BBC R3 Documentary - 'On Planet Hoffnung'
Presented by Rainer Hersch
Broadcast September 5, 2009
Coded from a digital source at 128/44.1

BBC Blurb
Rainer Hersch, stand-up comedian and classical music specialist,
remembers the brilliant and eccentric contribution to the comic
side of classical music from Gerard Hoffnung.

Hoffnung, who died in 1959 at the age of 34, was a cartoonist and
wit whose mocking of the solemn rituals of classical music created
a sensation in the 1950s. At a time when the symphony concert was
a matter of great seriousness for music-lovers, Hoffnung loved to
see the funny side of those formalities. His famous cartoons took
the instruments of the orchestra - and the characters of the people
who played them - and sent them up mercilessly.

In 1956 Hoffnung had the idea of translating the cartoons into real
life. With a combination of realisations of his weird cartoon instruments
and suitably eccentric compositions to showcase them, the first Hoffnung
Music Festival took place at the Royal Festival Hall in London.
.