Piano highlights at this year's BBC Proms
23 April 2012
Benjamin Grosvenor, who made his Proms debut in 2011, is set to perform Saint-Saens Concerto No 2© Chris Christodoulou/Proms
The line-up for this year’s BBC Proms – which takes place 13 July – 8 September – will include pianists Murray Perahia, Imogen Cooper, Steven Osborne, Katia and Marielle Labèque, Benjamin Grosvenor and Joanna MacGregor, among others.
The festival will draw on themes inspired by the Queen’s Diamond Jubilee and the Olympics, and on the opening night of the Proms, four British conductors – Martyn Brabbins, Sir Mark Elder, Edward Gardner and Sir Roger Norrington – will ‘pass the baton’ on stage.
The 118th season includes 17 new commissions, with a further five world premieres and 14 other UK and London premieres, including that of Richard Dubugnon’s Battlefield concerto, written for and performed by Katia and Marielle Labèque.
British composers celebrating significant birthdays include Oliver
Knussen and Simon Bainbridge at 60, and Hugh Wood and Alexander Goehr at 80. There
are also 150th-birthday tributes to Debussy and Delius. Joanna MacGregor will
perform Wood’s piano concerto and Pierre-Laurent Aimard gives a solo recital of
Debussy works.
Daniel Barenboim and his celebrated West Eastern Divan Orchestra
make Proms history by performing all nine Beethoven symphonies and the festival
hosts six major opera performances. Other headline-grabbing concerts include
the Children’s Prom, which will feature a concerto penned by none other than
animated inventor Wallace (of ‘& Gromit), and a complete performance of My
Fair Lady.
Promming tickets remain at £5 and for the first time ever, seats are half-price for under-18s. Every Prom is broadcast live on BBC Radio 3 and many are televised on BBC One, BBC Two and BBC Four.
