The Essay

Linda Cracknell reflects on the appeal of the quartz on Ben Lawers, her local Munro.

Breaking Free - the minds that changed music.In The Essay this week, personal reflections on the revolutionary music and ideas of the Second Viennese School as they searched for an antidote to all the certainties and expectations of the past, and cast music on a new path of dissonance and discovery, shocking audiences then and now.Bethany Bell is a BBC foreign correspondent and has lived in Vienna for more than 15 years. In tonight's Essay Bethany remembers living in Mödling, a town near Vienna where Schoenberg lived and where on walks with Berg and Webern he devised his radical ideas for music.

Breaking Free - the minds that changed music. In The Essay this week, personal reflections on the revolutionary music and ideas of the Second Viennese School as they searched for an antidote to all the certainties and expectations of the past, and cast music on a new path of dissonance and discovery, shocking audiences then and now.Musician and broadcaster Tom McKinney recalls his "first contact" with the music of Webern - his Five Pieces for Orchestra, Op.5, and then taking part in a transformative performance of the same work as a professional musician.

Breaking Free - the minds that changed music.In The Essay this week, personal reflections on the revolutionary music and ideas of the Second Viennese School as they searched for an antidote to all the certainties and expectations of the past, and cast music on a new path of dissonance and discovery, shocking audiences then and now.Tonight's essayist is Gillian Moore, Director of Music at Southbank Centre in London. She talks about Alban Berg's relationships with key women in his life, including his final operatic creation "Lulu".

Breaking Free - the minds that changed musicIn The Essay this week, personal reflections on the revolutionary music and ideas of the Second Viennese School as they searched for an antidote to all the certainties and expectations of the past, and cast music on a new path of dissonance and discovery, shocking audiences then and now.Tonight's essayist is broadcaster and journalist Stephen Johnson who has chosen Schoenberg's Second String Quartet as his touchstone - a work that defines Schoenberg's movement away from traditional tonality and embraces the dissonance.

Breaking Free - the minds that changed music.In The Essay this week, personal reflections on the revolutionary music and ideas of the Second Viennese School as they searched for an antidote to all the certainties and expectations of the past, and cast music on a new path of dissonance and discovery, shocking audiences then and now.Tonight's essayist is Radio 3 presenter and pianist Sarah Walker who describes the experience of learning and performing Schoenberg's Suite for piano (Op.25) for her MA recital.

Novelist Andrew Martin has long been interested in ghosts and their stories, and he gives them much thought over five essays.5. It goes without saying that Halloween and Christmas are resonant times for the Undead. Prepare to hear about the best ... or should that be the worst?Producer Duncan Minshull.

Novelist Andrew Martin has long been interested in ghosts and their stories, and he gives them much thought over five essays.4. Stories, novels, films.. but the author's favourite source for things unreal and unsettling is a huge tome called 'Phantasms of the Living', which he now celebrates..Producer Duncan Minshull.

Novelist Andrew Martin has long been interested in ghosts and their stories. He gives them much thought over five essays.3. The ghosts of Medieval times were 'solid' and had a moral purpose. Modern sightings were ephemeral, transluscent, and now 'doubt' crept in...Producer Duncan Minshull.

Novelist Andrew Martin has long been interested in ghosts and their stories. He gives them much thought over five essays:2. 'Britain is a ghostly nation', he reckons. And most of them came from the north. And their heyday was a hundred years ago. And just what is The Society of Psychical Research?Producer Duncan Minshull.