BBC Radio 3 is broadcasting Folk Connections over this weekend, 29/30/31 January.

The content is wonderful, but the branding is haphazard - and the publicity is minimal.

Folk Connections

Half a dozen programmes have been specially commissioned, but the great majority of programmes over the weekend have links - of varying degree - to folk music.

Appalachian Trail

Here is a list of programmes for the series, and some leading up to it too.

Thursday 28 January

7:30pm BBC Radio 3 Radio 3 In Concert BBC Scottish Symphony Orchestra
Recorded at Celtic Connections at the weekend
7:30 Liam O'Flynn, with his colleagues Arty McGlynn and Rod McVey, performs from his orchestrated repertoire, including The Brendan Voyage by Shaun Davey (excerpts)
8:30 Bela Fleck performs his own The Imposter Banjo Concerto, commissioned by the Nashville Symphony and premiered in 2011

Friday 29 January

10:30am Radio 3 Music in Time Delius's Brigg Fair
The focus is on the Modern period and Delius's English Rhapsody, Brigg Fair. 'Brigg Fair', the folksong, was 'collected' by Grainger in 1905 after a musical festival in the North Lincolnshire town of Brigg. When Delius heard Grainger's own arrangement of the song for solo tenor and chorus, he asked his permission to use it as the basis for this magnificent orchestral theme and variations.
2:00pm BBC Radio 3 Afternoon on 3
Penny Gore pre-empts Radio 3's Folk Connections weekend with a concert recorded in November at Chichester Festival Theatre. The BBC Concert Orchestra are joined by the folk musicians Nancy Kerr and James Fagan in a specially arranged programme featuring folk-inspired orchestral music by the likes of Holst, Moeran and Britten alongside traditional song and dance tunes.

BBC Radio 3 Folk Connections weekend; Celebrating folk music and the influence of folk on classical music

Friday 29 January

4:30pm In Tune Folk Connections Special Suzy Klein presents a special edition of In Tune live from Cecil Sharp House to launch Radio 3's Folk Connections weekend celebrating folk music and exploring how folk music has inspired composers through the centuries. Alongside traditional folk song there will be music influenced by folk, including the songs of George Butterworth in the year which marks the centenary of his death at the Somme.
11:00pm World on 3 Folk Connections Lopa Kothari presents music from Calan, Bella Hardy and Afro Celt Sound System from Celtic Connections at the CCA in Glasgow - performances by leading musicians from Scotland, Wales and England as part of Radio 3's Folk Connections weekend.

Saturday 30 January

7:00am Breakfast Tom McKinney including music for Folk Connections
10:30am Record Review Recent recordings of British folk music
12:15pm Music Matters Debating the appropriation of folk music in the classical repertoire with Sandra Kerr
1:00pm Saturday Classics chosen by Kathryn Tickell 2/2 (Available on demand 23 January Kathryn Tickell 1/2)
***3:00pm Folk Connections 1/3 Voice of the People Continuing Radio 3's Folk Connections weekend, Verity Sharp chairs a discussion about the history, origins and future of folk song collecting in the UK. With live performances from Emily Portman, Fay Hield and Thomas McCarthy.
***9:45pm Between the Ears Return to Brigg Fair
Jim Moray bends sound and time to recreate the encounter between composer Percy Grainger and elderly farm bailiff Joseph Taylor which marked a major turning point in the history of traditional folk music.
10:15pm Hear and Now Modern Muses Beamish's folk-infused double concerto Seavaigers
12:00 midnight Geoffrey Smith's Jazz The folk-jazz connection from Lead Belly to Dizzy Gillespie

Sunday 31 January

7:00am Breakfast Tom McKinney with folk-inspired classical music
9:00am Sunday Morning including Lincolnshire Posy by Percy Grainger and Beethoven's settings of Scottish and Irish songs
12:00 noon Private Passions Michael Berkley welcomes Shirley Collins She tells Michael about her Sussex childhood, her passion for Baroque music, and the pleasure she's finding in singing again after a gap of more than thirty years. And we hear Shirley singing with her late sister and collaborator Dolly.
***1:00pm Folk Connections 2/3 Sam Lee and Friends in concert from Celtic Connections
2:00pm The Early Music Show Lucy Skeaping explores the influence of folk music on early music
4:00pm The Choir with guest Paul Sartin and his own Loft Singers
5:30pm Words and Music Village Minstrel - Celebrating John Clare Texts and music inspired by John Clare's poetry. With folk music from Paddy Tunney and Fred Jordan, singer-songwriters Vikki Clayton and Chris Wood, fiddler Giles Lewin and The Imagined Village, plus works by Britten, Haydn, Gurney, Tippett, Thomas and Linley.
***6:45pm Sunday Feature Cecil Sharp's Appalachian Trail Andy Kershaw follows Cecil Sharp's Appalachian Trail through Virginia, North Carolina, Kentucky, and Tennessee, hearing some of the songs he collected both in their original versions and in present-day interpretations in specially-recorded sessions from Martin Carthy, Brian Peters and more.
7:30pm Radio 3 in Concert Transatlantic Sessions concert from Celtic Connections
***11:50pm Folk Connections 3/3 Verity Sharp and Bruce MacGregor join the Festival after-show party, sample more highlights from Celtic Connections, and contrast the folk scenes in England and Scotland.

Radio 3 this week