Prom: Beethoven’s Ninth, 21 July 2026
BBC Philharmonic Orchestra
Philharmonia Chorus
Conductor: Gianandrea Noseda
Royal Albert Hall
It’s a pleasant change to attend a traditionally shaped concert (quasi overture, concerto and symphony) without any clumsy attempt to forge links between the three works. It’s also good to time travel from from the early 18th century to 2026 via early 19th century.
The late, much missed Sir Andrew Davis – a familiar face at the Proms – shared Stokowski’s delight in orchestrating organ works by JS Bach. This arrangement of Fantasia and Fugue in G Minor BWV 542 was written in the final months of Sir Andrew’s life (he died in 2024) and this was its first Proms performance.
It came with strings which actually sound like an organ and the tinkling celeste added an attractive percussive element. Gianandrea Noseda balanced the sound so that we got plenty of tender grandiloquence in the opening statements and delicate playing in the fugue with especially pleasing bassoon work. And the tuba entry just before the end was a fine moment.
Jessie Montgomery’s These Righteous Paths, inspired by her late mother’s poems and plays, is essentially a cello concerto with voice. This performance was its UK premiere. She discussed it at some length with Tom Service on Radio 3’s Music Matters two days before the concert which was helpful.
Abel Selacoe is a remarkable, highly charismatic, performer whose cello playing is electrifying and his singing mellifluous and arresting. In the first movement his voice becomes another instrument in the texture. As the piece progresses his voice diversifies, becoming gravelly against the muted tuba at one point. He incorporates throat singing and circular breathing and produces some fascinating sounds. There’s a passage in which he sounds like a didgeridoo, and we sense that this was definitely a fusion of African tradition with Western classical music. The piece is both moving and compelling. Sadly it won’t get many outings or go mainstream because there are few performers on the circuit who can play cello and sing in this in this way.
His encore was quite something too. Addressing the Royal Albert Hall audience comfortably and audibly he announced that he wanted to play something which was about them rather than him. The Spirit of Wellness started with solo cello until he added his voice and brought in lower strings playing a soft pizzicato vamp. Then he encouraged the audience to sing a four note pedal motif, over which he wove a melody, and it was all very haunting especially when he directed it to taper away to silence.
After the interval came the title work we were all waiting for and a very fine performance of Beethoven’s, still startling, last symphony it was too. Of course we’ve all heard it hundreds of times before – one of my favourite memories is several times seeing Malcom Sargent conduct it at the Proms on the penultimate night when I was a teenager.
Yet, Noseda managed to pack it with so much drama and colour that it was like experiencing it for the first time. And he achieved this largely by building tension not with absurd tempi but through exquisite dynamic control. The opening, for example, came as pianissimo as I’ve ever heard it and it quivered with tension. “Now sits expectation in the air” as Shakespeare might have put it.
I loved the long, sustained crescendi in the second movement. Even the famous repeated timp tattoo came more subtly than usual. Full marks too for the delicate woodwind work in the quasi-trio section.
The soloists moved into position immediately before the third movement – sitting behind the orchestra in the centre of the choir just south of the organ and Sir Henry Wood. I admired the unshowy lyricism of the playing in the Adagio, especially the melody introduced by second violins. Noseda is very good at ensuring that no detail goes unnoticed and he brought plenty of tight tenderness to this movement.
The opening to the fourth movement, as the choir stands and expectation rachets up another notch, was slightly hesitant but soon settled. The cellos injected plenty of warmth at the beginning and, again, it was all driven by dynamics as we progressed through what is effectively a rousing set of variations. The Philharmonia Chorus was in fine fettle – raising the roof in fortissimo sections and almost whispering in contrasting passages. Aurally placing the soloists in the centre worked well on the whole. Leah Hawkins’s soprano rang out but Derek Walton’s bass seemed understated especially at his dramatic first “Freude” entry.
Overall, though, the symphony was a spectacular climax to a richly varied concert.
