Episode 2 BBC Proms

Tonight on Proms Extra, we unveil a different side to Bach,

Mozart gets dissected in more ways than one, and the

Hello and welcome to Proms Extra, the show that looks over all things

This week, besides discussing Mozart,

Bach and Liszt, we unplug the sound secrets of Radio 3, and David Owen

Norris shows off with grace and vigour in Chord of the Week.

It's been a busy second week for the Proms, and we're not playing

Just some of the highlights from this week in the Royal Albert Hall.

So, who's in our studio in the Royal College of Music tonight?

First up, we have a celebrated soprano,

with not one but two performances to come in this Proms season, one

Next is a renowned pianist who has played the Proms more times than he

cares to remember, and he's one of two members

It's a welcome return to Stephen Hough.

Fresh from his performance a few days ago at the Proms is

a brilliant violinist and another Proms Extra family member.

And closing the show will be a performance

by a group heralded as one of the most exciting on the chamber-music

Daniel, have you recovered from Tuesday's Prom with the Borusan

I still in recovery! It was a huge thrill, and to have the to launch a

new child unto the world is very exciting. We are still riding on the

high. Fantastic, a tremendous orchestra. The conductor was so full

of energy. The orchestra was so honoured and thrilled to be here. We

had been building up to it for a long time. One had the feeling that

the energy was limitless. Now,

in the beginning there was Bach, This year, for the first time,

we have both of his epic, dramatic, choral passions in the same Proms

season. We've got the St Matthew Passion

in September, which will be conducted by Sir Simon Rattle, and

last weekend we had an acclaimed Carolyn, Bach is a staple

of your repertoire. For those unfamiliar with the St

John Passion, can you describe it? It tells the story of the events

leading up to and the crucifixion of Christ. It is in contrast to the

Saint Matthew Passion, it is much more compact, and the chorus has a

big role to play. They are involved in the drama of the peace. That was

reflected in this year's prom. Conducted by Sir Roger Norrington,

here is the Zurich Chamber Orchestra/Zurcher

Sing-Akademie, and an extract That was the

Zurich Chamber Orchestra performing Stephen, this is gutsy, bold,

it's spiritual, but not pious? It is astonishing. It is so

extraordinary to hear, even at this time. It is not like an opera where

you have a steady progression, even though the story is steady, you have

the Courant is, the arias, and they are different in style, and

altogether you get this mosaic that adds to the bigger picture of the

story. He was doing some extraordinary

things with his voice. Tell us about the challenges. The Evangelist is

the storyteller, the narrator, and that clip, with the scourging, and

the word painting, it is extraordinary. James is a consummate

Evangelist, he gets into the drama of the piste, and that is what you

want. The arias are a different challenge, because you are not

telling the story in that direct way. Do you love singing it? Yes.

Why? It is beautiful and there is so much variety, and although Bach is

not an operatic composer, he is a dramatic composer still. Stephen, it

is a spiritual work, but it is never pious. It is very earthy. Whether or

not you believe in the story and whether it has a personal

significance, it is an Everyman story of an innocent man going to

his death, and somehow finding the capacity to forgive and even at that

worst time, there is never a time in human history when that is not

important. It is beautiful. This is not the

homework Bach that I remember as an amateur pianist, this is drama and

beauty and passion and gods. Yes, it is Bach the master. It is so

compelling, the drama in his music. In the tiny -- piano and violin

music, it is there, but it is different here. Certain directors

have done semi-staged versions. The narrative has been taken further and

other elements brought in. The music lent itself to that. Incredibly hard

to sing, I imagine. There was an energy to it, for a guy

in his 80th year, that was quite something. So Rod is unique. He has

his opinions. It is fascinating to work with him. The first time we met

was playing Mozart, he was dogmatic about how he wanted the sound to be.

We went along with it, we got to the pores, and he said, is that OK? He

said, if it is not, tell me to get lost! He throws himself into

music-making, and we have had a wonderful time together, performing

everything from Bach, you never quite know what to expect. He seems

like a cornerstone of our classical culture, but there was a time when

people thought he would never be fashionable. It was not until the

20th century that he took a centre place in everyone's life. Performers

did not play Bach, the idea of playing him in concert is not

something that happened until the second half of the 20th century. Do

you find that audiences respond well to Bach? Yes. I do not know if that

is because the people that come to performances are expecting Bach,

they are exciting, and yet they give you space for contemplation as well.

There is something for everybody in that. It is wonderful, when they

sent up the Voyager spacecraft, there was Bach in there, and the

idea of an alien listening to it, it is something that goes on forever,

his music, and perhaps it will. We were told when we were kids that if

we practised our Bach, it would improve our maths. I was terrible at

maths! Still to come on Proms Extra,

a performance by the Heath Quartet, plus Chord of the Week,

which focuses on Mozart. Now, as you must surely know by now,

during the season, Radio 3 broadcasts every note live

of every single Prom from the You'd be forgiven

for thinking that sound is sound and what works for TV, or on a CD

would work for radio, right? Radio 3 has its own particular

requirements for broadcast, and Proms Extra went off with

a mic to unplug Radio 3's secrets I am one of the people who presents

the Proms on Radio 3. We broadcast every concert live over the summer,

and there is an amazing team of people who are responsible for

translating the sound to your radio. What we are trying to achieve is for

our listeners at home to be sitting in the best seat in the hall, so you

have the sense of the acoustic, but do have the detail to hear the lines

that the orchestra are playing. I am going to hit a piano Mike. Can

you tell B which one? Every venue has its own challenges. In the well

Albert Hall, you get a slap back down from the dome. You will hear

the sound that goes up and reflects off the roof and comes down, so you

almost hear things twice. With microphones, we can overcome that,

by maybe going in a bit closer. This is instructions for what we are

doing at the moment, it is a bit of light plumbing, we pluck the right

thing into the Whitehall. Making sure the right microphone is in

front of the right instrument. Chris is getting the right sounds at the

right time. The choir is tracking, that is good.

That is good. That is fine, that was six, and we have got more in hand.

We are making the quiet bits louder, and the loud bit quieter, but we are

keeping it proportional. While the music is being balanced, the

presentation has to come directly from the venue itself, so here we

are in the present's box, I sit here, the producer can speak to me,

I speak into this microphone, and what you hear is a mix of me and the

music. The best thing about this, I have a good view onto the stage, so

whatever happens, I can respond to it immediately and bring the concert

live for you on the radio. The Albert Hall makes this available to

us each year. It is a bit cramped and hot, but otherwise, it is

lovely. This is the focal point of our operation, because the music mix

comes through here, and I can bring Sara in. She is doing her

commentary. Occasionally, the announcer will hold up a piece of

paper, what is going on? Who am I handing back to?

That was my queue, I am going back on air in a moment. I do this and

awful lot, and I have been presenting from here for eight or

nine years, and you can get blas? about it, sitting here, with this

amazing music and at the sphere, and every time the red light goes on,

amazing music and at the sphere, and every time the I get a bit of a

flutter of excitement. When I have finished presenting, I can sit back

and listen to the music, which is not a bad job. Welcome back for the

second half of the concert to night. Bringing the BBC Symphony

Orchestra to their feet. It is one of the nicest seat in the

hall, a really privileged position, to see the conductor and the

performers from the side of the stage. Although I have more sweet

than she does! Just some

of the unsung Radio 3 heroes of the Proms, who build the incredible

wall of sound that is experienced What do you expect of the sound

technicians? You have a huge respect for what they are doing. They make

you sound better. You are in their hands, and dependent on them. It is

in the rehearsals, they check, are you OK? You do not want to hit the

microphone. There are all sorts of considerations. You know, it is the

BBC, they have been doing this for so long, you let go, but it is

always there, you are conscious of it, it is a fascinating moment.

There is such skill in crafting that sound world for different media.

Totally, and they are working at the last minute a lot of the time, they

have to be quick. The Albert Hall is vast, it is difficult to get the

sound, especially of a big orchestra, things can bounce off the

walls, they can be a lack of clarity, different balance issues.

How do you find the acoustics? Sitting at the piano, you are in the

worst seat to hear the instrument, because the wooden lid is projecting

the sound, the microphones are over there. I am trusting myself. It is a

similar thing when you are playing out doors, the sound is not just

acoustic. In the whole, it is acoustic, the microphones are there

for the people at home, but outdoors, you are trusting them for

the sound on the lawn. When you are playing outdoors, there are a whole

world of things that can go wrong, which we are more protected from in

the hall. The weather, for example. A week ago, in Cleveland, we had an

enormous thunder storm. The entire orchestra shrieked and job out of

their seats. I went like this, I thought it was a bomb going off. I

was at the point of atrial, and I went back to that, and then there

was applause and laughter, and another thunderstorm, and I thought,

I will keep this going! Then it calmed down, I carried on with it.

It was shocking, but fun. I like those challenges, great voices from

the streets, individual of an urban setting. I had frogs once, in a

Beethoven concerto. It became so loud, you could not hear the music

any more. The audience dissolves into laughter. You are trying to be

as devoted as you can, it. Easy. As a singer, those challenges must be

even more nerve wracking, because it is you? Yes. What I find is the

biggest challenge with microphones in live performances, whether you

sing to the hall, whether you are projecting into this big hall, or

whether you are singing for the microphone, where you might want to

keep a lid on it a bit, because you do not want to jot anything. Some

people who have only experienced music in a pot or just setting, they

surprise that classical music is acoustic, we produce a sound in its

own space, with no help from electronics. With this, we are

talking about broadcasting, but we are not talking about amplification.

People have found that surprising, that this box is able to project,

just by the way it is built, into a large space. A slightly older box in

my case! Do you prefer being recorded live, or do you relish the

precision of being in a studio? You are looking at each other in a

conspiratorial way! It is always wonderful to have a record, for many

reasons. For the concerto this week, was a world premiere. But it

is also about doing a postmortem, listening to yourself, what it is

bad or good as one thought? Learning from that. Sometimes, you have a

performance and you think, I wish that had not been recorded! It is

the rough with the smooth. You can not always tell. From the

performance, we are the worst judges as to what was good or bad. In a

live performance, the audience do not mind the odd slip. They quite

enjoy it. It is OK to be human. I hope so! We are not machines, it

will never be perfect. If you are aiming at perfection, it restrains

you, and you cannot express yourself. Working with students, to

get them to forget about it, not to bother. You will make this takes,

the greatest artists made lots of mistakes. Then, you will play more

accurately, if you are not worried about being inaccurate. That is very

good advice! In life as well as music! Let's turn to the turn of the

China philharmonic. One of the standout performances was from

Haocheng Zhaig. Let's see him in action.

A star in the making on Proms Extra, Haocheng Zhang,

performing there with the China Philharmonic Orchestra.

Not only was he playing in which the piece that you trilled many minutes

in the thunder, but that Liszt piano concerto was your Proms debut. Yes,

about 30 years ago now. It's a cracker of a piece for a young

artist especially. It's wonderful on many levels. It's very exciting

physically, it's full of display. It's got an amazing soul. Liszt was

a wonderful constructor. He uses the same themes and transforms them in

much the same way that Wagner does in his op raz. It's beautifully

constructed. There's a soul there. There's a feeling of the great

personality of Liszt, someone who walked onto the stage and people

were captivated by this incredible human Can you being. Remember your

first Proms performance? I have to admit that I can't. I remember,

though, very clearly my first Proms visit. And promming and the queueing

and going to see a horn concerto. That whole atmosphere of being there

in the arena, so close to the artists and I don't know about you,

but I love being on stage and having that proximity to such enthusiastic

people and the way that faces become familiar over the years. It's very

much a regular loyal audience. That's very special about the

festival. Every Proms artist, particularly after their first time,

says this about the audience. I know that the China Phil and the

musicians and had that sense of excitement. You were saying again

another Proms debut orchestra, the Borusan Istanbul. They did, it's a

moment of what's it going to be like when we get there. They practised

tuning so that they felt that they would be behaving in the right way,

as it were. They were just - it was wonderful to be part of that. Then

the buzz back stage in the rehearsal going up to the concert, the volume

was going up and up and up. They were dying to get out there. It was

very, very special. We have a lot of really exciting new international

orchestras playing this season. My impression is that it's just opening

our eyes and ears to a whole new sound. It's fantastic. I'm sure that

in the future the focus of our Western music will be in the East.

Those people are learning the instruments, learning the music,

buying the CDs and loving the music and rediscovering it. So many people

in the West are jaded about their own tradition. People are excited

about it there. That's fantastic. Let me talk about the conductor a

little bit, who you're working with at the prom. Rarely have we seen a

more animated conductor on that podium and one of the critics wrote

that he thought he would get the best dad dancing prize of any

maestro this proms season. What an accolade. He's quite something. He's

amazing. His enthusiasm His exuberance is infectious. He's done

wonders with that orchestra. He's built them up. He takes an active

role in how they play, who plays there. He was instrumental in

getting them to the Proms. That was moment tore Muslim to get on the

stage and -- for him to get on the stage and loving it. Let's lock at

him in action now. -- look.

He has got some moves. He really has. He conducts with his cuffs as

well, which I love. That concert with Daniel and the Borusan Istanbul

Phil will be on August 31. Don?t forget on Proms Extra that

the Heath Quartet will be playing a piece by Sir Michael Tippett very

shortly, but first let?s turn to the graceful tones of Mozart?s

piano concerto in A major. You've played this concerto a couple

of times here at the Proms. Yes, many times I'm sure. Tell us what

you love about it. It's one of the most perfect of all the Mozart

concertos. There's a perfection to this one, I think, that is very

specially moving. And also a sunshine certainly to the first and

third movements. It's one of the most cloudless in a sense, of all

the Mozart concertos. Contrasted with the slow movement, one of the

most intensely sorrowful and moving movements. There's just this

wonderful grace, precision and yet, improvisation. You can see Mozart

making it up as he went along, when he was creating it, but the

proportions of it are so perfect and beautiful. It has amazing singing

lines. It has the grace of dance figures to it. You just have a jewel

of such perfection in your hands when you're playing this piece, that

it's astonishing to do that. Let?s take a glimpse at

Ingrid Fleeter on the piano, accompanied by the BBC Chorus

and Symphony Orchestra, performing Mozart's Piano Concerto in A major

as performed by the Argentinian You use the word "perfect" quite a

lot when talking about that work, which must be a weight on your

shoulders when performing it. You can't treat it like it's a porcelain

figure that's going to break in your hands. Mozart is tough, great things

that are meat in a perfect -- made in a perfect way are resilient. Have

you to throw yourself into it, in one sense, it's just that you're

aware all the time that underneath what you're doing there is a bigger

picture prove portion of architecture that's so beautiful. I

think the word "beauty" comes to mind so much when playing a work

like that. Is that the way you approach Mozart as well? Absolutely.

I always find the humour in Mozart is incredible. That's what makes him

so difficult to crack. You have total perfection and yet, you have

somebody who is so individual and so cheeky, at the same time. You get

elements of this, this brilliance that comes out. Yet, again, there's

distance there. So trying to penetrate that is something that I

think we all work at. He's always on my dream dinner party guest list. I

think he would be so interesting to meet. People refer to him as a

genius. Is that too strong a word? No. He is absolutely a genius, in

the same way as Bach and the consummate genius. I love the fact

that he has so many human elements, so many flaws as well. Read the

letters and you read the torment and again, the humour, the fun that he

had. The ups and downs and so many of the letters are about money and

about love and about - he was living life. His music is perfection, yet,

it has this human element. That's what makes it He was special. A bit

of a shambles. His personal life was crazy and chaotic. Totally. He was a

billiard champion. He loved to drink. Often we have these visions,

images of these composers and we know from their portraits and

untouchable. That's just not the case. Such an extraordinary figure

who spoke his mind and got into so much hot water with the authorities,

with the Archbishop. He was, again, ahead of his time. And yet, this

music that resonated out of him, which was just to die for. We now

have this cannon of his work and when he was alive he was known as an

improviser. Almost all composers were. They began their lives

improvising in their moment of creation. Yes, I think it's very

dangerous to have a sense of a cannon of the icon of these, the

portrait, because we have the wrong kind of reverence. Of course we want

to reverence Bach and Mozart. They are geniuses. They wouldn't like us

to feel they were untouchable. Mozart would have invited us for a

drink and I don't know what Bach would have done, involved us in a

fight perhaps! That's right. It's a balance. We need to have the right

kind of respect, but also, when we're playing a piece of music, for

that moment, it's ours. The composers no longer - at least those

two - are no longer with us. They're in our hands in a good and bad

sense. We have to have the confidence to play this music and to

believe in it and to, and not to handle it with kid gloves. You're

singing in the Requiem tomorrow night. How do you feel when you're

performing his work? Do you have a sense of reverence? Or do you feel

you can own the work? Absolutely, I think respect for the work of art

that you're performing is there, but I agree that the perfection should

be rather freeing and it can take it. My little interpretation or

something is not going to cause Mozart any trouble, I don't think.

The requiem tomorrow, that's one thing because it's a sacred piece

and we're working as a quartet of soloists, it's not my piece. It's

not my show. Whereas singing like the concert arias, you're more free

to do your own thing. It's more like a concerto and then you can be more

free. The vocal challenges are different. There's ridiculous leaps

from low to high and that's a whole different thing to singing the

Requiem. I always get a special tingle with the Requiem knowing that

it was the last piece of work he wrote and that he was almost writing

his own requiem. Do you feel that? Yes, of course. On Monday we are

doon the Taverner Requiem. There is something about this idea, this

composition. We look forward to that.

Now you've heard of Pick of the Week, Book of the Week,

Well, Proms Extra has Chord of the Week.

Today, David Owen Norris tinkles with the aforementioned

You might have missed the chord of the week there. It's a wolf in

sheep's clothing, this one. Not very Mozart with that grinding

dischord in the middle of it. This balances two contrasting principles,

grace and vigourment on the one hand, though it's a concerto in A

major, we hear a lot of D major. What we call the subdominant, like a

graceful bow. On the other hand, we've got the vigour of busy

repeated notes, nearly every theme has them. Mozart announces both

those principles of vigour and grace at the beginning. We have our

repeated notes in the base. And the graceful D major chord here already.

Now Mozart could have written this tune like this. Then there wouldn't

have been a dischord with his graceful D in the base. Instead he

chooses to repeat his melody note Ement -- E. But he wants to have his

cake and eat it, so he puts his graceful D in the base as well. It's

the collision of those two principles that produces this

arresting dischord, the chord of the week. It's an aural red flag from

Mozart to warn us that the next half hour is going to be a tug-of-war

between grace and vigour. The ever cordial David Owen Norris

will be back next week with We're almost at the end

of this week's show. What are you looking forward to next

week, after your own performances? Yes, well looking through the coming

week, there are loads of things that sound wonderful. Chopin pinot

concerto, I personally would love to -- piano concerto, I would love to

see Oedipus Rex. Why not. Absolutely. Stephen, what about you?

I'm going to Mark Wigglesworth. I think it was the first piano

concerto that I was part of. He's doing Elgar first symphony. I think

Elgar and the Albert Hall have a particular connection that is very

resonant for me. So I'm looking forward to that. It's tough. Vaughan

Williams, Talis Fantasia. I adore the Vaughan Williams. It's one of my

favourite pieces. It will be a special concert. Some excellent

advice. That's just some

of the highlights that Tomorrow night on BBC Four, I'll be

presenting a concert, one of many, that marks the 150th anniversary

celebration of Richard Strauss. A preview

of the Strauss concert which you can find on BBC Four tomorrow night

at 7pm, and you can watch Proms Radio 3 broadcasts every Prom live

and you can find this episode of Proms Extra

and all the works we feature in this programme in the Proms Extra

collection on the BBC iPlayer. And that's it for Proms Extra,

l?ll back next week with violinist Jansen, conductor Sakari Oramo

and the singer Sir Willard White. Plus all three guests will

be performing, l?m not going Many thanks to my guests tonight,

Carolyn Sampson, Playing the show out is

a group who will be appearing at the Proms on Monday night

in the world premiere of Tonight on Proms Extra they?re

performing a piece by one of the giants of British music,

a contemporary of Benjamin Britten,