BBC Radio 3 trumpets the Proms as “the greatest classical music festival in the world”. In its 131st year since the series was started in the Queen's Hall by manager Robert Newman and the conductor Henry Wood, it is a claim hard to argue against. The BBC took over the management and the risk in 1927, when Newman could not continue, and moved concerts into the Royal Albert Hall after the Queen's Hall (ironically right next to Broadcasting House) was bombed in the Blitz.
These days, when the BBC is under severe political and financial pressure and the arts budget in England is stalled, the Proms are of enormous importance to the cultural fabric of the country. At two months the festival is not the longest – several in Europe last all summer – and there are others with a greater concentration of events. The Enescu Festival in Romania follows a similar pattern but only for one month every two years. The Utrecht Early Music Festival has a similar number of concerts from morning till night but is confined to the mediaeval, Renaissance and Baroque, and over only two weeks. So yes, the BBC Proms is still the greatest. It covers all genres of classical music and a few that are not (which I avoid, but that's my prejudice) from the middle of July till mid September, for standing ticket prices that exclude nobody.
