Stephen Bryant

This year the 115th Prom season gets under way on the 17th July and kicks off with a programme of Stravinsky – Fireworks, Chabrier – Ode a la Musique, Tchaikovsky – Piano Concerto No 3 in E Flat Major, Poulenc – Concerto for Two Pianos, Elgar – In the South (Alassio), Brahms – Alto Rhapsody and Bruckner – Psalm 150 plus two intervals!

Even though I’ve taken part in about 140 Proms (to date!) I still get excited being part of this great annual event. As any Promenader worth his salt knows, the Proms are the world’s biggest music festival and were started back in 1895 by Henry Wood at the Queen’s Hall and then moved to the Royal Albert Hall in 1941 after the Queen’s Hall was damaged in an air raid. Although not always the easiest hall in which to play acoustically speaking, the Albert Hall is an aesthetically beautiful building steeped in tradition and atmosphere.

The Proms attract a huge selection of really top notch conductors and soloists but, for me, the best thing about the concerts is the audience. Prom audiences and the famous Promenaders are knowledgeable, informed, open minded and enthusiastic and since I’ve been doing the Proms for a long time now, I recognise many friendly faces each year!

Of course the BBC Symphony Orchestra is proud to play a major role in the Proms, including opening and closing the season with the First and Last Nights. This year I’ve tried to spread my share of the Proms more evenly over the season. So here are the Proms I’m doing this summer!

Prom 1 – 17th July

Programme as above – conducted by Jiri Belohlavek.

I last worked with Jiri, our Chief Conductor, at the end of May in an exciting performance of Mahler 5 which wrapped up our Barbican season until October. I’m looking forward, as always to working with him for the First Night of The Proms.

Prom 24 – 2nd August

Susanna Malkki conducts:

Ben Foskett – new work (BBC commission, world premiere)

Beethoven – Symphony No 4 in B flat major

Berlioz – Te Deum

There are some excellent women conductors around today in a profession that is still extremely male dominated, so it will be interesting to work with Susanna Malkki as I haven’t worked with her before. Also, Trinity Boys Choir are performing – my old school!

Prom 46 – 19th August

Semyon Bychkov conducts:

Detlev Glanert – Shoreless River

Rachmaninov – Rhapsody on a Theme of Pagannini

Shostakovich – Symphony No 11 ‘The Year 1905’

Last year the BBCSO did a Prom with Semyon Bychkov which many reckoned was among the best of our season. I haven’t worked with him since my days at the LPO so I’m looking forward to this concert featuring Shostakovich’s massive Symphony No 11!

Prom 57 – 28th August

David Robertson conducts:

Stravinsky – Agon

Tchaikovsky – Concert Fantasia in G Major Op 56

Variations on a Rococo Theme

Francesca da Rimini

This programme, with our Principal Guest Conductor David Robertson, includes Tchaikovsky’s Variations on a Rococo Theme with the very fine cellist Steven Isserlis and Stravinsky’s Agon which I have played at the Proms in the past and which has some fiendish violin solos.

Prom 63 – 2nd September

David Robertson conducts:

Xenakis – Numos gamma

Rachmaninov – The Isle of the Dead

Xenakis – Ais

Shostakovich – Symphony No 9 in E flat Major

David Robertson again, this time conducting two pieces by Xenakis sandwiched in between two of my favourite orchestral works – Shostakovich - 9th Symphony and Rachmaninov – The Isle of the Dead, where at the beginning you can hear Charon rowing his boat across the River Styx – much more reliable than the trains I believe! Two days later we’re taking this programme to Berlin to play in the Berlin Philharmonic Hall.

Prom 72 – 9th September

Jiri Belohlavek conducts:

Mendelssohn – A Midsummer Night’s Dream – Overture and Incidental Music

Augusta Read Thomas – Violin Concerto No 3 ‘Juggler in Paradise’

Beethoven – Symphony No 6 in F major ‘Pastoral’

This interesting programme includes the Augusta Read Thomas Violin Concerto which I don’t know at all but am looking forward to hearing!

I’m taking the Last Night of the Proms off this year as I’ve done it the previous two years! I have four days rest and then it’s on to Besancon and Montreaux with the orchestra for a week.