Front Row

On Saturday at the Barbican 18 musicians from several countries will play in a concert of Christian music from the East - Greece, Syria and India. Three of them, the singer Susheela Raman, guitarist Sam Mills and percussionist Pirashanna Thevarajah, talk to Samira Ahmed about the music and where they found it, and perform live in the Front Row studio.Elizabeth Dawn played Vera Duckworth in Coronation Street; Tony Booth, was Alf Garnett's Scouse son-in-law, Mike Rawlins, in Till Death Us Do Part, and was also in Coronation Street. The death of both actors was announced today and Susannah Clapp, the theatre critic of the Observer, and a keen Corrie fan, discusses the characters and the actors.This weekend many students will be going to university. As well as being a place of sober (and lewd) learning the university campus has, since the Second World War, been the setting of so many novels and films these have become a genre. Hannah Rose Woods captained her team to victory in University Challenge last year. She and Toby Lishtig, fiction editor of the Times Literary Supplement, consider the role of the campus in modern culture.It was announced today that playwright and director Kwame Kwei Armah, who for the last few years has been running the Center Stage theatre in Baltimore, will return to take over as Artistic Director of the Young Vic. Susannah Clapp tells Samira about him, and considers the significance of the appointment.Presenter: Samira Ahmed Producer: Julian May.

Nancy Meyers has made her career making hugely popular romantic comedies such as The Holiday, It's Complicated and What Women Want. As her latest venture, Home Again, comes to cinemas we speak to Nancy Meyers about the rom-com and her career in Hollywood. Last week, UK book publishers Bloomsbury launched their first 'Modern Classics' series, joining the likes of Picador, Faber & Faber and of course Penguin, who established their iconic series way back in 1961. But why are certain books deemed worthy of the label? And what exactly does the term mean in the first place? The curator of Bloomsbury's new series, Alison Hennessey, and literary critic Suzi Feay discuss what makes a modern classic.The migration crisis was seen as a key factor in Germany's election results this weekend with the nationalist AfD party winning enough parliamentary seats to become the third-largest party in the Bundestag. Award-winning novelist Jenny Erpenbeck was born in East Germany and she discusses her latest novel - Go, Went, Gone - which explores the crisis from the perspective of a recently-retired German professor based in East Berlin, who discovers that the transitions in his own life connect him in ways he had never imagined to the thousands seeking new lives in Germany.With the Turner Prize scrapping its eligibility age limit of 50, the work of the four artists who've made the shortlist - two of whom are over 50 - goes on display this week. Critic Jonathan Jones casts an eye over the Turner Prize exhibition which this year takes place at the Ferens Art Gallery in Hull for the first time. Presenter Kirsty Lang Producer Jerome Weatherald.

The political cartoonist Gerald Scarfe discusses Stage and Screen, a new exhibition at House of Illustration of his designs for theatre, rock, opera, ballet and film over the last 30 years, from Orpheus in the Underworld for English National Opera to Pink Floyd's 1982 film The Wall. Maja Lunde, author of the best-selling novel The History of Bees, tells Kirsty why she was inspired to write about these insects whose future is under threat, and how this led her to explore what the world might look like without them.Composer Sally Beamish and librettist David Harsent discuss The Judas Passion, their new oratorio which tells the Passion story from the perspective of Judas Iscariot.And today is the autumn equinox and on Radio 4 we've been marking the turning of the year and the darkening of the days with poems. Live in studio we have the poet Nick Makoha with a poem called The Good Light.

Last time they worked together director Natalie Abrahami buried Juliet Stevenson up to her neck in Samuel Beckett's play Happy Days. In their new collaboration, Stevenson spends almost the entire evening flying about above the stage, for her role as a stuntwoman who suffers a stroke. Juliet Stevenson and Natalie Abrahami talk to Samira Ahmed about staging Arthur Kopit's Wings.The New York street artist Jean-Michel Basquiat, who died at the age of 27 in 1988, is the subject of a comprehensive new exhibition at the Barbican in London. The writer and former director of the ICA, Ekow Eshun, considers whether Basquiat was really 'one of the most significant painters of the 20th century', as the show claims.As Radio 1 prepares to celebrate its 50th birthday later this month, Tony Blackburn - the 24-year-old who launched the station in 1967 - looks back at the landscape of the time and how pop music changed radio for good.And the final shortlisted author for the BBC National Short Story Award, Jenni Fagan, talks about her story The Waken, an evocative tale of transformation and death set in the Scottish islands.Presenter: Samira Ahmed Producer: Sarah Johnson.

Benedict Cumberbatch on bringing Ian McEwan's novel The Child in Time to BBC1, playing a children's writer whose marriage breaks down following the disappearance of his daughter.Giles Coren talks about the new Front Row television programme which begins this Saturday, and discusses his recent remarks about theatre which caused controversy in the press. Sports journalist Eleanor Oldroyd reviews Borg vs McEnroe, a feature film about the intense 1980's rivalry between the two tennis superstars. BBC National Short Story Award shortlisted author Will Eaves discusses his story, Murmur. Presenter: John Wilson Producer: Timothy Prosser.

The Hollywood actor and cellist Jan Vogler discuss their new classical album.

As spy spoof Kingsman: The Golden Circle is released in cinemas, we speak to its co-writers Jane Goldman and Matthew Vaughn, which Vaughn also directed and produced. A sequel to the original hit Kingsman: The Secret Service, Goldman and Vaughn discuss bringing back a character from the dead, convincing Elton John to be in the cast and the impact of Brexit on the British film industry.Cynan Jones has been shortlisted for the BBC National Short Story Award with The Edge of the Shoal. The writer discusses his story of a canoeist who sets out to scatter his father's ashes at sea and gets lost during a storm. The story is broadcast on Radio 4 at 3.30pm on Tuesday and the winner of the BBC NSSA is announced on Front Row on 3 October. TV critic Emma Bullimore considers the landscape of British television in light of last night's Emmy Awards.The first comprehensive retrospective of the work of the American artist Jasper Johns in almost 40 years opens at the Royal Academy this week. The two curators of the exhibition, which features Johns's famous Flags series, look back over the artist's 60-year career.Presenter John Wilson Producer Edwina Pitman.

Jack Dee talks to John Wilson about his new ITV1 sitcom Bad Move, inspired by the idea of downsizing to a supposedly idyllic life in the country. Joanna Trollope announces the shortlist for this year's BBC National Short Story Award: Will Eaves, Jenni Fagan, Cynan Jones, Helen Oyeyemi and Benjamin Markovits, who joins John in the studio. Sci-fi writer Lisa Tuttle reviews Electric Dreams, Channel 4's new drama series based on short stories by Philip K. Dick, starring Bryan Cranston.

The German cabaret singer Ute Lemper joins Kirsty in the studio to perform from her Last Tango in Berlin series of songs, which features the music of Brecht, Weill, Piaf and Marlene Dietrich.Kirsty visits Port Talbot where the National Theatre of Wales is staging a new play, We're Still Here, inspired by the threatened closure of the town's steelworks in 2015 and the hundreds of people who lost their jobs. Kirsty talks to the creators Rhiannon White and Evie Manning, and Sam Coombes, the steelworker who has taken a sabbatical to star in the production.If you've ever wondered what it take to be a great conductor, Vasily Petrenko, winner of the Gramophone Artist of the Year 2017, gives his top tips of dos and don'ts.Presenter Kirsty Lang Producer Jerome Weatherald.

The comedian and writer Sara Pascoe explains to Kirsty Lang why Pride and Prejudice, great as the book is, was in need of a comic stage adaptation. Her play based on Jane Austen's novel is about to open at the Nottingham Playhouse. It includes scenes with modern commentary, original music from Emmy the Great, and jokes. The Man Booker Prize shortlist, announced today, includes some surprises - omissions as well as inclusions. Critics Alex Clark and Toby Lichtig deliver their verdicts and nominate their favourite to win. Actor Robert Lindsay talks to Kirsty about playing Jack Cardiff in Prism, a play about the cinematographer's life. Prism looks back at Cardiff's career which includes working on the film sets of The Red Shoes, The African Queen and Sons and Lovers.Presenter: Kirsty Lang Producer: Kate Bullivant.