Prom 1: First Night of the Proms: 14 July 2023

[Bryn]

delighted to see you here Alison

As is Nethersage.

[Alison]

Thanks guys.

Anton: football season soon :-)

Petrushka: Did you get my PM? Had a message saying your inbox was full.

Bryn: How different will DAB+ be?

[Bryn]

T . . .Bryn: How different will DAB+ be?

My guess is that while AAC (used by DAB+) is a far better lossy data compression method than mp2 (used by DAB), they are all too likely to simply reduce the data rate, if and when the BBC decide to adopt DAB+ and make the many DAB radios redundant in the process. The low audio data rates employed by BBC HD television (which uses AAC, rather than the mp2 uses for standard definition TV) would seem to support this view.

[Petrushka]

Petrushka: Did you get my PM? Had a message saying your inbox was full.

Yes, I did thanks, Alison. Not sure why it said my inbox was full as it wasn't!

[Cockney Sparrow]

Glad you reconsidered, Alison, and good to see you here.

It turned out to be a reasonably good concert, three crowd-pleasers, a rarity and a short new commission which somehow managed to hang together but didn't feel like a First Night to me. Very poor TV presentation from Myrie treating the viewers as if they were a class of six year olds to Toksvig and Lapwood laughing like a couple of schoolgirls. Dire.

Absolutely. Dire is the word. Has it been worse? (even in the Derham "face of the _ _ _ Proms" years). Not watching alone, I turn the sound down as much as I can get away with, and (as I do when watching the Channel 4 catchup service) read a magazine until the music starts.

[Alison]

Clive completely missed the applause for the BBC singers. You would think someone used to presenting news live would be better able to think on his feet.

[oddoneout]

Absolutely. Dire is the word. Has it been worse? (even in the Derham "face of the _ _ _ Proms" years). Not watching alone, I turn the sound down as much as I can get away with, and (as I do when watching the Channel 4 catchup service) read a magazine until the music starts.

Such a shame it has come to this. Time was when watching such concerts was added enjoyment - intelligent presenting and the chance to see the musicians at work, and their interactions.

[Ein Heldenleben]

Did any one else notice the misattributon of the Kissin excerpt played as a filler in the First Night interval on Radio Three ? Identified as a Chopin Mazurka it was clearly an arrangement of the Schubert F minor Moment Musicaux - I suspect by Rachmaninov as it had a few of his trademark harmonies. Difficult to understand how it happened as R3 must be full of pianists who learnt the original as a teenager.
Anyway Kissin played it very well….

[Petrushka]

Such a shame it has come to this. Time was when watching such concerts was added enjoyment - intelligent presenting and the chance to see the musicians at orkw, and their interactions.

The whole thing was just too embarrassing to watch. Camera direction etc was fine but the presentation was beyond belief awful. Anyone tuning in for the first time will have thought they'd mistakenly got some strange comedy deal. Myrie was a parody of a presenter and the giggling schoolgirls came from St Trinian's. Myrie, Toksvig and Lapwood are intelligent people who are more than capable of doing far, far better than this..

[Ein Heldenleben]

The whole thing was just too embarrassing to watch. Camera direction etc was fine but the presentation was beyond belief awful. Anyone tuning in for the first time will have thought they'd mistakenly got some strange comedy deal. Myrie was a parody of a presenter and the giggling schoolgirls came from St Trinian's. Myrie, Toksvig and Lapwood are intelligent people who are more than capable of doing far, far better than this..

I wonder if they were just responding to direction from the producer. I see (for those that take interest in these things ) that Clive also got himself in a Twitter spat over a slightly ill phrased tweet about crotchets and quavers.

[oddoneout]

The whole thing was just too embarrassing to watch. Camera direction etc was fine but the presentation was beyond belief awful. Anyone tuning in for the first time will have thought they'd mistakenly got some strange comedy deal. Myrie was a parody of a presenter and the giggling schoolgirls came from St Trinian's. Myrie, Toksvig and Lapwood are intelligent people who are more than capable of doing far, far better than this..

I wonder whose idea it was to do what sounds to have been a CBeebies version? Bit of a worry, in terms of R3, that Sam Jackson presumably was involved.

[oddoneout]

Just found this.

https://blog.thoroughlygood.me/2023/07/15/the-bbc-proms-first-night-tv-comes-good/

I didn't watch, so perhaps shouldn't say that I disagree with the author's views on the TV coverage, except that my decision not to watch was based on the way other concerts/music events that I have watched have been presented, and which I dislike, so factoring in the Proms hype I reckoned the First Night broadcast wouldn't be for me.
Other parts of the article raise important points, and also give me the chance to see what Myrie put in his twits that caused upset.

[Rolmill]

Just found this.

https://blog.thoroughlygood.me/2023/07/15/the-bbc-proms-first-night-tv-comes-good/

...Other parts of the article raise important points....

Not least this disturbing comment at the end:

"The talk amongst some BBC conductors I spoke to last week is that there are going to be some Quite Unpleasant Announcements to come about the BBC’s performing groups after the Last Night credits have rolled."

☹