BBC Proms 2023 | Colin's Column

BBC Proms 2023 – Prom 42: Philharmonia Orchestra. Santtu-Matias Rouvali conducts Edward Elgar & Richard Strauss, with Seong-Jin Cho playing Chopin. Live on BBC Radio 3.

Aug 16, 2023 | BBC Proms 2023, Concert Reviews

Photo, Chris Christodoulou Wednesday, August 16, 2023 Royal Albert Hall, London Italian adventures courtesy of Elgar, In the South (Alassio), 1904, and Strauss, Aus Italien, 1886, the former nominally a Concert Overture if more a symphonic poem, the latter a...

BBC Proms 2023 – Prom 41: Royal Philharmonic Orchestra. Vasily Petrenko conducts Ligeti & Shostakovich, with Alexandre Kantorow playing Beethoven. Live on BBC Radio 3.

Aug 15, 2023 | BBC Proms 2023, Concert Reviews

Photo, Andy Paradise Tuesday, August 15, 2023 Royal Albert Hall, London The Royal Albert Hall can have its own lontano (from a distance), even more so if sitting in certain areas, so whether Ligeti’s Lontano reached the venue’s remotest regions I know not,...

BBC Proms 2023 – Prom 40: BBC Symphony Orchestra. Sakari Oramo conducts Dora Pejačević’s Symphony in F-sharp minor, with Martin Helmchen playing Brahms’s Second Piano Concerto. Live on BBC Radio 3.

Aug 15, 2023 | BBC Proms 2023, Concert Reviews, Outstanding [category w.e.f. January 2021]

Photo, Sisi Burn Monday, August 14, 2023 Royal Albert Hall, London Following a previous London performance,...

BBC Proms 2023 – Prom 39: Budapest Festival Orchestra (3/3). Iván Fischer conducts Beethoven’s ‘Eroica’ Symphony, with Anna-Lena Elbert performing Ligeti’s Mysteries of the Macabre and Sir András Schiff playing Bartók’s Piano Concerto No.3. Live on BBC Radio 3.

Aug 13, 2023 | BBC Proms 2023, Concert Reviews, Outstanding [category w.e.f. January 2021]

Photo, Chris Christodoulou Sunday, August 13, 2023 Royal Albert Hall, London A bizarre start, an excerpt (arranged by Elgar Howarth) from Ligeti’s opera Le Grand Macabre, music that is extreme and surreal, unpredictable, humorous, a showcase for the exceptional...

BBC Proms 2023 – Souvenir photo of Prom 38: Budapest Festival Orchestra (2/3). Iván Fischer conducts the Audience Choice Prom. The afternoon of Sunday August 13 @ Royal Albert Hall, London.

Aug 13, 2023 | BBC Proms 2023

Photo, Chris Christodoulou Glinka, Overture to Ruslan and Ludmila Tchaikovsky, Symphony 4 (first movement) Beethoven, Symphony 6 (Pastoral; (ii) Scene by the Brook) Dvořák, Symphony 7 (third movement; incomplete: without Trio and Scherzo da capo) Mendelssohn, Symphony...

BBC Proms 2023 – Prom 37: Budapest Festival Orchestra (1/3). Iván Fischer conducts Weber & Mendelssohn – Der Freischütz Overture & ‘Scottish’ Symphony – with Sir András Schiff playing Robert Schumann’s Piano Concerto. Live on BBC Radio 3.

Aug 12, 2023 | BBC Proms 2023, Concert Reviews

Photo, Mark Allan Saturday, August 12, 2023 Royal Albert Hall, London An atmospheric account of the Overture to Der Freischütz (Weber condensing his opera into ten minutes of orchestral theatre) got the concert off to a suggestive and dramatic start (forest-legend...