BBC Radio 3’s Verdi 200 celebrations are under way and will run until next week. The great Italian composer – born on October 9 or 10 (there’s confusion about the exact date) – will be a major focus of the network throughout the week. 

Four operas will be broadcast. Don Carlo (tonight, October 7 at 6.15pm), recorded at the Royal Opera House, Covent Garden in May, is cast from strength with Jonas Kaufmann (Carlo), Anja Harteros (Elisabeth), Mariusz Kwiecen (Posa) and Ferruccio Furlanetto (Phillip). Sir Antonio Pappano conducts. For night birds (or users of the iPlayer) 'Through the Night' on Thursday (October 10 at 00.30am) brings a 1963 performance recorded at the Concertgebouw of Falstaff with Carlo Maria Giulini conducting. And later that day (at 2pm) the rarely heard Giovanna d’Arco will provide the fare for 'Afternoon on 3': Anna Netrebko sings the role of Joan and Plácido Domingo takes the baritone role of Giacomo. Next Saturday (October 12, 7.30pm), Harteros and Kaufmann return in a Munich production of Il trovatore. 

On Friday (October 11 at 2pm) the Verdi Requiem will feature in a performance recorded at this year’s Salzburg Festival with Riccardo Muti on the podium (the soloists are Krassimira Stoyanova, Elīna Garanča, Piotr Beczala and Dmitry Belosselskiy), and during the afternoons each day Verdi’s ballet music from the operas will be played. The subject of Donald MacLeod’s 'Composer of the Week' (at 12pm and 6.30pm each week day) will be Verdi.

Among the features scheduled for Verdi 200 is ‘Verdi the Director’ (Saturday at 12.15pm), a documentary by Verdi scholar Susan Rutherford explores the composer’s role in the staging of his operas. 'Night Waves' (Wednesday at 10pm) will look at Verdi’s Shakespeare operas and there will be second airings for Ronald Frame’s drama Sunday at Sant’Agata (Sunday, October 13 at 10pm), Roger Parker’s ‘Viva Verdi!' (Sunday at 6.30pm) and Robert Lloyd’s personal Verdi selection (Saturday, October 12 at 2pm).

Tony Cheevers, the editor of Verdi 200, commented that ‘Our Verdi 200 week offers listeners the opportunity to enjoy the very best concert performances of a wide range of works, and to learn more about the composer himself. 2013 is an important year for Verdi and for opera, I’m particularly excited that our listeners will get the chance to hear four complete operas with so many wonderful Verdi singers including Kaufmann, Harteros, Domingo, Corena and Netrebko.'