Today at the Proms - Prom 21 & 22

Continuing our daily coverage of what's on at The Proms 2019, Susan Omand has a quick look at the programme for Prom 21: Olivier Latry and Prom 22: Rachmaninov, Shostakovich & Outi Tarkiainen ...



Watch Prom 22 live on BBC Four tonight



Wow, lots to choose from today with two proms of much variety. The evening Prom is being broadcast live on BBC Four so that will be a fun one. It promises a world premiere of a new work by the Finnish Lapp composer Outi Tarkiainen, who said of its composition, "This work for orchestra is a set of variations on the light when the sun never sets in the arctic summer night." Also tonight we have Rachmaninov's Isle of the Dead. This is a tone poem inspired by a black and white photograph of Arnold Böcklin's painting The Isle of the Dead although, apparently, he disliked the actual painting when he saw it, preferring the monochrome representation in the photo! The other work tonight is Shostakovitch's Symphony No 11, In the Year 1905, actually written in 1957 to reflect the recent 50th anniversary of the Russian Revolution, although some say it was actually a response to the 1956 Hungarian revolution. It is very revolutionary in any case.



Before all that, though, we have a morning Prom and it's one I really wish they would have televised because I really wanted to see Olivier Latry's organ. [*giggles* - Ed] No, I mean it's the organist from Notre Dame Cathedral playing the organ in the Royal Albert Hall. And what a fantastic programme of music is lined up for it, encompassing 250 years of organ music, most of which you will recognise when you hear them, and it includes a favourite of mine with Bach's Toccata and Fugue in D minor.

Watch this utterly glorious music video of Latry playing that work at Notre Dame, taken from his album Bach to the Future...

Here's the full programme for this evening's Prom which you can listen to live on Radio 3 or on the iPlayer 



Prom 21 - 11:00

Aram Khachaturian
Gayane – Sabre Dance (transcr. Kiviniemi)(3 mins)

Manuel de Falla
El amor brujo – Ritual fire dance (transcr. Latry)(5 mins)

Ludwig van Beethoven
Adagio in F major (for mechanical clock)(5 mins)

Johann Sebastian Bach
Toccata and Fugue in D minor, BWV 565

Eugène Gigout
Air célèbre de la Pentecôte(3 mins)

Franz Liszt
Prelude and Fugue on the name BACH, S 260(14 mins)(arr. Guillou)

Charles‐Marie Widor
Bach's Memento – No. 4: Marche du veilleur de nuit(4 mins)

Camille Saint‐Saëns
Danse macabre (arr. Lemare)(8 mins)

Prom 22 - 19:30

Sergey Rachmaninov
The Isle of the Dead(21 mins)Henry Wood Novelties: UK premiere, 1915

Outi Tarkiainen
Midnight Sun Variations(10 mins)BBC co-commission with the National Arts Centre Orchestra, Ottawa: world premiere

INTERVAL

Dmitry Shostakovich
Symphony No 11 in G minor 'The Year 1905'(58 mins)

Image - Photo © Chris Christodoulou