producer)

From Frankie Valli and Jeff Buckley to Andreas Scholl and Iestyn Davies - Tom Service celebrates the male singers hitting the high notes.

With inside knowledge from countertenor Lawrence Zazzo.

Does practice make perfect? And what is perfect practice? Tom Service asks whether anyone can become a good musician by just putting in the hours. Pianist James Rhodes talks about the role practice plays in his life, and Professor Brooke Macnamara reveals the true role practice plays in performance.

Tom Service considers the rise of Sound Art, commonly found in art galleries today, and wonders whether it is a new genre or simply music in an art space? He consults musician and sound artist Mark Fell, finds precedents in Wagner's operas, considers how a 16th-century choral work became a contemporary art installation, and celebrates the American performance artist Laurie Anderson who accidentally had a pop hit with her piece O Superman.