Proms Prompter - Week 8

With the historic Last Night of the Proms coming up next Saturday (9th), what’s left to look forward to in the final week of the 2017 Proms season? Susan Omand gives you some final Proms Prompters...



More Mahler in the final full week of this glorious season of the Proms and it’s difficult to believe it’s nearly all over bar the traditional bobbing up and down at the Last Night. But it’s to another M for my first recommendation for this week and Mendelssohn, as the beautifully evocative Fingal’s Cave (the Hebridean Overture) is part of Sunday’s Prom. Next on the list is Wednesday Prom, which may at first glance be seen as a bit of a downer with all the funereal titles but the music is superb and I am interested to hear the "lost" Stravinsky. Last recommendation to round off 8 weeks of wonderful music is some "proper classical piano" with Bach's Well Tempered Clavier on Thursday - and a laugh at the fact that we're only getting book one this time and will have to wait til next year to hear the second part. That's one hell of an interval!



Here's the Prelude in C Major (yes you do know it - especially if you watched The Mentalist)

As well as the televised concerts, every Prom is broadcast live on BBC Radio 3 and HD Sound online, so “people in countries all over the world can tune in and have 'the best seat in the house’”. They’ll also be available to download on the Radio 3 app and you’ll find any you missed on iPlayer.



Here’s the full list of what’s on this week (Saturday 2nd to Friday 8th September)



Saturday 2 September 2017



HAYDN AND MAHLER



For their second concert, the Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra and Daniele Gatti pair two of the repertoire’s sunniest symphonies: Mahler’s song-filled Fourth and Haydn’s ebullient No. 82, nicknamed ‘The Bear’.



Programme



Joseph Haydn Symphony No. 82 in C major, 'The Bear'(26 mins)



INTERVAL



Gustav Mahler Symphony No 4 in G major(56 mins)





Sunday 3 September 2017



FREIBURG BAROQUE ORCHESTRA AND PABLO HERAS-CASADO



Pablo Heras-Casado and the Freiburg Baroque Orchestra bring authentic colour to some of Mendelssohn’s best-loved works, including the overture The Hebrides and the Fifth Symphony. Isabelle Faust is the soloist for the lyrical Violin Concerto.



Programme



Felix Mendelssohn Overture 'The Hebrides' ('Fingal's Cave')(10 mins)

Violin Concerto in E minor(27 mins)



INTERVAL



Felix Mendelssohn Symphony No 5 in D major 'Reformation'(27 mins)





Sunday 3 September 2017

PROKOFIEV, TCHAIKOVSKY AND SHOSTAKOVICH



Valery Gergiev and the Mariinsky Orchestra and Chorus mark the 100th anniversary of the Russian Revolution with performances of Prokofiev’s extravagant October Revolution cantata and Shostakovich’s darkly evocative Fifth Symphony.



Programme



Sergei Prokofiev Cantata for the Twentieth Anniversary of the October Revolution, Op 74(39 mins)

Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky Piano Concerto No. 3 in E flat major(16 mins)



INTERVAL



Dmitri Shostakovich Symphony No 5 in D minor(49 mins)





Monday 4 September 2017



ANNE-SOPHIE MUTTER PLAYS DVORÁK’S VIOLIN CONCERTO



The Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra and Manfred Honeck perform Mahler’s First Symphony, a work charged with all the narrative energy of a tone-poem, and John Adams’s joyous Lollapalooza. Anne-Sophie Mutter is the soloist in Dvořák’s Violin Concerto.



Programme



John Adams Lollapalooza(7 mins)

Antonín Dvořák Violin Concerto in A minor(33 mins)



INTERVAL



Gustav Mahler Symphony No 1 in D major(56 mins)





Tuesday 5 September 2017



MISSY MAZZOLI, BARTÓK AND DVORÁK (Televised on 8th September on BBC Four)



American pianist Jeremy Denk joins Karina Canellakis and the BBC SO for Bartók’s ferociously brilliant Second Piano Concerto – a contrast to the pastoral beauty of Dvořák’s Symphony No. 8. The concert opens with Missy Mazzoli’s mesmeric Sinfonia.



Programme



Missy Mazzoli Sinfonia (for Orbiting Spheres)(12 mins)European premiere of orchestral version

Béla Bartók Piano Concerto No 2(30 mins)



INTERVAL



Anton ín Dvořák Symphony No 8 in G major(36 mins)





Wednesday 6 September 2017



STRAVINSKY, BRITTEN, PROKOFIEV AND SHOSTAKOVICH



The LPO marks the centenary of the Russian Revolution with Prokofiev’s ‘Mendelssohnian’ First Violin Concerto and Shostakovich’s Symphony No. 11. Stravinsky’s Funeral Song, lost for over a century and rediscovered in 2015, opens the concert.



Programme



Igor Stravinsky Funeral Song(12 mins)

Song of the Volga Boatmen(2 mins)

Sergei Prokofiev Violin Concerto No. 1 in D major(22 mins)



INTERVAL



Benjamin Britten Russian Funeral(7 mins)

Dmitri Shostakovich Symphony No 11 in G minor 'The Year 1905'(65 mins)





Thursday 7 September 2017



VIENNA PHILHARMONIC – MAHLER’S SIXTH SYMPHONY



Daniel Harding conducts the Vienna Philharmonic in this most powerful of Romantic symphonies, Mahler’s Sixth, dark with musical storm clouds, which builds gradually to a shattering climax.



Programme



Gustav Mahler Symphony No 6 in A minor





Thursday 7 September 2017

SIR ANDRÁS SCHIFF PERFORMS BACH’S THE WELL-TEMPERED CLAVIER (Televised live on BBC Four)



The two volumes of Bach’s The Well-Tempered Clavier together represent a wealth of musical invention, ingenuity and delight. Eminent Bach-specialist Sir András Schiff here performs Book I – concluding the cycle next year with Book 2.



Programme



Johann Sebastian Bach The Well-Tempered Clavier – Book 1(111 mins)





Friday 8 September 2017



VIENNA PHILHARMONIC – BRAHMS, MOZART AND BEETHOVEN



Pianist Emanuel Ax joins the Vienna Philharmonic for its second Prom this season, under Michael Tilson Thomas. Beethoven’s Seventh Symphony sits alongside Brahms’s ‘Haydn’ Variations and the quasi-operatic lyricism of Mozart’s Piano Concerto No. 14.



Programme



Johannes Brahms Variations on the St Anthony Chorale(18 mins)

Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart Piano Concerto No 14 in E flat major, K449(23 mins)



INTERVAL



Ludwig van Beethoven Symphony No 7 in A major(40 mins)