Front Row

Nicola Benedetti has co-written a new cadenza for Beethoven's Violin Concerto. As she embarks on a tour with the Orchestra of the Age of Enlightenment, she talks to Kirsty Lang about the challenges of performing this classical masterpiece. Jason Solomons reviews Winchester: The House That Ghosts Built, which stars Helen Mirren in the first horror movie of her 50 year career and is set in the real life house that the Winchester gun heiress built to keep ghosts at bay.As part of Reading Europe Radio 4 is dramatising 'The Bride and Groom' , a novel by the award-winning Russian author Alisa Ganieva. Kirsty talks to Alisa about the contrasting picture of tradition and modernity she presents of Dagestan, her homeland in the Caucasus. Grigory Ryzhakov, author of a guide to modern Russian literature, gives us an overview of what Russians are reading both in terms of literary fiction and popular novels, from crime thrillers to the classics.Presenter: Kirsty Lang Producer: Timothy Prosser.

Simple Minds, the stadium-filling band from Glasgow, have been together for 40 years. As they release Walk Between Worlds, lead singer Jim Kerr looks back on the four decades and the band perform an acoustic version of a song from the new album.Reputed to be Daniel Day-Lewis' final film before retiring from acting, Phantom Thread travels behind the doors of London's 1950s fashion houses. Film critic Catherine Bray discusses director Paul Thomas Anderson's latest project.Theatre company Told by an Idiot's latest production Napoleon Disrobed imagines a comical alternative history in which instead of dying in exile, Napoleon traverses Europe alive, well and in disguise. Director Katherine Hunter and actor Paul Hunter explain the challenges of re-writing history on stage.Writer and broadcaster Lindsay Johns argues that the South African novelist Alex La Guma is an overlooked literary colossus who should be restored to his rightful place at the centre of the literary canon.Presenter: Samira Ahmed Producer: Edwina Pitman.

All day long I'd bidi-bidi-bum... Sheldon Harnick is 93 and won worldwide acclaim as the lyricist of the hugely successful Fiddler on the Roof. As a new production of Rothschild & Sons, one of his lesser-known musicals, opens in this country he talks about a lifetime of lyrics.Britain's first professor of Musical Theatre, Professor Millie Taylor, and theatre critic David Benedict discuss the evolution of the musical since the premiere of Fiddler on the Roof in 1964.The Danish Icelandic artist Olafur Eliasson is best known for his large-scale installation art using natural elemental materials, such as The Weather Project, a dazzling sun in Tate Modern's Turbine Hall. Nikki Bedi met him at his studio in Copenhagen to discuss his views on the cultural landscape of Denmark, artistic collaborations and breakdancing.Presenter: Nikki Bedi Producer: Rebecca Armstrong.

Last year, wunderkind playwright James Graham premiered three plays Ink, Labour of Love, and Quiz which looked respectively at the rise of the Sun newspaper, Labour party history; and the Who Wants To Be A Millionaire "coughing Major" scandal. As he begins 2018 with another premiere, The Culture: A Farce in Two Acts, he discusses turning his attention to Hull's year as City of Culture and his desire and energy to keep creating new work.The V&A's new exhibition Ocean Liners: Speed and Style explores the golden age of ocean travel through all aspects of ship design from ground-breaking engineering, architecture and interiors to the fashion and lifestyle aboard. Design critic Corrine Julius reviews.Jennifer Nansubuga Makumbi on her novel Kintu - lauded as 'The Great Ugandan Novel' - which has just been published in the UK for the first time.And we speak to the winner of the 2017 Costa Book Prize, live from the ceremony. The book is chosen from the five category winners - Inside the Wave by Helen Dunmore (Poetry); Eleanor Oliphant is Completely Fine by Gail Honeyman (First Novel); Reservoir 13 by Jon McGregor (Novel); The Explorer by Katherine Rundell (Children's) and In the Days of Rain by Rebecca Stott (Biography).

Former National Theatre director, Sir Nicholas Hytner on his new production of Julius Caesar, starring Ben Whishaw and David Morrissey, which offers the audience a chance to stand and be immersed in the action. Sir Nicholas talks about the staging, how contemporary politics resonates with this Shakespeare play and about his new venue the Bridge Theatre. Ruth Barnes looks at what the list of Grammy winners says about the current state of popular music.The pioneering architect Neave Brown, responsible for celebrated landmark designs in social housing, died earlier this month. Architects Joanne McCafferty and Paul Karakusevic assess Brown's legacy and his influence on social housing design today.Joe Dunthorne, who achieved great success with his debut novel Submarine whilst still in his twenties, talks to John about his third book, The Adulterants. Set in trendy East London it's about a group of thirtysomethings making life choices against a backdrop of the 2011 summer riots.

As part of Radio 4's Reading Europe season, Kirsty Lang explores Turkish literature in Istanbul, talking to leading writers including Nobel Laureate Orhan Pamuk.Critics Kaya Genc and Nagihan Ibn Haliloglu discuss how the Turkish literary scene compares to our own: what are the bestselling books, and how are writers dealing with the current political situation, given Turkey has imprisoned more writers recently than any other country. Orhan Pamuk on his latest novel The Red-Haired Woman (Radio 4's current Book at Bedtime), and its themes of authoritarianism and the clash between the old and new Turkeys. Since being sacked from her job as one of Turkey's most-read newspaper columnists because of her political views, Ece Temelkuran has concentrated on her career as a novelist, including writing the bestselling Women Who Blow on Knots. Burhan Sönmez, the prize-winning Kurdish writer whose latest novel Istanbul, Istanbul, inspired by his own experience of torture and imprisonment, is about four political prisoners who tell each other magical stories about Istanbul. Why has a little known love story written in 1940 recently topped the Turkish bestseller charts? Filiz Ali talks about her father Sabahattin Ali, who was murdered in 1948 but whose novel Madonna in a Fur Coat has become a publishing phenomenon. The books discussed in our programme are:The Red-Haired Woman, written by Orhan Pamuk and translated by Ekin Oklap Istanbul, Istanbul, written by Burhan Sönmez and translated by Ümit Hussein. Women Who Blow on Knots, written by Ece Temelkuran and translated by Alexander Dawe. Madonna in a Fur Coat, written by Sabahattin Ali and translated by Maureen Freely and Alexander Dawe. The Stone Building and Other Places, written by Asli Erdogan and translated by Sevinç Türkkan.Presenter: Kirsty Lang Producer: Timothy Prosser.

In 2016 Paapa Essiedu became the first black actor to play Hamlet for the RSC. As he reprises the role for a tour of the production we speak to the actor tipped to be a star, about Hamlet and his performances in television dramas Kiri and The Miniaturist. It's rare for a poetry essay to make the news headlines but that's exactly what's happened to the essay written by Rebecca Watts in the current issue of PN Review. She talks to Samira about her problem with the poetry establishment and explains why her criticism of poet Hollie McNish wasn't personal. Award-winning poet Don Paterson responds.Publisher Daniel Mallory turned debut novelist A J Finn discusses making it to the top of the best-seller charts with his psychological thriller, The Woman In The Window.On tonight's podcast, artist Grayson Perry explains why the late Mark E. Smith of the post-punk group The Fall, was one of his heroes.Presenter: Samira Ahmed Producer: Edwina Pitman.

Now just 18, cellist Sheku Kanneh-Mason won the title of BBC Young Musician of the Year in 2016. His choice of repertoire ranges from Shostakovich to Bob Marley and he plays live in the studio on the release of his debut album, Inspiration.Following the announcement of the death of Ursula K. Le Guin, the Earthsea writer's literary agent Ginger Clark and fantasy novelist Vic James discuss her legacy. Charles I (1600-1649) acquired and commissioned an extensive collection of art, including works by Rubens, Van Dyck, Holbein and Titian. Jerry Brotton, author of The Sale of the Late King's Goods, assesses the new Royal Academy exhibition Charles I: King and Collector, which includes works reunited for the first time since the 17th century.As two Belfast-based arts institutions - the arts complex The MAC and the Ulster Orchestra - receive emergency funding after financial problems put them at risk, the BBC's Northern Ireland Arts Correspondent, Robbie Meredith, discusses the current state of arts funding in Northern Ireland.Presenter: Alex Clark Producer: Jerome Weatherald.

The nominations for the 90th Academy Awards were announced earlier today, with Guillermo del Toro's fantasy romance The Shape of Water receiving the most, including best picture.Stig Abell is joined by film critics Larushka Ivan-Zadeh, Gaylene Gould and Tim Robey to consider the winners and losers, and to assess whether the nominations reflect events of 2017 including Weinstein and #MeToo, and whether there is a better representation of BAME talent than in previous years. Presenter Stig Abell Producer Hannah Robins.

Matt Damon's new film Downsizing imagines a solution to over-population is to shrink humans to five inches tall. Director of Film for the British Council Briony Hanson reviews the film which is part midlife strife part speculative science-fiction.A choreographer for sex scenes on stage or on screen is just as important as that for a fight scene - so says movement director Ita O'Brien, who is calling on the industry to do more to protect performers in scenes involving sex or nudity. Ita O'Brien and casting agent Chris Carey discuss her proposals in the post-Weinstein, #MeToo era.Political cartoonist Martin Rowson joins John at the British Museum to meet Patricia Ferguson, curator of a display called Pots with Attitude: British Satire on Ceramics, 1760-1830 which looks at the Georgian fashion for printing satirical drawings onto pottery .And on the day the BFI re-issues of the classic British nuclear disaster film When the Wind Blows, based on the cartoon by Raymond Briggs, Ian Christie considers the film's relevance now.Presenter : John Wilson Producer : Dymphna Flynn.