Last workweek was blockbuster week at the Proms, with Venezuelan wunderkind Gustavo Dudamel returning after his electrifying concert last year with the Simon Bolivar Youth Orchestra, followed by two concerts by Daniel Barenboim and his good act in a unholy world, the Israeli-Palestinian West Eastern Divan orchestra; capped by a Jan�ccirc;ek program conducted by the lordly old man of modernism, Pierre Boulez.
Other programmes over the workweek included ever popular pieces such as Elgar's Enigma Variations and Rimsky-Korsakov's Scheherazade, exactly the kind of thing to attract nonclassical music buffs.
Not surprisingly, seating room at all these concerts, apart from the late-night Barenboim, were sold out in advance. Good news for sometimes embattled classical music, simply arguably not so good for the BBC's license payers world Health Organization underwrite the two-month prom season.
Londoners could of course queue well in boost for the limited standing promenade places, but even this would be too risky for out-of-towners, minded the cost of travel on specification to the capital.
It's true that all concerts ar transmitted on Radio 3 � merely for those who desire to parcel in the excitement of the event, not hardly hear the music, the BBC has the ideal medium (it's called tV). But only the (early) Barenboim and Boulez concerts were broadcast live � a especial disappointment for those wHO wanted to see Dudamel conduct a "proper" orchestra with mainstream repertoire (the Gothenburg Symphony Orchestra with Symphonie Fantastique by Berlioz).
Last year the fag-end of the television year was brightened up by live transmissions of the number one two weeks of the Proms. But just as you settled in to a long August of winding down each evening with a glass of plonk to an undisturbed oasis of intelligent tv on that largely deserted island of BBC4, they stopped.
This yr, we were promised live Proms passim the season. Except the broadcasts on BBC4 are too irregular to build an audience or the audience a habit; and the BBC2 transmissions call on out more often than not not to be "live" in the sense of happening concurrently in the Albert Hall as you watch, just live as in actually performed before an audience at some point � which in this instance, on Saturday night, meant the "Prom" consisted of half of the Boulez and half of the Barenboim concerts from in the first place in the week spatchcocked together. All this leavened by the introduction of populist guests in the inbetween bits, who don't know much about music, but know what they like.
If there's one thing worse than a self-appointed elite, it's a self-appointed elite which lacks all confidence. Which presumably is the only reason it feels unable to simply transmit all the concerts on BBC4, since it presumably has the rights and TV coverage is the musical equivalent of snooker � a couple of camerapeople and a director able to come after a score and show which instruments are carrying the patch at any time. Surely it can't be ratings worries for a distribution channel which � regrettably � doesn't exist on the TV map of around 97% of the universe, anyway? So what did we get instead of the Proms for that much-anticipated Dudamel concert: BBC4 gave us an ancient Batman episode (a echo), and the documentary Black Power Salute � a fine program, but as well a repeat.
BBC4 used to be the best plaza for public cinema, just now Sky's Indie channel generally seems the best bet for seeing what the rest of the world looks like. And Sky Arts now oftentimes offers the best humanistic discipline programming of the week, given the off-air channels' increasing timorousness over whatsoever serious humanities coverage. How long earlier Murdoch finds another corner to slip into and gives us a proper summer season of euphony? It would be the supreme irony if the old deuce ended up with all the topper tunes.
Exciting new artists like Gustavo Dudamel could bring a new youth audience to classical music � simply people have to be able to see him first. We all pay for the Proms. Why should only Londoners and tourists capture to see them?
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