Even if it doesn’t really seem like one, this year’s Proms marks the beginning of a new era for what styles itself as the world’s biggest classical music festival. Though Sam Jackson took over as controller of BBC Radio 3 and director of the Proms two years ago, the 2023 and 2024 programmes were essentially planned under the aegis of his predecessor as Proms supremo David Pickard. So the coming season is the first for which Jackson has been responsible, though he is keen to emphasise that organising a festival on the scale of the Proms is a team effort, and that though his name is the one that appears on the introduction to the printed guide, he is just one among several who have put the season together – a season of 72 concerts in the Royal Albert Hall, together with weekend residencies and concerts in Belfast, Bradford, Bristol, Gateshead and Sunderland.
Certainly the alterations that have been made to the eight weeks of concerts so far seem more matters of subtle degree than radical shifts in emphasis. There have been fears that the changes that have already been inflicted on Radio 3 during Jackson’s tenure might be mirrored in his first Proms. These include the tendency to play single movements rather than complete works, while avoiding any details such as opus and catalogue numbers that might be construed as off-puttingly musicological, as well as the launch of Radio 3 Unwind, devoted to music to “restore calm”. Such worries are quickly allayed though by a glance at the programmes, which contain as much serious, challenging music, both old and new, as ever. And whether deliberate or not, the choice of repertoire and the artists performing it this year suggest that attempts to ensure that every politically correct box has been ticked seem far less strenuous and contrived than they sometimes have in previous years.
