Today at the Proms - Prom 65

Continuing our daily coverage of what's on at The Proms 2019, Susan Omand has a quick look at the programme for Prom 65: Mozart, Beethoven & R. Strauss ...



As if to make up for last night's "not classical" prom [oh, don't start - Ed] tonight's prom really couldn't get more classical if it tried, with lots of little bits of Mozart and Strauss before Beethoven's 7th Symphony.



Beethoven's 7th is probably one of his most lively and heartfelt works, with superb rhythmic changes, although, allegedly, these weren't appreciated by the conductor Sir Thomas Beecham, who described the final movement of the symphony being like "like a lot of yaks jumping about." Why 'yaks', one wonders!



Anyway, before jumping the yak, we have a couple of Richard Strauss pieces, starting with the sextet from his opera Capriccio. The opera itself, although not very popular at the time of its writing, was very clever, looking at the relative importance of poetry, dance, theatre and music by staging an opera within an opera and this sextet is the composition that is being rehearsed by the characters on stage. The other Strauss piece is a wonderful coloratura aria (so lots of twiddly bits) from his comic opera Ariadne auf Naxos, so that should exercise the vocal cords of tonight's soprano Danae Kontora.



She'll also get a vocal workout with some of the Mozart too as there are a couple of concert arias in the mix. Concert arias are not a part of an opera but just standalone vocal pieces. Add to that his short Symphony No 35, a lovely lilting andante with his Cassation No 1 (a cassation is just an informal "bit of music") and his overture from The Abduction from the Seraglio and this short programme really showcases the playfulness that Mozart's work encompasses.



Here then, is one of Mozart's concert arias, No, no, che non sei capace, just for the over-decorated showy-offedness of the coloratura, here sung by the wonderful Diana Damrau.









Here's the full programme for this evening's Prom which you can listen to live from 19:30 on Radio 3 or on the iPlayer 


Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart
The Abduction from the Seraglio – overture(5 mins)
Aria: 'Popoli di Tessaglia! – lo non chiedo, eterni dei'(11 mins)
Cassation No. 1 in G major – Andante(3 mins)
Aria: 'No, no, che non sei capace'(4 mins)
Symphony No. 35 in D major, 'Haffner'(21 mins)

INTERVAL

Richard Strauss
Capriccio – sextet(7 mins)
Ariadne auf Naxos – 'Grossmächtige Prinzessin!'(11 mins)

Ludwig van Beethoven
Symphony No 7 in A major(39 mins)Image - Photo © Chris Christodoulou