Midsomer Rhapsody is the eighth episode of the eighth series of the popular ITV crime drama Midsomer Murders and was originally aired on 2nd October 2005.
Synopsis
When an early copy of Midsomer's beloved (and dead) composer Joan Alder's most famous work surfaces, people start dying. Barnaby is an old friend of the family and investigates the deaths, plus delves into the mystery surrounding Joan's love life and the reasons she left the village years earlier. Questions about the authenticity of the work threaten Joan's ex-husband's claim to the royalties still generated by the music.
Plot
DCI Barnaby and Sgt. Scott investigate the murder of Arthur Leggott. The man had recently moved into a care home but was found dead in his house. He was a respected music teacher and had been a close friend of Joan Alder the late, great composer. There had been rumors that Leggott may have had in his belongings a rare piece of sheet music from Alder's early years. When such a piece turns up at auction, Barnaby is convinced it was stolen in the first place. Joan Alden's husband, her agent, a young woman who now claims to be her daughter, her putative father and an antique dealer are all suspects. As the death count rises the field of suspects narrows, but the solution lies in a letter handwritten by Joan Alder and and the infatuation of someone who loved her in their youth.
Cast
- John Nettles as DCI Tom Barnaby
- John Hopkins as Sergeant Dan Scott
- Jane Wymark as Joyce Barnaby
- Laura Howard as Cully Barnaby
- Barry Jackson as Dr George Bullard
- June Whitfield as Peggy Alder
- Trevor Peacock as Charlie Speight
- Belinda Sinclair as Melody Thorpe
- David Lyon as Alan Thorpe
- Nicholas Amer as Arthur Leggott
- David Burke as John Farrow / Hedge
- Frank Middlemass as Noah Farrow
- Oliver Cotton as Michael Maybury
- Clare Higgins as Laura Crawford
- Christopher Benjamin as Harvey Crane
- Stephen Boxer as Owen Swinscoe
- Richard Vanstone as Joe Smeeton
- Julia Deakin as Valerie Smeeton
- Tom Ellis as Lee Smeeton
- Kate Fleetwood as Sarah Douglas
- Malcolm Raeburn as Auctioneer
Galleries
Body Count
Supporting Cast
Episode Images
Notes
The following actors and actresses who appeared in this episode have also appeared in the following episodes
- Malcolm Raeburn - A Talent for Life and Picture of Innocence
- June Whitfield - The Flying Club
- David Burke - The Village That Rose from the Dead
- Clare Higgins - Death in a Chocolate Box and Talking to the Dead