Politics and Passion at the Proms
Conductor Daniel Barenboim is not one to shy away from politics.
Daniel Barenboim Photo: Public Domain via Wikimedia Commons
This week his West-Eastern Divan orchestra performs a work for soprano and orchestra called Looking for Palestine by British composer David Robert Coleman.
The youth-based West-Eastern Divan orchestra was established in 1999 by Barenboim and academic Edward Saïd and is made up of musicians from countries in the Middle East including Israel and Palestine.
Composer David Robert Coleman describes the work Looking for Palestine here:
Violinist Joshua Bell has been music director of one of the world’s finest chamber ensembles, the Academy of St Martin in the Fields since being selected by the musicians in 2011.
American violinist Joshua Bell Photo: Bill Phelps
Bell is the first person to hold the post since Sir Neville Marriner, who was right there at the beginning of the orchestra in 1958. Neville Marriner passed away in 2016. This year Bell leads the Academy of St Martin in the Fields through an afternoon concert of music by Mendelssohn and Saint-Saëns, as well as a work that premièred at the Proms in 1915 and hasn’t been performed there since. Frank Bridge’s “Lament” was written as an elegy for those who died following the torpedoing of the RMS Lusitania.
The sinking of the Lusitania Photo: Public Domain via Wikimedia Commons
The Proms Schedule this Week:
Monday 3 September 2018
7.30 Music Alive
BBC Proms 2018: Daniel Barenboim & West-Eastern Divan Orchestra
Elsa Dreisig (soprano), Lisa Batiashvili (violin), West-Eastern Divan Orchestra/Daniel Barenboim
TCHAIKOVSKY: Violin Concerto in D Op 35;
D R COLEMAN: Looking for Palestine;
SCRIABIN: The Poem of Ecstasy
Recorded Royal Albert Hall, London (BBC)
Tuesday 4 September 2018
12.00 Upbeat
Including: 1.00 BBC Proms 2018:
Joshua Bell & the Academy of St Martin in the Fields
Academy of St Martin in the Fields/Joshua Bell (conductor and violin)
MENDELSSOHN: A Midsummer Night's Dream, Overture;
SAINT-SAËNS: Violin Concerto No 3 in B minor Op 61;
BRIDGE: Lament;
BEETHOVEN: Symphony No 4 in Bb Op 60
Recorded Royal Albert Hall, London (BBC)
7.30 Music Alive
BBC Proms 2018: Elgar, Prokofiev & Venables
Pekka Kuusisto (violin), BBC Symphony Orchestra/Sakari Oramo
ELGAR: Introduction & Allegro Op 47;
VENABLES: Venables Plays Bartok;
PROKOFIEV: Symphony No 5 in Bb Op 100
Recorded Royal Albert Hall, London (BBC)
Wednesday 5 September 2018
7.30 Music Alive
BBC Proms 2018: Chopin & Tchaikovsky
Seong-Jin Cho (piano), European Union Youth Orchestra/Gianandrea Noseda
ZUBEL: Fireworks;
CHOPIN: Piano Concerto No 2 in F minor Op 21;
TCHAIKOVSKY: Symphony No 5 in E minor Op 64
Recorded Royal Albert Hall, London (BBC)
Friday 7 September 2018
7.30 Music Alive
BBC Proms 2018: Mozart & Mahler
Annelien Van Wauwe (clarinet), BBC Scottish Symphony Orchestra/Thomas Dausgaard
MOZART: Clarinet Concerto in A K622;
MAHLER: Symphony No 5 in C# minor
Recorded Royal Albert Hall, London (BBC)
