The annual Proms Season has been announced!
An amazing itinerary (as ever) - everything from Rachmaninov to Rufus Wainright to Radiohead, Mozart to Mahler to Lata Mangheshkar, Bach to Berlioz to Dee Dee Bridgewater, and much much more besides, over 71 concerts from 14th July to 9th September, and apart from the Royal Albert Hall, in venues up and down the country. Wow.
And people knock the BBC licence fee, which pays for it all (mostly refunded by ticket sales, of course)!
By way of a celebration, here's a remarkably talented lady, indeed. Performing herself at Prom #28, South Africa's finest Miss Masabane Cecilia Rangwanasha (for it is she) is not yet 30 years old - yet has a set of pipes on her that would make many a seasoned diva envious!
Here she is, celebrating another of London's grandest music venues the Royal Opera House, at the time it reopened for live performances after the pandemic:
Simply too, too divine.
Love Tannhäuser, love her voice, love the Proms and love the BBC. 'when' it does what it is meant to do.
ReplyDeleteThe choice of this aria to reopen the Royal Opera House after the pandemic was pure genius.
'I greet you once again,
Beloved hall
I found no happiness here
once his songs of passion had gone
My heart leaps with joy,
You will stand proud and noble again'
It is inspired! Masabane Cecilia is going places with a voice like that! Jx
DeletePS Love the Proms and love the BBC, too. What other organisation could provide us with David Attenborough's Wild Isles, the Eurovision Song Contest and three whole months of classical concerts all in one year, despite funding cuts?!
I'm properly terrified of the BBC not existing, my main problem with it is it's essentially funded by a flat tax, with the rich and the poor paying the same, but I can't think of a way of altering that.
ReplyDeleteAs the government has basically washed its hands of our national broadcaster and cut its funding, the Beeb wouldn't have the resources needed to manage a "means-tested" or "tiered" licence fee system. Jx
DeleteIt'd be damaging. The worst thing that could happen would be for the Beeb to end up as a state broadcaster like RT or AlJazeera. Funding it directly through the treasury would most likely do that
ReplyDeletePlus, it's not as if HMRC is a wonderful progressive organisation that is always fair to the poor.