well, sexy

Music I felt rather disconnected from the Last Night of the Proms tonight having spent the past month missing everything. I just simply failed to be excited by some of the programming for a few weeks at the beginning of August, didn't listen for a stretch and then got out of the habit. I felt ... as though I hadn't earned it, like one of those people who don't go to anything else but manage to grab a ticket for last night through the morning clearing service. There's no doubt though that it's rekindled my appreciation and I'm very thankful that I still record all of the televised concerts and I'll be able to catch up on at least some of the things I've missed.

I've not heard Beethoven's Fantasia in C minor for piano, chorus and orchestra, 'Choral Fantasy' before and as suggested by the very ill at ease Clive Anderson (who seemed to spend most of the broadcast with the same look in his eye as he gave Barry Gibb when the Bee Gee walked off the set of his chatshow) I could see the similarities with the 9th, almost a synopsis for the longer piece. Coincidentally his Piano Concerto 4's just truned up on my mp3 player and I can't think of anything that man composed that I don't like.

Special mention has to be made for Anna Meredith's froms, which could have been a rerun of the Harrison Birtwhistle/Panic incident, but because of its ambition, spreading the sound across the various sites simultaneously was clearly the best non-tradition moment of the night, just fascinating. The interview between Meredith and Suzy Klien was fun too, entirely knocking down the expectation that composers can be stuffy and rather over serious when talking about their music. Anna was as excited as you'd hope she'd be to hear how the piece turned out and well, sexy. If that's not the kind of thing which is going to drag me back to classical music, nothing is.