{"id":17519,"date":"2022-07-12T12:00:00","date_gmt":"2022-07-12T10:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.classical-music.com\/?p=6295"},"modified":"2022-07-12T17:06:22","modified_gmt":"2022-07-12T15:06:22","slug":"100-most-memorable-proms-ever","status":"publish","type":"rss_feed","link":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/bbcmusicmagazine\/rss_feed\/100-most-memorable-proms-ever\/","title":{"rendered":"100 most memorable Proms ever"},"content":{"rendered":"
<\/p>
By Jeremy Pound\n \t\t<\/p>
Published: Tuesday, 12 July 2022 at 12:00 am<\/p>
\n\n
The BBC turns 100 years old in 2022 \u2013 and as a result we can expect all manner of party poppers and hullaballoo when the big day itself arrives in October. For classical music fans, there is in fact quite a lot to celebrate, as the staging and broadcasting of performances has been at the heart of the Beeb\u2019s activities right from Day One. <\/strong><\/p>\n
And most famous of these is, of course, the Proms. While the famous festival founded by Robert Newman and Henry Wood has been in existence for 127 years, around three-quarters of that has been under the watchful eye of \u2018Auntie\u2019 \u2013 a period that has seen Proms that range from joyful to doom-laden, from sternly serious to splendidly silly. Here, we present 100 of the most memorable\u2026<\/p>\n
The 100 best, memorable and downright quirky Proms ever<\/h2>\n
Early leaders: Henry Wood in action. Credit: Getty Images<\/span><\/figcaption><\/div>\n
\u00a0<\/p>\n
Auntie takes over. Though the BBC began life in 1922, it was five years later that the organisation took over the running of the Proms. Now 32 years old, the festival itself was very popular but not in the greatest financial health \u2013 with co-founder Robert Newman having died the year before, things were looking iffy. Keen to find a way to broadcast concerts from the Queen\u2019s Hall, the BBC saw its chance\u2026 and pounced. \u2018When I walked on to the platform for my first Promenade Concert under the British Broadcasting Corporation, I felt really elated,\u2019 wrote conductor Henry Wood later. \u2018I realised the work of such a large part of my life had been saved from an untimely death.\u2019<\/p>\n
\u00a0<\/p>\n
24 August 1927<\/h3>\n
After her performance of Brahms\u2019s Violin Concerto grinds to a halt midway, soloist Daisy Kennedy blames a lack of rehearsal time. The BBC denies responsibility.<\/p>\n
11 August 1928<\/strong><\/h3>\n
Absent for the first year of the BBC Proms, the decorative fountain is restored to the centre of the Queen\u2019s Hall for the new season. It continues to bring watery relief to hot and sweaty Prommers until 2011.<\/p>\n
24 August 1928<\/h3>\n
Beethoven\u2019s Ninth Symphony is performed in its entirety and with full chorus for the first time since 1902. From now on, it will become a regular part of each Proms season.<\/p>\n
08 August 1931<\/h3>\n
Brought together as an ensemble the previous autumn, the BBC Symphony Orchestra makes its Proms debut on the First Night.<\/p>\n
22 August 1931<\/h3>\n
Webern\u2019s Passacaglia Op. 1 is performed for the first time in Britain, but the critics are largely sniffy about a work they regard as little more than juvenilia.<\/p>\n
14 August 1934<\/h3>\n
Mooted in previous seasons, Berg\u2019s Three Fragments from Wozzeck gets its Proms premiere, sung by soprano May Blyth.<\/p>\n
19 September 1935<\/h3>\n
An all-Russian Prom includes the British premiere of Shostakovich\u2019s First Symphony and an aria from the 28-year-old composer\u2019s Lady Macbeth of Mtsensk, a work dismissed in Pravda the next year as \u2018a muddle instead of music\u2019.<\/p>\n
11 August 1938<\/h3>\n
A 24-year-old Benjamin Britten gives the world premiere of his Piano Concerto. \u2018This is not a stylish work,\u2019 grumps the Musical Times. \u2018Mr Britten\u2019s cleverness has got the better of him.\u2019<\/p>\n
1 September 1939<\/p>\n
After conducting Beethoven\u2019s Second Piano Concerto and Sixth Symphony, Henry Wood announces that the rest of the Proms season is cancelled, as Britain is now at war with Germany.<\/p>\n
27 June 1942<\/h3>\n
The Beeb is back. The BBC has not been in charge of every Proms season since 1927 \u2013 on the outbreak of WWII, the corporation made the decision to leave the 1940 and \u201941 seasons to others as it hotfooted it out of the capital. When, with things a little quieter, it returned to the helm in 1942, a couple of notable changes had taken place. Firstly, with the Queen\u2019s Hall having been obliterated by German bombs on the night of 10 May 1941, the festival had moved to a new home at the Royal Albert Hall. Secondly, on 16 August 1941, Henry Wood \u2013 not the keenest of orators \u2013 had given the first of the conductor\u2019s speeches that would become a regular Last Night feature.<\/p>\n
29 June 1942<\/h3>\n
In a show of defiance against the German invasion of Russia, Shostakovich\u2019s \u2018Leningrad\u2019 Symphony No. 7 receives its first performance in western Europe. The score has been smuggled out of the Soviet Union on microfilm two months earlier.<\/p>\n
24 June <\/span>1943<\/span><\/h3>\n
<\/source><\/source><\/picture><\/div>\n
Ralph\u2019s vision of peace. <\/span>The list of works that have had their first performance at the Proms is both long and distinguished. Few, however, have enjoyed such lasting popularity as Vaughan Williams\u2019s extraordinarily haunting Fifth Symphony. The work of a composer who, even at 70, was doing nightly duty as a fire-watcher in the event of German air raids, its message seemed to many listeners to be one of a longed-for vision of peace. \u2018Its serene loveliness is completely satisfying in these times,\u2019 wrote conductor Adrian Boult to the composer, \u2018and shows, as only music can, what we must work for when this madness is over.\u2019<\/span><\/p>\n
11 July 1943<\/h3>\n
With the government commandeering the Albert Hall for a meeting to honour China on 7 July, that evening\u2019s Prom\u00a0 has to be postponed four days, making this the first ever Prom to take place on a Sunday.<\/p>\n
29 June 1944<\/h3>\n
As German doodlebugs fall on London, a Prom including works by Bax, Franck and Sibelius brings the regular Albert Hall season to a premature end. Operations transfer to Bedford, where Proms are performed in front of an invited audience.<\/p>\n
28 July 1944<\/h3>\n
An increasingly ill Henry Wood conducts Beethoven\u2019s Seventh Symphony in his last ever Proms appearance. He dies three weeks later, aged 75.<\/p>\n
1 July 1945<\/h3>\n
Back at the Albert Hall, the First Night of the Proms\u2019 50th-anniversary season includes Walton\u2019s Memorial Fanfare for Henry Wood and, aptly, Elgar\u2019s Cockaigne (In London Town).<\/p>\n
19 July 1947<\/h3>\n
Alongside Adrian Boult and Basil Cameron, the recently knighted Malcolm Sargent conducts the First Night, beginning a close association with the Proms that will continue for 20 years.<\/p>\n
12 September 1947<\/h3>\n
The BBC cameras arrive at the Albert Hall, as parts of the Last Night are televised for the first time. Many observers are sceptical, and orchestra members struggle under the heat of the TV lights.<\/p>\n
16 September 1950<\/h3>\n
Now the chief conductor of the BBC Symphony Orchestra, Sargent takes solo control of the Last Night.<\/p>\n
Photo by Lambert\/Getty Images<\/span><\/figcaption><\/div>\n
The cameras are coming\u2026 <\/span>With the Queen\u2019s Coronation on 2 June having led to a boom in the sales of television sets across the UK, the BBC decided that now would be a good time to bring the Proms to the small screen again, beginning with the 1953 First Night. Television had a natural showman in Malcolm \u2018Flash Harry\u2019 Sargent, who was positive from the outset, though not everyone was so keen. Many within the BBC didn\u2019t want TV treading on radio\u2019s patch, while others worried about the impact that bulky cameras might have on the experience of concert-goers. Both debates would continue well into the 1980s. <\/span><\/p>\n
25 August 1953<\/h3>\n
Under John Barbirolli, the Hall\u00e9 becomes the first orchestra from outside London to appear at the Proms. Barbirolli was at one point being eyed up as a possible chief conductor of the Proms, but chose to stay put in Manchester.<\/p>\n
19 September 1953<\/h3>\n
Raucous shenanigans by the Promenaders in recent seasons \u2013 described by conductor Stanford Robinson as \u2018hooliganism\u2019 \u2013 lead to Henry Wood\u2019s Fantasia on British Sea Songs being removed from the Last Night. The decision causes an uproar.<\/p>\n
27 August 1955<\/h3>\n
The Albert Hall stage has a fresh-faced look to it, as the National Youth Orchestra of Great Britain performs its first ever Prom, beginning what will become a near-annual tradition.<\/p>\n
17 August 1957<\/h3>\n
The BBC celebrates the tenth anniversary of the Third Programme radio station by commissioning Ibert\u2019s rowdy Bacchanale. The composer himself is in the audience.<\/p>\n
28 August 1958<\/h3>\n
The Proms hosts its first complete Bruckner symphony since 1903, as the Hall\u00e9 plays his \u2018Romantic\u2019 Fourth.<\/p>\n
1 September 1959<\/h3>\n
In a \u2018Masters of the 20th century\u2019 Prom, Sargent conducts works by Sibelius, Stravinsky, Kod\u00e1ly and Shostakovich.<\/p>\n
23 July 1960<\/h3>\n
The first Prom under the auspices of William Glock as the BBC\u2019s controller of music is rounded off by Dvo\u0159\u00e1k\u2019s Symphony No. 9 \u2018From the New World\u2019. For some, Glock will prove to be a disruptive modernist; to others, he is a much-needed breath of fresh air.<\/p>\n
31 August 1960<\/h3>\n
Janet Baker performs an aria from Tippett\u2019s The Midsummer Marriage, the first of 36 appearances from the mezzo, who goes on to become a Proms favourite.<\/p>\n
28 July 1961<\/h3>\n
How to make a point? One of Glock\u2019s first commissions is Symphonies for piano, wind, harps and percussion by Elisabeth Lutyens, a ferocious critic of the \u2018cowpat\u2019 traditional school of English music.<\/p>\n
21 August 1961<\/h3>\n
The Proms hosts its first complete opera performance, as John Pritchard conducts Mozart\u2019s Don Giovanni in a production brought over from Glyndebourne.<\/p>\n
14 September 1961<\/h3>\n
Robert Schumann\u2019s Second Symphony enjoys a surprisingly late Proms debut, played by the LSO under Meredith Davies.<\/p>\n
22 July 1963<\/h3>\n
The hegemony of British conductors at the Proms comes to an end as the Swiss Silvio Varviso takes the baton for Mozart\u2019s The Marriage of Figaro. Hungary\u2019s Georg Solti and Italy\u2019s Carlo Maria Giulini follow later in the season.<\/p>\n
30 July 1963<\/h3>\n
The first ever Proms performance of Mahler\u2019s Second Symphony proves such a hit that conductor Leopold Stokowski gets the LSO to play the entire final movement again as an encore.<\/p>\n
1 August 1963<\/h3>\n
Fifteen months after its premiere in Coventry, Britten conducts his War Requiem. The soloists include soprano Heather Harper and tenor Peter Pears.<\/p>\n
6 September 1963<\/h3>\n
Soprano Birgit Nilsson and bass Gottlob Frick join the party as Georg Solti leads a 150th-anniversary Wagner celebration.<\/p>\n
13 August 1964<\/h3>\n
Berthold Goldschmidt conducts the LSO in the world premiere of Mahler\u2019s Tenth Symphony, a work left unfinished at the composer\u2019s death but recently completed by Deryck Cooke.<\/p>\n
4 September 1964<\/h3>\n
The Amadeus Quartet does its best to fill the vast spaces of the Albert Hall with a performance of the \u2018Emperor\u2019 String Quartet at the start of an all-Haydn Prom.<\/p>\n
1 September 1965<\/h3>\n
Featuring Jacqueline du Pr\u00e9 in Elgar\u2019s Cello Concerto, Malcolm Sargent conducts a Prom celebrating his 70th birthday (a day that actually fell back in April).<\/p>\n
17 August 1966<\/h3>\n
Shostakovich, Rachmaninov and Tchaikovsky are on the bill as the Proms welcomes its first ever overseas orchestra, the Moscow Symphony, conducted by Gennady Rozhdestvensky.<\/p>\n
17 September 1966<\/h3>\n
A 25-year-old Martha Argerich wows the Last Night audience with her Proms debut in Prokofiev\u2019s Piano Concerto No. 3. It will be another 26 years before the Argentinian makes a return visit to the festival.<\/p>\n
16 September <\/span>1967<\/span><\/h3>\n
A poignant farewell. <\/span>Suffering from pancreatic cancer, Malcolm Sargent was too ill to conduct any Proms in the 1967 season. Nonetheless, come the Last Night, he appeared at the Albert Hall one final time to give a speech. \u2018Next year, the 74th season of the Henry Wood Promenade Concerts begins on July 20th,\u2019 he told the audience. \u2018I\u2019ve been invited to be here on that night. I have accepted the invitation.\u2019 He died on 3 October.<\/span><\/p>\n
19 July 1968<\/h3>\n
The 1968 season opens with a Malcolm Sargent Memorial Prom, in which Colin Davis conducts works by Vaughan Williams, Walton and Elgar.<\/p>\n
12 August 1968<\/h3>\n
After a first half featuring Thea Musgrave\u2019s Concerto for Orchestra, John Tavener\u2019s Alium and Don Banks\u2019s Violin Concerto, the audience is asked to vote for which work they would like to hear again after the interval. Alium wins by a landslide.<\/p>\n
21 August <\/span>1968<\/span><\/h3>\n
Emotions in Czech. <\/span>On 20 August, Soviet tanks rolled into Prague to put a stop to liberal reforms being carried out by the Czechoslovak leader Alexander Dub<\/span>c<\/span>\u02c7<\/span>ek \u2013 137 civilians were killed as the world looked on in dismay. When the USSR State Orchestra and Russian cellist Mstislav Rostropovich (above) took to the Albert Hall stage to play Dvo<\/span>r<\/span>\u02c7<\/span>\u00e1k\u2019s Cello Concerto the next night, the occasion was highly charged and tinged with desperate irony. \u2018That night will forever live in the memory of those of us who were there,\u2019 recalls cellist Julian Lloyd Webber, who was 17 at the time. \u2018Prague was a very important city in Rostropovich\u2019s life \u2013 he met his wife Galina there \u2013 and here he was playing the<\/i> Czech cello concerto. The tension was extraordinary, and while the performance was not his most technically perfect, towards the end it was utterly heartbreaking. When it came to the encore, he had tears rolling down his face.\u2019 <\/span><\/p>\n
18 July 1969<\/h3>\n
Breaking with tradition, the Proms season does not open with the National Anthem. Instead, conductor Colin Davis launches straight into Berlioz\u2019s Grande messe des morts in a Henry Wood Centenary Prom.<\/p>\n
13 August 1969<\/h3>\n
As well as championing the new, Glock shows his willingness to push the boundaries at the other end of the timeline, as the Proms welcomes music from the 14th century: Machaut\u2019s Messe de Nostre Dame, sung by the Ambrosian Singers.<\/p>\n
28 August 1969<\/h3>\n
Some things go on too long. The 40-minute premiere of Maxwell Davies\u2019s Worldes Blis has many audience members heading towards the bar well before the work is over. Others stick around to boo.<\/p>\n
30 July 1970<\/h3>\n
Period performance pioneer David Munrow brings the Early Music Consort of London to the Proms for the first time.<\/p>\n
13 August 1970<\/h3>\n
The music carries on well towards midnight as the BBC Symphony Orchestra is joined by rock band Soft Machine for the first ever Late Night Prom. An evening of premieres includes Mike Ratledge\u2019s Out-Bloody-Rageous.<\/p>\n
7 September 1972<\/h3>\n
The Albert Hall Arena is cleared to make room for Stockhausen\u2019s Carr\u00e9 for four orchestras. It is played once, and then again for good measure.<\/p>\n
29 December 1972<\/h3>\n
Yes, you have read the date right. An all-Stravinsky concert launches an eight-day Winter Prom season, reviving a tradition abandoned earlier in the century. The revival only lasts a year.<\/p>\n
4 January 1973<\/h3>\n
The Berlin Philharmonic makes its debut visit to the Proms, playing Beethoven\u2019s Fourth and Fifth Symphonies under Herbert von Karajan.<\/p>\n
26 July 1974<\/h3>\n
As pre-Proms talks are introduced to the mix, the BBC Symphony Orchestra\u2019s chief conductor (and composer) Pierre Boulez leads the way, giving five during the season, including one introducing this evening\u2019s programme of Stockhausen, Berg and Wagner.<\/p>\n
7 August 1974<\/h3>\n
Crisis looms when baritone Thomas Allen collapses during Orff\u2019s Carmina Burana but \u2013 Oh, Fortuna! \u2013 budding opera singer Patrick McCarthy steps out from the audience to take over and save the day.<\/p>\n
9 August 1976<\/h3>\n
The hair is here. Simon Rattle\u2019s late night concert with the London Sinfonietta makes him, at 21, the youngest ever conductor at the Proms.<\/p>\n
17 August 1977<\/h3>\n
An 88-year-old Adrian Boult conducts his 251st and last Prom, rounding off with Vaughan Williams\u2019s Job, a work that the composer himself had dedicated to him.<\/p>\n
18 August 1979<\/h3>\n
Although the BBC Northern Symphony Orchestra\u2019s \u2018Viennese Night\u2019 Prom is later watched by more than five million on TV, the BBC\u2019s controller of music Robert Ponsonby decides not to repeat the format.<\/p>\n
7 August 1980<\/h3>\n
After a musicians\u2019 strike has wiped out the first 19 Proms, the season gets off to a very belated start, with soprano Jessye Norman joining the BBC SO for Mahler\u2019s Fourth.<\/p>\n
16 and 18 July 1982<\/h3>\n
Pleas to Ponsonby for a TV-friendly First Night fall on deaf ears, and the new season opens instead with Berlioz\u2019s The Trojans, divided between two Proms on Friday and Sunday. Neither are televised.<\/p>\n
20 August <\/span>1984<\/span><\/h3>\n
Odaline breaks new ground. <\/span>It took nearly 90 years since Henry Wood first flourished his Proms baton, but at last the conductor\u2019s podium was filled by someone with two X chromosomes, with Odaline de la Martinez stepping up to lead her own Lontano ensemble in works by Schoenberg, Gerhard and others. \u2018I remember contacting the BBC and suggesting I do a programme there,\u2019 de la Martinez later said in an interview. \u2018They agreed, and it was only a few weeks before the performance that someone said to me, \u201cDo you realise that you are the first woman to conduct a performance at the Albert Hall?\u201d So I rang the BBC and they confirmed it!\u2019<\/span><\/p>\n
8 September 1984<\/h3>\n
Symphonies by Mozart and Bruckner mark the Vienna Philharmonic\u2019s first visit to the Proms, under Claudio Abbado.<\/p>\n
15 September 1984<\/h3>\n
The audience at the Last Night is invited to enjoy an extra-long interval so that TV viewers have time to watch Dynasty on BBC One before joining them for the second-half jollity at the Albert Hall.<\/p>\n
14 September 1985<\/h3>\n
Last Night mezzo soloist Sarah Walker unbuttons the sleeve of her seemingly conventional white dress to reveal a Union Flag. A sartorial precedent is set.<\/p>\n
24 July 1988<\/h3>\n
Leonard Bernstein is here to conduct his Songfest. The Prom\u2019s kick-off time is 7.30pm. Bernstein arrives at the Albert Hall at 7.28pm. And relax\u2026<\/p>\n
15 September 1990<\/h3>\n
Andrew Davis takes over the Last Night at late notice after intended conductor Mark Elder has been sent to the naughty step, sacked for questioning the suitability of singing patriotic songs in the light of the impending Gulf War.<\/p>\n
10 August 1992<\/h3>\n
Performed by Evelyn Glennie, the world premiere of James MacMillan\u2019s percussion concerto Veni, Veni, Emmanuel proves a major hit (excuse the pun).<\/p>\n
18 July 1994<\/h3>\n
At the age of 68, Queen Elizabeth II attends her first ever Prom. Her Majesty is treated to an all-British concert from the BBC Symphony Orchestra\u00a0 and Andrew Davis that includes Britten\u2019s Violin Concerto, performed by Ida Haendel.<\/p>\n
16 September<\/span> 1995<\/span><\/h3>\n
Don\u2019t Panic! <\/span>The popular narrative goes that John Drummond, the departing controller of the BBC Proms who was never a fan of the Last Night, plonked Birtwistle\u2019s discordant Panic <\/i>for saxophone and orchestra into the concert\u2019s second half specifically to wind up the TV audience tuning in for Jerusalem<\/i> and all. Very dr\u00f4le if so\u2026 but not true. Though countless calls of complaint were made to the BBC, that was not Drummond\u2019s aim. Panic<\/i> had in fact been intended for the first half but, as Birtwistle had composed a work nearly twice as long as commissioned and because it required large amounts of orchestral shifting beforehand, there was no choice but to put Panic<\/i> at the start of the second.<\/span><\/p>\n
22 July 1996<\/h3>\n
Lovers of music on a smaller scale head to the Royal College of Music on a Monday lunchtime as the new Chamber Music Proms series is launched with a performance by the Arditti Quartet. The series later finds a permanent home at nearby Cadogan Hall.<\/p>\n
14 September 1996<\/h3>\n
Another Proms first, this time involving thousands of concert-goers and an open-air stage in Hyde Park. Hosted by Sheridan Morley, the debut Proms in the Park event on the Last Night proves such a success that it is soon extended to other cities across the UK.<\/p>\n
10 August 1997<\/h3>\n
The Russian pianist Evgeny Kissin makes history by giving the first ever solo recital at the Proms. The seven encores that follow may well be a Proms record too\u2026<\/p>\n
17 August 1997<\/h3>\n
Westminster Abbey choristers in cassocks and ruffs, processing into the Royal Albert Hall and singing Britten\u2019s A Ceremony of Carols on a swelteringly hot August afternoon? Absolutely.<\/p>\n
12 September 1997<\/h3>\n
A moving performance of Verdi\u2019s Requiem is dedicated to the memories of Princess Diana and Georg Solti. Tragically, Solti was himself initially scheduled to conduct the concert, but died the day before Diana\u2019s funeral. Five minutes of silence follows the performance before applause begins.<\/p>\n
10 August 1998<\/h3>\n
Simon Rattle and the Birmingham Contemporary Music Group\u2019s Late Night Prom is brought rudely to a halt by the sound of rape alarms and leaflets fluttering down from up high in the Albert Hall. The perpetrators, who are protesting against what they believe is a cabal running British music publishing, disappear anonymously into the night.<\/p>\n
7 September 1998<\/h3>\n
Here\u2019s one we made earlier. Presented by Katy Hill, the first Blue Peter Prom marks the 40th anniversary of the much loved children\u2019s programme.<\/p>\n
10 August 1999<\/h3>\n
And\u2026 one, two, three, kick! One, two, three, kick! The Proms premiere of Bernstein\u2019s Wonderful Town, starring Thomas Hampson, ends with Prommers doing a conga around the Arena.<\/p>\n
15 September <\/span>2001<\/span><\/h3>\n
Barber replaces Britannia. <\/span>Perfected by the likes of Malcolm Sargent and Andrew Davis, the conductor\u2019s Last Night speech usually provides the chance to indulge in a few witticisms and rouse the Prommers into a state of even greater patriotic excitement. For Leonard Slatkin (above) in 2001, the task was very different. Coming just four days after the 9\/11 terrorist attacks, the occasion required a change of tone, not just in the speech but in the choice of music too. Out went \u2018Land of Hope and Glory\u2019 and \u2018Rule Britannia\u2019; in came Barber\u2019s Adagio, Negro Spirituals from Tippett\u2019s A Child of Our Time<\/i> and\u00a0the final movement of Beethoven\u2019s Ninth Symphony. \u2018We felt it was vital to respond to people\u2019s mood at this sombre and difficult hour,\u2019 explained Proms controller Nicholas Kenyon, \u2018and at the same time to show that music can affirm our shared humanity.\u2019<\/span><\/p>\n
19 July 2003<\/h3>\n
Readers of the Radio Times are invited to vote for the repertoire of the Nation\u2019s Favourite Prom. The winning works include Prokofiev\u2019s Peter and the Wolf, read here by Sir David Attenborough.<\/p>\n
31 August 2003<\/h3>\n
For some concert-goers, learning how to turn off a mobile phone is an intellectual challenge too far, as Simon Rattle discovers at the beginning of Stravinsky\u2019s Rite of Spring. He stops the Berlin Philharmonic mid-bar, and starts the piece again.<\/p>\n
16 July 2004<\/h3>\n
After two years of silence during a major revamp, the mighty Albert Hall organ is ready to play again. And how. The 2004 season opens with the thunderous sound of Bach\u2019s Toccata in D minor, played by Martin Neary, before the BBC Symphony Orchestra takes over for the Fugue, as orchestrated by Henry Wood.<\/p>\n
3 August 2005<\/h3>\n
A family moment, as Ravi Shankar and his daughter Anoushka perform together in a concert that includes the Proms premiere of Shankar Snr\u2019s Sitar Concerto No. 1.<\/p>\n
19 July 2006<\/h3>\n
Her Majesty the Queen makes a return visit to the Proms, this time for an 80th-birthday celebration. Among the works are A Little Birthday Music by Master of the Queen\u2019s Music Peter Maxwell Davies and Poet Laureate Andrew Motion.<\/p>\n
2 August 2006<\/h3>\n
Elgar\u2019s Pomp and Circumstance March No.\u00a06, a work created by Anthony Payne from the composer\u2019s incomplete sketches, is given its world premiere.<\/p>\n
4 September 2006<\/h3>\n
After their Beethoven Ninth Symphony Prom has been cancelled by a fire in the Albert Hall, the Philadelphia Orchestra and Christoph Eschenbach come back the next day for a second go, this time playing Beethoven\u2019s and Tchaikovsky\u2019s Fifths.<\/p>\n
19 August 2007<\/h3>\n
The Albert Hall stage becomes a vibrant sea of yellow, blue and red, as Venezuela\u2019s Sim\u00f3n Bol\u00edvar Youth Orchestra makes its lively Proms debut under conductor Gustavo Dudamel.<\/p>\n
27 July 2008<\/h3>\n
Daleks come face to face with double basses at the inaugural Doctor Who Prom. Thankfully, no viola players or trombonists are exterminated.<\/p>\n
30 July 2011<\/h3>\n
No sooner have the daleks been repelled than the Albert Hall is invaded by Vikings, courtesy of the Horrible Histories Prom. There are also visits from Henry VIII, a caveman and Death, among others.<\/p>\n
1 September 2011<\/h3>\n
Though the concert itself goes ahead, protests by the pro-Palestinian group BDS London lead to the Israel Philharmonic\u2019s Prom being taken off air.<\/p>\n
13 July 2012<\/h3>\n
BBC Music Magazine plays its own little part in Proms history, as the 2012 season opens with Mark-Anthony Turnage\u2019s Canon Fever, a work commissioned by the magazine\u2019s editorial team.<\/p>\n
27 July 2012<\/h3>\n
Daniel Barenboim conducts the West-Eastern Divan Orchestra in Beethoven\u2019s Ninth Symphony before haring off and across the city to appear as one of the Olympic flag bearers at the Opening Ceremony of London 2012.<\/p>\n
22 July 2013<\/h3>\n
From Olympic rings to Wagnerian ones \u2013 Barenboim returns to the Proms to conduct Das Rheingold, following up with the rest of the Ring cycle in three further concerts over six days.<\/p>\n
7 September 2013<\/h3>\n
Marin Alsop is the first woman to conduct the Last Night of the Proms. \u2018I feel certain that Henry Wood would see this evening as a natural progression towards more inclusion in classical music,\u2019 says the American in her speech.<\/p>\n
10 August 2014<\/h3>\n
As he steps onto the podium to conduct the Academy of St Martin in the Fields in Walton\u2019s Henry V: A Shakespeare Scenario, Neville Marriner becomes, at 90, the oldest conductor in the history of the Proms. Marriner appeared in his first Prom, as a violinist, in 1963.<\/p>\n
29 July 2015<\/h3>\n
Radio 1 DJ Pete Tong hosts a late-night Ibiza Prom, bringing the Balearics party vibe to Kensington.<\/p>\n
5 August 2016<\/h3>\n
In one of the great Proms encores, violinist Pekka Kuusisto marks his debut by getting the audience to join him and BBC Scottish Symphony Orchestra leader Laura Samuel for a Finnish folk sing-along.<\/p>\n
21 July 2019<\/h3>\n
The Sunday morning CBeebies: A Musical Trip to the Moon Prom includes Earth, a specially commissioned work by Oscar-winning composer Hans Zimmer, no less.<\/p>\n
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