Borrowing – not necessarily copying! – happens a lot in pop music, and you might be surprised to learn just how many songs, dance hits and the like indulge in a spot of it from classical sources.

The Borrowers is going to explore those links, from the obvious – and they don’t come much more obvious than Emerson, Lake and Palmer (above) or Yes! – to the much more subtle, which is where the likes of Madonna, Janet Jackson or Pet Shop Boys come in.

If you’d like a particular piece of music to be put under the microscope, get in touch with some suggestions!

We began this corner of Arcana by looking at Joybringer by Manfred Mann’s Earth Band, inspired by Holst‘s The Planets.

Following that it might not be a surprise to learn that Pachelbel‘s Canon is responsible for a number of songs, chiefly Village People’s Go West

More recently, Robbie Williams has decided to Party Like A Russian, with the considerable help of the Dance of the Knights from Prokofiev‘s Romeo and Juliet – which will also, for many people, conjure up visions of the BBC’s reality show The Apprentice.

Come back for more instalments of The Borrowers – including a snippet from Madonna’s new Madame X album!