Prom 16: Sea Sketches with Andrew Manze and BBC NOW (27.07.22)

[Eine Alpensinfonie]

19:30 Wednesday 27 July 2022 ON TV
Royal Albert Hall

Doreen Carwithen: Bishop Rock
Grace Williams: Sea Sketches
Ralph Vaughan Williams: A Sea Symphony


Elizabeth Llewellyn (soprano)
Jacques Imbrailo (baritone)
BBC National Orchestra and Chorus of Wales
BBC Symphony Chorus
Andrew Manze (conductor)

‘Behold, the sea itself!’ Vaughan Williams’s A Sea Symphony takes the poetry of Walt Whitman and opens the floodgates to a spring tide of inspiration. Andrew Manze’s Vaughan Williams recordings have been praised for their ‘rare sensitivity and warmth’, and in the composer’s 150th-anniversary year, A Sea Symphony gets the deluxe treatment from two of the BBC’s great symphonic choruses, plus the operatic voices of soloists Elizabeth Llewellyn and Andrew Foster-Williams. But the concert opens the way Vaughan Williams would have wanted: with a surging musical seascape from his Welsh pupil Grace Williams, and an equally nautical opener by Doreen Carwithen, composed in 1952 and receiving its first Proms performance in this, her centenary year.

[Eine Alpensinfonie]

I know the VW Sea Symphony isn't everyone's cup of tea, but from the movement I first heard it, I've been in love with the expansive settings of Walt Whitman's poems, and how it all gels together as a symphony. I just wish I could attend a live performance.

[Nick Armstrong]

I know the VW Sea Symphony isn't everyone's cup of tea, but from the movement I first heard it, I've been in love with the expansive settings of Walt Whitman's poems, and how it all gels together as a symphony. I just wish I could attend a live performance.

Also love it, and finding that the diary’s clear tomorrow evening, I’ve just picked up an ideally-placed stalls seat for this. Lots of empty seats still…

[Ein Heldenleben]

Also love it, and finding that the diary’s clear tomorrow evening, I’ve just picked up an ideally-placed stalls seat for this. Lots of empty seats still…

I get the impression that seat sales haven’t been that good this year. Hot weather ? Cost of living crisis?

[cloughie]

I thought when I saw a piece by Doreen Trewithen called ‘Bishop Rock’ I thought there must be a Cornish or Scilly connection but wiki doen’t point to any and she was born in Buckinghamshire! I could have misled cryptic solvers wonderfully on the old AA thread! Whatever happened to the rest of that merry crew that used to take part!

[Ein Heldenleben]

I thought when I saw a piece by Doreen Trewithen called ‘Bishop Rock’ I thought there must be a Cornish or Scilly connection but wiki doen’t point to any and she was born in Buckinghamshire! I could have misled cryptic solvers wonderfully on the old AA thread! Whatever happened to the rest of that merry crew that used to take part!

I think you’ve changed the Car to Tre though Carwithen is a Cornish surname I think as well.

[Simon B]

I get the impression that seat sales haven’t been that good this year. Hot weather ? Cost of living crisis?

Unprecedented disaster would be nearer the mark. Stormin' Normin' Lebrecht has been thundering about it on his blog thingy - on this occasion the observable evidence broadly backs him up. Figures of 25% sales across the season are mentioned.

A most telling example is the 2nd Berlin PO/Petrenko Prom which still has acres of unsold seats at the time of writing https://tickets.royalalberthall.com/...formance/76384.

In recent years Rattle/BPO could have put on a concert melding Faroese sheep herding music with orchestral arrangements of Einstürzende Neubauten*'s greatest demolitions and still filled the place.

*For those unfamiliar, the rough translation of this band's moniker is "Collapsing New Buildings" which is as good an evocation of their sound world of as you're likely to get.

Punters seem to be being highly selective. Some of the obvious "events" have ultimately sold out as expected - Verdi Requiem, Mahler 2 & 7, Gerontius, The Planets, but otherwise... Not good, and (curiously?) much worse than last year according to my anecdata.

[Nick Armstrong]

Hot weather ? Cost of living crisis ?

I must say that the fact it’s coolish today and predicted to be similar tomorrow was in my mind when making a spur-of-the-moment decision to buy a ticket.

But I was slightly taken aback at the price of a stalls seat: the change from 50 quid probably won’t even buy a half-pint at the interval (Someone will tell me they’ve always been that sort of price but I don’t remember a seat being that expensive)*

*There is a fee plus an “optional covid recovery levy” of £1.50 included

[Ein Heldenleben]

Unprecedented disaster would be nearer the mark. Stormin' Normin' Lebrecht has been thundering about it on his blog thingy - on this occasion the observable evidence broadly backs him up. Figures of 25% sales across the season are mentioned.

A most telling example is the 2nd Berlin PO/Petrenko Prom which still has acres of unsold seats at the time of writing https://tickets.royalalberthall.com/...formance/76384.

In recent years Rattle/BPO could have put on a concert melding Faroese sheep herding music with orchestral arrangements of Einstürzende Neubauten*'s greatest demolitions and still filled the place.

*For those unfamiliar, the rough translation of this band's moniker is "Collapsing New Buildings" which is as good an evocation of their sound world of as you're likely to get.

Punters seem to be being highly selective. Some of the obvious "events" have ultimately sold out as expected - Verdi Requiem, Mahler 2 & 7, Gerontius, The Planets, but otherwise... Not good, and (curiously?) much worse than last year according to my anecdata.

Interesting and reliable information. I saw the Lebrecht blog but he is a notorious catastrophizer.

[Ein Heldenleben]

I must say that the fact it’s coolish today and predicted to be similar tomorrow was in my mind when making a spur-of-the-moment decision to buy a ticket.

But I was slightly taken aback at the price of a stalls seat: the change from 50 quid probably won’t even buy a half-pint at the interval (Someone will tell me they’ve always been that sort of price but I don’t remember a seat being that expensive)*

*There is a fee plus an “optional covid recovery levy” of £1.50 included

I seem to remember (non international orchestra ) stalls seats about a third to the side ( ie second highest) were about £35 five years back which just about left enough change from £50 for a round of drinks at the (wickedly overpriced) bar.

[cloughie]

I think you’ve changed the Car to Tre though Carwithen is a Cornish surname I think as well.

Indeed I did Tre is Homestead and Car is Love!

I must have been thinking about the dairy which alongside Rodda’s is one of the local Cornish dairies having their milk processed in Lostwithiel!

[Ein Heldenleben]

Indeed I did Tre is Homestead and Car is Love!

I must have been thinking about the dairy which alongside Rodda’s is one of the local Cornish dairies having their milk processed in Lostwithiel!

Apparently Carwithen means castle in the woods ( looked it up)
I thought the dairy at Lostwithiel closed in the 90’s - maybe it’s partially reopened. Haven’t been through there for a few years.
I see Doreen was married to William Alwyn …

[Simon B]

I seem to remember (non international orchestra ) stalls seats about a third to the side ( ie second highest) were about £35 five years back which just about left enough change from £50 for a round of drinks at the (wickedly overpriced) bar.

In 2012 a Side Stalls seat for a concert in the lowest price band A (i.e. BBC Orchestra/RPO etc) was £25.48 inc fees.
In 2022, the equivalent is £32.64 inc fees.

That's 28% over 10 years, or 2.5% per annum. Not unreasonable.

However, a simple A:B comparison doesn't work because what has happened is that many more concerts have been pushed into higher price bands. There's an attempt at fine-grained "yield management" going on.

Consider the next few days:

26/7: BBCSO, Tchaik 4: £8.50-£42
27/7: BBCNOW, Sea Symphony: £9.50-£52
28/7: BBCSSO, Deutsches Requiem: £8.50-£42
29/7: BBCSSO, Shostakovich 5: £9.50-£52
30/7: Halle, Puccini Il Tabarro : £14-£62
...
24/8: LSO, Mahler 2: £18-£72
3/9: BPO, Mahler 7: £18-£72

Various noteworthy things going on there, not the least of which is charging the same for the LSO as the Berlin PO. Don't recall ever seeing that before.

[Nick Armstrong]

a round of drinks at the (wickedly overpriced) bar.

Might have to smuggle in me own tot o’rum, intrepid sailors and mates

[Ein Heldenleben]

In 2012 a Side Stalls seat for a concert in the lowest price band A (i.e. BBC Orchestra/RPO etc) was £25.48 inc fees.
In 2022, the equivalent is £32.64 inc fees.

That's 28% over 10 years, or 2.5% per annum. Not unreasonable.

However, a simple A:B comparison doesn't work because what has happened is that many more concerts have been pushed into higher price bands. There's an attempt at fine-grained "yield management" going on.

Consider the next few days:

26/7: BBCSO, Tchaik 4: £8.50-£42
27/7: BBCNOW, Sea Symphony: £9.50-£52
28/7: BBCSSO, Deutsches Requiem: £8.50-£42
29/7: BBCSSO, Shostakovich 5: £9.50-£52
30/7: Halle, Puccini Il Tabarro : £14-£62
...
24/8: LSO, Mahler 2: £18-£72
3/9: BPO, Mahler 7: £18-£72

Various noteworthy things going on there, not the least of which is charging the same for the LSO as the Berlin PO. Don't recall ever seeing that before.

Superb analysis - Thank you . Something similar has happened at the ROH where my favoured seats stalls E3 , E4 have been “upbanded “leaving only E1 and E2 as the (comparatively) cheapskate seats.