Prom 10: Public Service Broadcasting - 25.07.19

[Eine Alpensinfonie]

22:15 Thursday 25 July 2019
Royal Albert Hall


The Race for Space

Public Service Broadcasting
The Multi-Story Orchestra
Christopher Stark conductor

Cult London band Public Service Broadcasting makes its Proms debut in a special Late Night Prom to mark the 50th anniversary of the first manned mission to the Moon.
The electronics/instrumental outfit is joined by The Multi-Story Orchestra to perform an orchestral arrangement of their 2015 studio album The Race for Space.
Blending both acoustic and electronic performance and archive audio samples, the album explores the highs and lows of the US–Soviet space race of the 1960s, and is heard here for the first time in this specially commissioned new version.

[Eine Alpensinfonie]

I'm afraid it's the reading scheme presenter who may end up putting people off this potentially interesting concert.

[underthecountertenor]

I'm afraid it's the reading scheme presenter who may end up putting people off this potentially interesting concert.

Do you mean the BBC4 presenter? Cerys Matthews, fluent in English, Welsh, French and Spanish, and an admirer of Yeats and Dylan Thomas?
If so, that’s quite some reading scheme.

[underthecountertenor]

Ah - now I’ve looked at the Radio 3 credits, I now think you may have been referring to our Liz.

[bluestateprommer]

From this side of the pond, the BBC4 discussion clearly doesn't apply. That aside, given that I was totally unfamiliar with this group and thus their album, this Prom struck me as an exercise in "chill" listening, in mood if not always volume. The musicians did well, even if this was a kind of "one and done" experience for me. Very gracious words from the group at the end, it must be said, in praise of the BBC and their presentation of The Proms.