Last Night of the Proms - Part 1 BBC Proms

History in the making tonight at the Royal Albert Hall as the first-ever

female conductor, Marin Alsop, takes on the most famous classical music

concert in the world. Welcome to the Last Night of the Proms 2013. It has

been the most amazing season. Weeks Last Night of the Proms 2013. It has

of glorious sunshine outside and two months of scorching music-making

inside the Royal Albert Hall. Tonight, we are celebrating with the

grandest of grand finales. Lots on the programme. We have Nigel Kennedy

playing The Lark Ascending, we have music by Wagner, Verdi and Bernstein

and a clutch of favourites sung by mezzo-soprano Joyce DiDonato. We

have Rule Britannia and Land of Hope and Glory. The celebrations are

spilling out to Proms in the Park events throughout the UK. Press your

red button to watch highlights of those at any time tonight.

There are Proms in the Park events in Belfast, Caerphilly, Glasgow and

in Hyde Park. Later, everyone will come together for one of the newest

Proms traditions singing You'll Never Walk Alone. We have over 200

musicians here on stage, the magnificent BBC Symphony Orchestra

and the BBC Symphony Chorus. They are raring to go. Well, that

applause there for the leader of the BBC Symphony Orchestra, Stephen

Bryant. Before the music gets under way, we

have a vital Last Night tradition of honouring the Founder of the Proms

Sir Henry Wood by placing laurels on the bust of the man himself. Doing

the honours are two dedicated Promenaders, Paul Davies, and Roger

Greenwood, who says he's attended over 1,500 Proms in his lifetime.

That bust of Sir Henry Wood lent to the BBC Proms each summer by the

Royal Academy of Music. But on with the music. First up, we have a

brand-new fanfare especially written for tonight by Anna Clyne. It is

called Masquerade. Coming on stage now to a huge cheer to conduct the

BBC Symphony Orchestra, the American conductor, Marin Alsop.

MUSIC: "Masquerade" by Anna Clyne

MUSIC: "Masquerade" by Anna Clyne

Masquerade by Anna Clyne, our curtain-raiser to Last Night of the

Proms. The BBC Symphony Orchestra conducted by Marin Alsop. I think we

got a glimpse of Anna Clyne, just 33, born in Britain but now living

in America. There she is, dedicating Masquerade to the Prommers, that

committed bunch of music lovers who stand down in the arena at the Royal

Albert Hall and are cheering her to the rafters. Next up, we have music

from Richard Wagner whose 200th anniversary we have been celebrating

all season. This is Wagner's Overture to the Mastersingers of

Nuremberg. Wagner's Overture to the

Mastersingers of Nuremberg, performed by the BBC Symphony

Orchestra, conducted by Marin Alsop. A major Wagner anniversary this

year. We have been celebrating it at the Proms. Next, we will be hearing

music close to Marin Alsop's heart, Leonard Bernstein's Chichester

Psalms. Marin studied conducting with Bernstein. She really

understands his music. Someone else who knows a thing or two about

Leonard Bernstein, is Julian Joseph, who is my guest tonight. Welcome to

the Last Night of the Proms. who is my guest tonight. Welcome to

Pleasure to be here. My goodness! I know. Quite the event. Bernstein, we

know him as a conductor and composer of West Side Story. How do you

define his music? His music encapsulates so much of the

classical tradition, whether it is the German tradition of writing, or

the full classical gambit. He uses the blues and we will hear this in

the next piece. There is something quintessentially American about his

music? Absolutely. He has that signature sound. I think, possibly,

after George Gershwin, he is one of the signatory composers that really

brings that American sound forward. The fact that Marin learnt with him,

does that mean she will be interpreting his music in a special

way? Absolutely. If you know the composer, if you have a closeness

way? Absolutely. If you know the with him and you have spoken to him

about music, you will get an insight into how things really work. This is

a curious woman. She's an incredible musician. I'm sure that studying

with him, the questions were flying thick and fast. Not only that, he

offered her some sense of process in terms of developing as that great

musician we know her to be. She said she saw him conduct when she was

seven or eight and that is what made her want to be a conductor. At a

time when her teacher said, "Girls don't do that." Absolutely. She also

went on to say he was somebody who bucked the trend and encouraged her

to Leonard Bernstein's Chichester Psalms was commissioned by the Dean

of Chichester Cathedral. It sets the words of the Psalms in the original

Hebrew. Here comes countertenor Iestyn Davies, along with Marin

Alsop who will be conducting the BBC Symphony Orchestra and Chorus now in

Leonard Bernstein's Chichester Psalms.

MUSIC: "The Chichester Psalms" by Leonard Bernstein

Leonard Bernstein's Chichester Psalms performed at the Last Night

Leonard Bernstein's Chichester of the Proms by BBC Symphony

Orchestra and Chorus, conducted by a former pupil of Bernstein, Marin

Alsop, and the soloist was countertenor, Iestyn Davies. He is

getting his Last Night gift from dedicated Prommer, Joan Sheppard.

Joan has been to no fewer than 70 Proms this year - that's all but

four! Iestyn Davies has been described as one of the most

glorious countertenor voices in the world today.

Next, we move from the unmistakeably American to the quintessentially

English. Vaughan Williams' beautiful piece of The Lark Ascending. We are

going to hear it performed by one of piece of The Lark Ascending. We are

this country's greatest violin superstars, Nigel Kennedy. I asked

him about the work when I caught up with him earlier.

Nigel, you're playing The Lark Ascending by Vaughan Williams

tonight which is a wonderful British piece of music

for the Last Night of the Proms. Tell us about it.

Well, it's very evocative of an old time in the past in England

when the lark actually did exist in the countryside

and it's very descriptive of the lark flying and gliding on thermals

So it's a beautiful reminiscent image

of how the rural agriculture used to be.

This work in particular, it's not a virtuosic work

so it's a pleasure to play it because you are not having to think

really about virtuosity and practising all the notes.

You're getting into the mood. And the thematic material,

it's shared equally between all the instruments.

So you have clarinet with a fragment then you've got horn with a fragment

and the violin is just part of it but it kind of holds it together.

about performing here at the Last Night of the Proms.

Even in the rehearsal, there's a lot of people in there

who haven't managed to get tickets to the gig.

You know, seeing the people, the enthusiasm for it.

And even in Poland, where I live half the time,

it's being relayed there and all over the world.

So it's something for the whole world,

celebrating beautiful classical music.

Nigel Kennedy does cross musical boundaries, performing classical,

folk and jazz. Another great boundaries, performing classical,

experimenter is still with me, Julian Joseph. The way he mixes it

up with the way he plays classical work is quite inspirational? It is

very inspirational. He is a musician who sees no boundaries, who wants to

dip into all of the ways of expressing that furious technique

that he has. It is great that he has an interest in folk because it lends

itself to the violin, his interest in jazz and the experimenting, and

it enables him to work hard. Vaughan Williams started writing The Lark

Ascending in 1914 on the eve of the First World War. He is now coming on

to the stage to perform The Lark Ascending by Ralph Vaughan Williams.

I am expecting to see that familiar figure come on to the stage any

minute now. Here he is. A face we know and love at the BBC Proms, with

Marin Alsop. Shaking the hand of leader Stephen Bryant. The BBC

Symphony Orchestra standing by to perform Ralph Vaughan Williams' The

Lark Ascending. MUSIC: "The Lark Ascending"

by Vaughan Williams So, the bird flies away at the end

of The Lark Ascending by Ralph Vaughan Williams, performed

beautifully by Nigel Kennedy, with the BBC Symphony Orchestra conducted

by Marin Alsop. Vaughan Williams once wrote that music preserves the

identity of the soul of the nation. Nigel Kennedy has got a very busy

night. He is about to race over to Hyde Park before returning to the

Royal Albert Hall for the second half of tonight's concert. The BBC

Symphony Orchestra needs a moment for the stage to be reset. The

orchestra is known as the backbone of the Proms. This is their 11th

concert since opening the Proms in mid-July. It is the BBC Symphony

Chorus who are going to be thrust into the limelight next. They too

are keen members of the Proms family. They are all volunteers. We

met some of them in rehearsals to find out more about them and about

the music they are singing tonight. It is a bit mind-blowing to begin

with to think I used to be watching this and now I'm in it. It is a

great privilege to take part in musical events in this country at

the highest standard. We are from all walks of life. People come from

far and wide because it's such a good chorus to be part of. The end

of a busy Monday is a rehearsal here and a wonderful opportunity to

release some of that energy that you have had to build-up during the

working day. You have to be fully committed and fully involved in that

time and that means that you gain space from however mad the rest of

your life is. Preparing for the Last Night, you have up to four

rehearsals a week. You start to feel like a family. It is great. It

helped me a lot when I moved here and knew nobody. We get to work with

these great conductors who I watched on the TV. Marin Alsop and also

Joyce DiDonato, who I heard so many on the TV. Marin Alsop and also

years ago. Now I can be on the stage on the TV. Marin Alsop and also

with her. It is great. The Britten was written for the opening of

Snape. The singing we are doing was first sung by local amateur choirs.

Singing together is one of the greatest things you can do. It is

just sheer elation when you know you have sung every dynamic, every

expression, every note and you stand up at the end and you hear the

audience, there is no better feeling in the world. Very good. We are

going to witness that joy and enthusiasm in a minute. The BBC

Symphony Chorus and Orchestra are poised on stage. We are ready to

hear that piece by one of this year's birthday boys, Benjamin

Britten, who was born 100 years ago. I'm sure you remember that

performance on the First Night. Here is Marin Alsop to conduct the BBC

Symphony Orchestra and Chorus in Benjamin Britten's overture to The

Building of the House. MUSIC: "The Building Of The House"

by Benjamin Britten could all agree with that tonight.

The aria that we just heard, as you may have gathered, is a celebratory

kind of tune, a huge celebration indeed, the opera's heroine has won

the man she loves and it's a happy ending for the opera. It's a happy

ending with this half of tonight's concert too.

Coming back on stage with such obvious delight at the response

she's got here in the hall. What a star. It's the first time she

and Marin have worked together. Indeed it's Marin's first time

working with Joyce and Nigel this evening. She describes them as two

exceptional, unique, high-volume Taj artists, the word she used was

"dynamite". Joyce last appeared at the Proms in

2009 singing other arias by Handel. She made her debut in 2007 singing

Rossini. She's loved here, clearly. They want her back, don't they?

CHEERING AND APPLAUSE She couldn't resist it.

Thanking the orchestra. The audience, all of them on their feet.

You know Joyce is one of seven children. She grew up in a very

musical household in Kansas. She showed an early talent for singing.

Her father, who was a church choir director, first introduced her to op

ra. She is, of course, going to be back

in the second half of tonight's concert. We wouldn't let her get

away so easily, singing all sorts of different kind of repertoire,

including Somewhere Over The Rainbow.

Well, what a way to end the first half of tonight's concert. This prom

is the last of a season of many, many concerts stretching back to

mid-July and the first night. Remember that? Here are some of our

favourite highlights. An unforgettable summer of music at

the BBC Proms. That is all for now An unforgettable summer of music at

here on BBC Two. But join me in a few minutes on BBC One, after the

news at 9. 20pm, when the festivities continue. Have your

flags at the ready. I'll see you there.