New Music at the BBC Proms

For our UK readers, a nod in the direction of BBC4 tonight – where there is a chance to experience some of the standout new music heard during this year’s BBC Proms festival.

There is a chance to experience more of one of today’s standout orchestral composers, Andrea Tarrodi – her Birds Of Paradise is featured, inspired by footage from David Attenborough’s Planet Earth and performed by the Deutsche Kammerphilharmonie Bremen, conducted by Pekka Kuusisto (above, photographed by Mark Allan).

From the first night comes Let There Be Light, by Ukrainian composer Bohdana Frolyak, while the National Youth Orchestra perform The Whole World, a heady new work from Errolyn Wallen.

You can watch from 8pm here

BBC Proms 2023 – we’re underway…

Yesterday saw the start of the biggest festival in British classical music, the BBC Proms – broadcast live from the Royal Albert Hall.

Dalia Stasevska, guest conductor of the BBC Symphony Orchestra, led passionate Nordic music from Sibelius (the choral version of Finlandia with the BBC Singers and BBC Symphony Chorus, and a new arrangement of Snöfrid, narrated by actress Lesley Manville) and Grieg, whose evergreen Piano Concerto was given a new lick of paint by a wonderful interpretation from Paul Lewis.

Also featured was a Sibelian new work, Let There Be Light, from Ukrainian composer Bohdana Frolyak – a composer definitely worth seeking out in this evidence – and the concert closed with Britten‘s Young Person’s Guide To The Orchestra, with its triumphant fugal finale.

You can watch the Prom here on the BBC iPlayer:

https://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/m001nr5b/bbc-proms-2023-first-night-of-the-proms

Arcana will be covering a good number of concerts as the season progresses, so check back through July and August to read more!