The BBC's Promising Proms
As I type this, I'm listening to the Monteverdi Choir & English Baroque Soloists perform the French baroque dance music of Jean-Philippe Rameau with the Buskaid Soweto String Ensemble live from London's Royal Albert Hall via BBC online. The music is part of Prom 3, i.e., the third night of the eight-week summer series of daily Royal Albert Hall concerts known as The Proms or, more formally, The BBC Proms, or, even more formally, as The Sir Henry Wood Promenade Concerts Presented by the BBC. You can hear them live on the BBC online and for seven days after broadcast via the BBC Radio Player.
This is, needless to say, a wonderful thing for classical music fans. The Proms began in 1895 as a way to use the hall during the off-season summer months and to develop an audience not used to attending classical concerts (sound familiar?). They became known as promenade concerts when audiences began strolling around the lower-priced standing areas of the hall.
The BBC Proms Guide offers the complete schedule of the season's seventy concerts. This year's focus is on Sibelius, Elgar, and "words and music" (including Shakespeare songs and Auden poetry set to music by the likes of Stravinsky and jazz composer John Dankworth). Yes, the lineup is a deep tried and true roster of "great composers," with only occasional examples of music written by the living. And of course at least one critic finds the BBC Proms overly conservative, focused on white males, and globally homogenized thanks to the Internet. At the same time, the BBC Proms has for several years sponsored competition for composers twelve to eighteen years old and it offers a robust outreach program to young listeners and, they hope, future Proms attendees. Listen in and judge for yourself.