Today at the Proms - Prom 57

Continuing our daily coverage of what's on at The Proms 2018, Susan Omand has a quick look at the programme for Prom 57: John Wilson conducts Bernstein's On the Town ...


Reminder - Watch Prom 57: John Wilson conducts Bernstein's On the Town on BBC Four tonight

Today marks 100 years since the birth of one of the most famous conductors and composers of the 20th Century and The Proms are doing it in style with a performance of On The Town.

Now, this is not the same music as is in the musical film of the same name from 1949 (because MGM wanted "new songs") but, five years earlier, Bernstein composed the score (and some of the lyrics) for the Broadway stage musical that the film was based on. The stage musical, choreographed by Jerome Robbins and with text/lyrics by a famous musical comedy duo of the time Comden and Green, was itself based on a shorter ballet by Bernstein and Robbins the year before called Fancy Free. 

 Like both the ballet and the film, the stage musical tells the story of a trio of sailors on 24 hours shore leave in the city of New York and everything (and everybody) they get up to in that time.  Famous songs you might recognise include Lucky to be Me, Some Other Time, Lonely Town and the only one of Bernstein's songs that made it into the film - New York, New York...



No, not that New York, New York sung by Frank Sinatra, THIS New York, New York sung by Frank Sinatra (and Gene Kelly and Jules Munshin)







Here's the full programme for this evening's Prom which you can listen to live on BBC Four, Radio 3 or on the iPlayer



Leonard Bernstein
On the Town(106 mins)



Image - Photo © Chris Christodoulou