BBC Proms announces 2024 programme
Thursday, April 25, 2024
The world's largest classical music festival returns to the Royal Albert Hall
The 2024 BBC Proms season at the Royal Albert Hall has been announced. Running from 19 July to 14 September, the festival will see performances from conductor Sir Simon Rattle, Daniel Barenboim and Yo Yo Ma with orchestras such as the Czech Philharmonic, Aurora Orchestra, Orchestre de Paris and Bach Collegium Japan.
The eight-week festival will also mark the anniversaries of Anton Bruckner, Gustav Holst and Ferruccio Busoni, Gabriel Fauré, Gustav Holst and Giacomo Puccini, as well as the 150th anniversary of Verdi’s Requiem, with a performance from Ryan Bancroft and the BBC National Orchestra of Wales and Chorus on 23 July.
Soloists will include Yo-Yo Ma, who performs with Leonidas Kavakos and Emanuel Ax, Jamie Barton, Sheku Kanneh-Mason, Patricia Kopatchinskaja, Yunchan Lim, Anthony McGill and Víkingur Ólafsson. Pop musicians Sam Smith and Florence and the Machine will each have their own Prom performances for the first time.
The First Night of the Proms will be conducted by Elim Chan, featuring soloists Isata Kanneh-Mason and Sophie Bevan, and a world premiere of Ben Nobuto’s Hallelujah Sim. The Last Night of the Proms will be conducted by Sakari Oramo, featuring pianist Sir Stephen Hough and soprano Angel Blue, who makes her BBC Proms debut.
The Proms will place a special focus on choral music and singing, with over 25 choirs appearing throughout the season. A three-concert Choral Day on 7 September will include performances from features The Sixteen, Jason Max Ferdinand and his Singers and Handel’s Messiah with soloists Nardus Williams, Helen Charlston, Benjamin Hulett and Ashley Riches.
Other choral highlights will include Britten’s War Requiem with the London Symphony Orchestra and its new Chief Conductor Sir Antonio Pappano. Bach Collegium Japan will perform Bach’s St John Passion on 19 August, and Janáček’s Glagolitic Mass on 28 August with the Czech Philharmonic Orchestra.
Glyndebourne Festival Opera returns to the Proms with a semi-staged performance of its new production of Carmen on 29 August, whilst Buckinghamshire-based Garsington Opera comes to the Proms for the first time, bringing its production of Britten’s Midsummer Nights Dream on 10 September.
The BBC Singers, celebrating their centenary in 2024, will perform in seven Proms including the First Night and the Last Night and in Eric Whitacre’s new piece Eternity in an Hour, on 4 September VOCES8 and the King’s Singers will combine forces for a Prom on 21 July.
