The Fat Controller's Monthly Note - BBC Radio 3

[Philidor]

NB Roger Wright is not overweight AFAIK.

Welcome to the Controller's Monthly Note for September 2009

GREETINGS FROM THE UK STATION OF THE YEAR

Dear All

PROMS 2009

Music on Radio 3

The Proms are drawing to a close after a long and enjoyable summer. The First Night seems a long time ago, but time seems to have flown.

With just two days to go there are still some treats in store. After the second Vienna Philharmonic Prom, cellist Yo-Yo Ma brings us the Silk Road Ensemble late on Friday evening to finish our 2009 Late Night Proms. The concert will explore links between East and West, historical and contemporary, inspired by the ancient trade route.

Then, on Saturday, we have the Last Night. Sean Rafferty presents the traditional festivities, conducted for the first time by David Robertson, principal guest conductor of the BBC Symphony Orchestra. There is music by three of Radio 3's Composers of The Year: a concerto by Haydn, played by Alison Balsom; Dido's lament by Purcell, sung by Sarah Connolly; and orchestral fireworks by Handel. Oliver Knussen's Flourish harks back to the First Night as it based on Stravinsky's Fireworks which kicked off this year's festival. It is complemented by new fanfares specially written by six young composers. In addition we have fun and games, marking the Gerard Hoffnung anniversary, with Malcolm Arnold's Grand Grand Overture; this piece includes vacuum cleaners, rifles and a floor polisher and is played by well known figures who have been involved in this year's Proms.

As the Proms term ends, the new Radio 3 season begins. On Sunday we bring you the Leeds International Piano competition in two instalments at 2pm and 6pm. You can hear the six finalists and the announcement of the winner following the concerto performances. Then we head to Edinburgh for more coverage of its International Festival. On Monday night we have the opening night performance of Handel's popular oratorio Judas Maccabaeus. Handel and his librettist used the story to make a political statement, celebrating the victory of the Duke of Cumberland over the Jacobites at Culloden. There is a star line-up of soloists, including Rosemary Joshua, Sarah Connolly and William Burden, with the Edinburgh Festival Chorus and the Scottish Chamber Orchestra, conducted by William Christie. The following night (Tuesday), there is music by Marin Marais and Handel, in which Jordi Savall conducts Le Concert des Nations. Like Handel, the great viol-master Marais was an important opera comp!
oser, and we can hear ballet music from his Alcione, coupled with popular Handel: Water Music suites and Music for Royal Fireworks.

On Wednesday evening we continue the Baroque theme from Edinburgh, as the European Union Baroque Orchestra showcases its talents in music by composers active in Rome: Corelli, Muffat, Geminiani and Handel. On Thursday, we hear Sir John Eliot Gardiner bringing the Monteverdi Choir and English Baroque Soloists to the Usher Hall. Bach's cantatas are incredibly dramatic and varied, and tonight's selection for the Feast of St Michael and All Angels, are no exception. We move from Scotland to Wales on Friday for the new season of the BBC National Orchestra of Wales under its associate guest conductor, Francois-Xavier Roth. Musical Vienna is a continuing theme of the orchestra's season, and tonight's programme begins with Beethoven's dramatic Leonore No. 3 overture, and concludes with Haydn's Nelson Mass, composed when Vienna was under threat from Napoleon - and Paul Lewis will perform Mozart's Piano Concerto No. 12.

Drama and Ideas on Radio 3

Our speech programming also launches its new season. On Sunday night we present Edward the Second, one of Christopher Marlowe's greatest works; it tells of a weak king in thrall to his passions, who pays the ultimate price for choosing his heart over his political responsibilities. Toby Jones stars as Edward, Patrick Kennedy as Mortimer and Anastasia Hille as Queen Isabella. Our Sunday feature (10pm) looks at The Audience For Poetry in the company of Julian May, who has been making poetry programmes for two decades; he talks to publishers, people who organise readings, literary historians, poets and their readers to investigate the relationship between poetry and its audience. And throughout the coming week we celebrate the 300th anniversary of the birth of Dr Samuel Johnson, creator of the great dictionary. In our increasingly popular late night strand, The Essay, five very different writers explore his linguistic heritage. In the first programme, Philip Hoare ponders the!
similarities between whales and words, and the disparities between Moby Dick author Herman Melville and Dr Johnson.

Night Waves returns on Tuesday 15th at 9.15 pm with a special programme dedicated to revolution, and explores what's left of the revolutionary spirit. We welcome back Music Matters on Sunday 19th, as Tom Service continues to visit some of the world's most important musical centres. This week, the spotlight turns to Budapest, where Tom, amongst other subjects, examines the legacy of Liszt, Bartok and Kodaly and the influence of folk music.

As always, you can find details of all Radio 3 events and broadcasts at:
http://www.bbc.co.uk/radio3.

I hope you enjoy the remaining Proms events and the new season on Radio 3!

With best wishes


Roger Wright

BBC Radio 3

[Philidor]

Welcome to the Controller's Monthly Note for Christmas 2009 and the New Year.

GREETINGS FROM THE UK STATION OF THE YEAR

Dear All: We hope you find time to relax over the holiday period and have a chance to enjoy the feast of music which we have prepared for you. For example there are wonderful operas live from the Metropolitan Opera, another chance to hear some of the most popular Proms from this year's record breaking festival, as well as the final celebrations in honour of our Radio 3 Four Composers of the Year.

CHRISTMAS AROUND EUROPE
We begin this Sunday with our traditional day of music from across Europe. It looks like an exciting journey. We start with Vienna for a concert of chamber music, and this is followed by a trip to Tallinn for the Estonian National Men's Chorus performing traditional Estonian songs alongside music by Bach and Gabrieli. We also visit Munich to hear the Bavarian Radio Chorus and Orchestra performing Arvo Pärt's Two Christmas Lullabies and Saint-Saens' fine, but seldom heard, Christmas Oratorio. From Warsaw, we have Renaissance motets for Christmas, and then from the Czech Republic we move to the Baroque with music from the extraordinarily rich archives in the Moravian town of Kromeriz.

OPERA
This year the Metropolitan Opera offers three very contrasting pieces across the holiday season. Tomorrow we can hear The Tales of Hoffmann by Offenbach, and in a darker vein on Boxing Day comes Elektra by Strauss with a cast including Susan Bullock, Felicity Palmer and Deborah Voigt. Then on January 2nd we have a Christmas favourite, Humperdinck's interpretation of the Brothers Grimm fairytale Hansel and Gretel. In this production conducted by Fabio Luisi, Miah Persson and Angelika Kirchschlager play the brother and sister lost in the woods and Philip Langridge sings the role of the Witch.

COMPOSERS OF THE YEAR 2009
This probably needs no introduction by now! However, on New Year's Eve we have the final celebration of the four composers who have been our companions throughout the year, Purcell, Handel, Haydn and Mendelssohn. We hear champions of the composers during the day: Sting and Roy Strong on Purcell; Jon Snow and Julia Neuberger on Handel; Patricia Routledge and Armando Iannucci on Haydn; and Henry Goodman and Sue MacGregor on Mendelssohn. And there is a chance to hear some of the wonderful highpoints again too, such as broadcasts from Handel's London home and the Foundling Museum, originally the Foundling Hospital, where Handel was a governor and benefactor. We hear his charming Italian cantata, Apollo e Dafne; a highly acclaimed production of Purcell's Dido and Aeneas from the Royal Opera House, starring Sarah Connolly as Dido; a short play starring Richard Briers as Joseph Haydn. Then comes the debate, chaired by Petroc Trelawny with Louise Fryer, in which you can vote for your favourite Composer of the Year. Those appearing include poet Jo Shapcott (Purcell), Guardian Editor Alan Rusbridger (Handel), philosopher Roger Scruton (Haydn), and actor John Sessions takes up Mendelssohn's cause. The winning composer will then be honoured with a sequence dedicated to his music. I hope you enjoy the debate - voting is open from December 28th.

In the week before Christmas we have another chance to hear some of the most important concerts of the year, including major choral works: Purcell at Westminster Abbey, Mendelssohn's Elijah from Birmingham Town Hall, and a performance of Haydn's Creation from the BBC Philharmonic. On Christmas Day, we have a performance of Handel's Messiah, which ties in with our successful project Sing Halleljah! in which so many choirs have participated in the past month. Laurence Cummings conducts English National Opera's new staged version with Sophie Bevan (soprano), Catherine Wyn Rogers (alto), John Mark Ainsley (tenor) and Brindley Sherratt (bass) with the Chorus and Orchestra of English National Opera.

BELIEF
This is an occasional Radio 3 programme, a series of interviews with people with a wide range of religious and spiritual beliefs. Joan Bakewell asks her guests about the influences that have shaped them and how their beliefs affect their lives. In Monday's programme, historian, writer and broadcaster David Starkey talks about how his Quaker upbringing equipped him with the skills to carve out his own moral views. Describing himself now as a 'high Anglican atheist', Starkey believes the church has been hugely important in shaping society, but doesn't offer any answers to the big questions of life. Later in the week, Joan talks to Conservative MP Ann Widdecombe (Friday), who was a life-long Anglican until she converted to Catholicism.

SOLITUDE OR EXCITEMENT
Our Sunday Feature on January 3rd follows Scottish poet Kathleen Jamie for an expedition to the tiny uninhabited island of North Rona, 45 miles out into the Atlantic Ocean. She assists with seabird surveys - counting the rare and mysterious Leach's Petrel - and with mapping the island's eighth-century early Celtic Christian buildings. Kathleen, surrounded by thousands of puffins and a herd of grumpy sheep, considers ideas of remoteness and isolation.

In a more animated mood, on Christmas Day late evening we look back on WOMAD 2009 in the company of Lopa Kothari, who recalls three days of sun, wind, rain and the wonderful sets including performances by legendary dub-reggae producer Denis Bovell, Mongolian throat singer Enkh Jargal and UK Bhangra pioneer Channi Singh. The following day in World Routes, Lucy Duran introduces South African group Ladysmith Black Mambazo, specially recorded in concert at the Brighton Dome.

2009 has been a busy year and a historic one for us as we received our UK Station of the Year accolade. I hope you have liked what you have heard and continue to enjoy what we offer.

From all of us here at Radio 3, a happy and peaceful festive season and best wishes for 2010.

Roger Wright
Controller, BBC Radio 3

Three cheers for Roger!

[Philidor]

Welcome to the Controller's Monthly Note for January 2010

GREETINGS FROM THE UK STATION OF THE YEAR
Dear All: A very happy new year to you all! I hope you managed to enjoy our Christmas programming. I thought our special New Year's Eve worked well as we celebrated our Four Composers. Judging by the interest shown by our listeners, they enjoyed it too. It was good to have one final chance in 2009 to hear the music of Purcell, Handel, Haydn and Mendelssohn, as well as debating and voting on their lasting value to us. Handel won the day with you, the listeners, and I hope you enjoyed a great year in their company. As we move on, 2010 will be no less rich, and I thought I'd share with you some of our highlights in January.

THE ENLIGHTENMENT
From Monday 11th for two weeks we are continuing our programmes in The Essay, called Enlightenment Voices. The first week is dedicated to the Dutch philosopher Spinosa, whose views on religion were regarded as inflammatory at the time. He can still help the contemporary world examine how a multi-faith society can live together harmoniously. The following week we have Denis Diderot - the driving force behind the biggest publishing enterprise of the Enlightenment, his Encyclopedie. His passion was to classify all human knowledge in the name of human progress, and the work contains 28 volumes, each around a thousand pages in length. Amazingly, it ranges across test-tube babies, pornography, spontaneous generation and religious tolerance. In Night Waves on Thursday 21st, Rana Mitter is joined by historians, theologians and politicians to debate the Enlightenment. To its supporters, it is a cornerstone, defining principles of Western life: the triumph of reason, human rights, !
free markets, and modern democracy. To critics, it fosters religious intolerance and hostility to those who do not share the same values. It promises to be a fascinating debate.

MADAGASCAR
Tomorrow afternoon in World Routes, Lucy Duran will be taking us far from our own snowy landscape, and sharing with us her recent visit to the Indian Ocean island of Madagascar. After her profile of the exciting Malagasy Orkestra last week, she will be visiting the Ambohimanga royal palace in the second programme in the series, filling the space with the tradition music of the Malagasy royal house. We'll also hear some rarely recorded Hira Gasy, troupes who entertain villagers with a satirical view of life, also spreading news and learning. The following Saturday, there will be the chance to hear songs that accompany exhumation ceremonies, as ancestors are removed from their tombs every seven years, re-dressed and introduced to new family members.

PERFORMANCE
On Monday 18th in Performance on 3, there is one of the BBC Symphony Orchestra's Total Immersion events in which one composer is featured in a number of events - on this occasion the music of Hans Werner Henze, with Oliver Knussen conducting. Apart from his massive Fourth Symphony, we hear the moving Elogium musicum, which was first heard in Leipzig in 2008 and is here receiving its UK premiere. It is the composer's serene memorial to his lifelong companion.

We also have two classic operas from the Metropolitan Opera, the one tomorrow is Der Rosenkavalier, as Renée Fleming takes the role of The Marschallin with Susan Graham as Octavian. Strauss's masterpiece mixes comedy and pathos, and, as ever, you can be transported to New York with live back-stage interviews and the regular quiz. The following week, Carmen stars Elina Garanca with Roberto Alagna as Don José. It contains some of the best-known moments in the operatic repertory, so if you are not a Met regular, this might be the place to begin. This is a classic romantic opera and a gritty tale which scandalised audiences some 130 years ago.

STORIES
I use the word stories, because we have two extraordinary tales to tell in the coming weeks. Fourteen centuries ago, three hundred warriors set out from Edinburgh and marched south to meet ten thousand Saxons in battle. There were only three survivors of the three hundred, one of whom returned to Edinburgh and composed an epic poem, The Gododdin. Poet Gwyneth Lewis explores the meaning of this series of elegies for the slain heroes, asking whether the Gododdin is an account of a battle or propaganda to instil courage. That's our Sunday Feature in two days' time.

Another remarkable story centres on Cupids Cove, the first English settlement In Canada. Our feature in the following week marks the 400th anniversary of this site, discovered in 1995. The programme reveals the life of the settlers and their relations with indigenous people. Twenty years before the Mayflower, this unique find provides a fascinating narrative.

We continue our always popular Composer of the Week series with the Russian Alfred Schnittke, whose music was suppressed by the Soviets, and Zelenka whose music represents a more certain world in Baroque form.

On Friday 22nd, Mary Ann Kennedy introduces a Late Night Session in World on 3, live from Glasgow's Celtic Connections. It's a tradition that line-ups that are never divulged before the day, so we have to wait and see. One thing is certain: it will be a lively celebration of the best in the world of folk and roots music.

Details of these and all Radio 3 broadcasts can be found at www.bbc.co.uk/radio3

Wishing you a Happy New Year in the company of Radio 3

Best wishes

Roger Wright
Controller, BBC Radio 3

Hooray for Roger!

[Philidor]

Welcome to the Controller's Monthly Note for March 2010


GREETINGS FROM THE UK STATION OF THE YEAR
Dear All
I hope you have managed to enjoy our week-long focus on music-making in Scotland; the concerts are still available on iPlayer, including a performance of the Sibelius Violin Concerto with Nicola Benedetti and the BBC Scottish Symphony Orchestra. I attended the concert and Nicola and the orchestra were in terrific form. To conclude our focus, Music Matters tomorrow comes from Glasgow, as Tom Service brings together Scottish performers to talk about performing for their home crowd. In addition, the new principal conductor of the Scottish Chamber Orchestra, Robin Ticciati, discusses his plans, and we learn how the bagpipes have become part of Scottish identity.
Also tomorrow, we have a new production of a Verdi's rarely heard Attila, live from the Metropolitan Opera. The opera has never been performed at the Metropolitan Opera, and it also represents conductor Riccardo Muti's Met debut. The story focuses on the collapse of the Roman Empire under the barbarians. Attila, the young Russian bass Ildar Abrazakov, falls in love with an Italian slave Odabella, sung by soprano Violeta Urmana, while she seeks revenge on Attila because he killed her father. The production has proved controversial and the musical performance has received critical acclaim - judge for yourself tomorrow evening.

COMPOSER OF THE WEEK
Composer of the Week is one of our most appreciated, and long-standing programmes, and next week it marks the anniversary of the birth of Thomas Arne in 1710. His most popular works are his songs Rule Brittania and Where the Bee Sucks. Starting on Monday, Donald Macleod will introduce listeners to this musical prodigy and questionable character, one of London's most successful stage composers. He had the misfortune to be a contemporary of Handel, whose brilliant legacy overshadowed a whole generation of British composers.
The following week, starting on the 15th, we move into the 20th century with Prokofiev's music for stage and screen. We will hear extracts from many opera and ballet scores alongside film and theatre music. When he was just eight, Prokofiev's parents took him to the Bolshoi Theatre in Moscow; on returning home, he announced he was going to compose his own opera. So began the journey which culminated in his masterpiece, War And Peace, as well as his incidental music for film and theatre and collaborations with the pioneering Russian director, Sergei Eisenstein.

AMERICAN PERFORMANCES
On Wednesday and Thursday (17th and 18th), we have American connections in Performance on 3. John Adams conducts the London Symphony Orchestra in the European première of his City Noir , a symphonic work which draws on the film noir, evoking sleaze and moments of panic alongside romance (17th).
On the 18th, we hear an important American orchestra with an all-Finnish cast in a major work by Sibelius. Osmo Vänskä and the Minnesota Orchestra are joined by Päivi Nisula (soprano) and Hannu Niemelä (baritone) as soloists in Kullervo, based on the Finnish national epic, the Kalevala. It is a tragic and dark story, as Kullervo suffers the slaughter of his family to be trapped in poverty. After a fated and unfortunate encounter, he is overcome with guilt, and seeks redemption.

THE ESSAY
There's a typically personal feel to The Essay beginning on Monday, in which five artists reflect on the British coastline as a place of personal, imaginative importance. In the first programme, the poet Katrina Porteous speaks of Northumbria and her exploration of the culture and language of fishing. She reveals how this has shaped her own way of seeing the world.
The following week, London-based novelist Kamila Shamsie travels to Karachi to see her family and friends. The city seems fresh to her, now she no longer lives there. She introduces us first to the experience of arrival, as all of Karachi's life seems to approach her once outside the deserted airport terminal.
Listen out also for our drama next weekend, simply called Gone; it is written and directed by Debbie Tucker Green. A young woman has gone missing. She is described by an unconnected group of people whose lives she touched on the last day anyone saw her. Different versions of events build to a disjointed version of who the woman was and what may have happened to her; it is a fascinating study in the absence of objective reality.

HOLY WEEK
For those of you who have enjoyed the EBU Day of Christmas Music over the years, we have a new initiative on Palm Sunday, March 28th - it is a day of Holy Week music. Like its Christmas counterpart, it brings together broadcasting organisations from across Europe to represent a variety of seasonal musical traditions.
Amongst other music, we have orthodox chant from Bulgaria, early choral music from Cambridge, as well as a Madrid performance of Frank Martin's rarely heard oratorio Golgotha, and Elgar's Dream of Gerontius conducted by Sir Colin Davis from Dresden.
Also on a seasonal note, we broadcast on Wednesday Sir Simon Rattle's eagerly anticipated return to the City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra after a break of four years. He will conduct Bach's St Matthew Passion, with the CBSO Chorus and an international line-up of soloists, including Camilla Tilling (soprano), Magdalena Kozena (mezzo-soprano), Mark Padmore (tenor - Evangelist), Christian Gerhaher (baritone - Christus) and Thomas Quasthoff (baritone). It promises to be a remarkable occasion.
As always, you can find full details of all Radio 3 broadcasts and events at www.bbc.co.uk/radio3.

I trust you will find much to enjoy on Radio 3 this month.

With best wishes

Roger Wright





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Keep it up Roger!

[Philidor]

April 2010

Welcome to the Controller's Monthly Note


Dear All,


WILLIAM BYRD

As Easter approaches, with its long weekend, many of you might have more time to sample what Radio 3 has to offer. Throughout the week, we have been celebrating William Byrd as Composer of the Week, programmes in which his church music is balanced by keyboard and secular pieces. Much of his sacred music is political in tone, as it reflects the anguish of the Catholic community in the reign of Elizabeth.

When we hear texts that talk about the holy land having become desolate, you can perhaps read that as a coded message meaning England in the composer's mind. Though that series started on Monday, you can still access all the programmes on iPlayer for the next week.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b00rrlsm


SPEAKING ABOUT BELIEF

iPlayer will also be the way to explore Belief if you have missed some of those programmes. All week Joan Bakewell has been speaking to people in her continuing occasional series about their beliefs, and how they influence their lives.

On Monday, Joan spoke to Christian feminist novelist, writer and theologian Sara Maitland. She has recently written of her journey into quietness and solitude in A Book of Silence, and now lives in isolation in a cottage on the Scottish moors.

We can also hear from Junaid Bhatti on finance and Islam, and in tomorrow's programme, James Jones, Bishop of Liverpool, tells of his engagement with social justice, urban planning and the environment.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b0071lcf

Tonight, in Night Waves, Anne McElvoy goes to Canterbury Cathedral to talk to artist Maggi Hambling about her numerous portrayals of the Crucifixion. For almost 25 years, Hambling has painted a cross every Good Friday, a tradition which started when she created one in memory of her mother in the 80s.

This year, her images are being displayed in the grounds of Canterbury Cathedral. Beyond the Cathedral, Kent is hosting an exploration of the use of the cross in modern art across the county with works by Tracey Emin, Stanley Spencer and Marc Chagall.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b00rpwkh

On Easter Sunday in Private Passions at 12.00 noon, Michael Berkeley meets the newly appointed Roman Catholic Archbishop of Birmingham, Bernard Longley, who studied singing at the Royal Northern College of Music and at New College Oxford.

Music has always been a great passion in his life, and he includes Poulenc's opera Dialogues des Carmelites, which he admires for bearing witness to the courage of Carmelite nuns during the French Revolution.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b00rs4yl

MACMILLAN PREMIERE

On Good Friday evening at 7.00pm, we are presenting the broadcast première of James MacMillan's St John Passion, live from King's College, Cambridge. Baritone Mark Stone sings the role of Christ and is joined by choirs and the BBC Concert Orchestra, conducted by Stephen Cleobury.

The Passion story, as told by St John, is given a very personal setting by MacMillan. He infuses the narrative with his love of both Gregorian chant and opera, creating music that is both sparse and yet dramatic.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b00rpwq6

RAVI SHANKAR

World Routes on Saturday at 3.00pm is a celebration of the career of Ravi Shankar, who celebrates his 90th birthday on 7 April. Mark Tully looks back on an interview recorded for World Routes 10 years ago, and introduces some of his classic recordings. Ravi recalls his early life performing in Paris, and his collaborations with Yehudi Menuhin and George Harrison.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b00rs4s9

MAHLER AND LUCERNE

Easter Monday sees two new themes on Radio 3. In Performance on 3, we begin our journey through the symphonies of Mahler, marking the 150 th anniversary of his birth. The cycle, which we return to each Monday, is a joint project between the BBC Philharmonic and the Hallé.

We start with the BBC Philharmonic conducted by Gianandrea Noseda in the first symphony. Mahler declared 'the symphony must be like the world: It must embrace everything'; it promises to be a fascinating journey following this series of performances which have been critically acclaimed.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b00rzqgv

In the afternoon of the same day, Louise Fryer begins a week of performances from the 2009 Lucerne Festival. The first programme features the Lucerne Festival Orchestra in two Mahler performances: the Rückert Lieder and Fourth Symphony; they are joined in both by the Czech mezzo Magdalena Kozená. We also feature the other orchestra founded by Claudio Abbado, the Gustav Mahler Chamber Orchestra, conducted by George Benjamin in a programme including his own music.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b00rs5nq

With thanks as ever for your interest in the station and all best wishes,

Roger Wright

Good stuff Rog!

[Philidor]

July 2010

Welcome to the Controller's Monthly Note

Dear All

PROMS: THE OPENING WEEKEND

On Friday (July 16th) the world's largest music festival, the BBC Proms, gets under way, with the most spectacular opening weekend ever. The first evening says something about the ambition and scale of this two-month musical feast, all programmes broadcast live exclusively on Radio 3. Mahler himself said of his Eighth Symphony, 'Try to imagine the whole universe beginning to ring and resound. There are no longer human voices, but planets and suns revolving.’ We begin the 2010 BBC Proms with this hymn to the creative spirit, the so-called 'Symphony of a Thousand'. The Royal Albert Hall stage will be packed with eight vocal soloists; a large orchestra and over 400 from massed choirs - from Crouch End to Sydney, and the BBC Symphony Chorus. Sir Henry Wood, the Proms founder gave the UK première 80 years ago with the BBC Symphony Orchestra and that orchestra is conducted on Friday by its current chief conductor, Jiří Bělohlávek.

Saturday offers another epic evening with Welsh National Opera performing Wagner's The Mastersingers of Nuremberg. The celebrated bass-baritone Bryn Terfel makes his debut in the role of Hans Sachs, the shoemaker and poet at the heart of this monumental work set around a singing competition in 16th-century Nuremberg. A young knight, Walther, arrives in the city with no experience of singing, but on falling in love performs a song in the hope of winning the hand of his beloved. As the Mahler symphony praises creativity, the opera can be seen as a paean to the power of music. The Chorus and Orchestra of Welsh National Opera is conducted by Lothar Koenigs. There are a number of events introducing the opera on Saturday (including a ‘ Come and Sing Wagner! session) - details on the Proms website.

On Sunday, we have another debut in an operatic role for one of the world’s leading singers. Plácido Domingo takes the title role in Verdi's opera Simon Boccanegra with the forces of the Royal Opera House conducted by Antonio Pappano. The opera speaks of the tension between love and power, and the relationship between Boccanegra and his long-lost daughter. Domingo had never sung a baritone role until he took the role of the Doge of Genoa. He is joined in this performance by Marina Poplavskaya, Joseph Calleja and Ferruccio Furlanetto. It will be Domingo's second only appearance at the Proms and he is sure to be given a special welcome by the Promenaders. Well, that’s just the opening weekend, almost a festival in itself, but for the BBC Proms merely the beginning of a unique summer of music.


PROMS ARCHIVE

Some of you will already have found the new online BBC Proms Archive listing all performances, composers, works, soloists, conductors and ensembles in its 115-year history. Rob Cowan in his Breakfast programme advised listeners not to browse in the office, as the journey through 7,168 concerts is dangerously compelling. Hours can pass as you create Top 40 lists of Proms performances by composer, ensemble or person, narrowing or widening searches by date.

Some extraordinary and previously inaccessible facts have emerged:
+ Wagner is the most performed composer with 5,892 performances, mainly excerpts in the earlier years.
+ Around 100 years ago, Beethoven, Tchaikovsky and Sullivan were the other most featured composers.
+ Beethoven's Symphony No. 5, Rossi ni's Overture to William Tell and Elgar's Pomp and Circumstance March No. 1 (Land Of Hope And Glory) are among the most popular single works
+ Bernstein, Copland, Hindemith and Poulenc have all appeared as performers and composers at the Proms.
+ Sir Henry Wood - the Proms co-founder and first conductor - conducted more than 23,000 pieces.
As well as collecting insights about changing musical taste, your personal memories may well be triggered, and we would love to hear your reminiscences at bbc.co.uk/proms/share.


BEETHOVEN NIGHTS

The earliest Proms seasons had the tradition of Wagner Nights on Wednesdays and Beethoven Nights on Fridays. The performance of Die Meistersinger can count as our Wagner night, but we are reviving the Beethoven night, not every week but in two special concerts dedicated to the composer. In the first of these, on Wednesday July 21st, a leading Beethoven interpreter, Paul Lewis, will begin his Proms cycle of all five piano concertos, the first time one pianist has played all the concertos in one Proms festival. On the 21st we will hear numbers two and four, alongside intense and dramatic overtures, Egmont and The Creatures of Prometheus. The BBC Symphony Orchestra will be conducted by Jiří Bělohlávek. In the second Beethoven Night (27th), the more classical First Symphony and the demanding, insistent Fifth are heard alongside the Violin Concerto in which the soloist is the American violinist, Hilary Hahn. The Deutsche Kammerphilharmonie Bremen will be performing unde!
r its artistic director, Paavo Järvi.


SONDHEIM

We pride ourselves on the range and breadth of the BBC Proms, so it is a pleasure to mark the 80th birthday of the Broadway composer, Stephen Sondheim, in a concert ( Saturday 31 July) bringing together figures from the world of opera and theatre, and joined by other special guests. Bryn Terfel, fresh from his Wagnerian incarnation, leads the high profile cast and is joined by musical theatre students and performers supported by the BBC Performing Arts Fund. We have excerpts from horror-opera Sweeney Todd, the Ingmar Bergman-inspired A Little Night Music and the fairy-tale compendium of Into the Woods. This Prom will be the first ever 'signed Prom'. Dr Paul Whittaker, artistic director of Music and the Deaf will guide the audience in the hall through the music of Stephen Sondheim in the company of the BBC Concert Orchestra conducted by David Charles Abell (above).

If you can join us in the hall for some concerts that would be wonderful, but Radio 3, the home of the BBC Proms, is dedicated to making sure that you don’t miss anything, wherever you live. We will be conveying the unique atmosphere of each event in live broadcasts on Radio 3.

If you miss a concert, there will be afternoon repeats, as well as the opportunity to catch up on-demand using iPlayer for a week after broadcast. There will, as ever, be plenty of other programming placing the music in the Proms in context.

With all best wishes for an enjoyable summer

Roger Wright

Excellent Roger!

http://www.bbc.co.uk/radio3/newsletters/