'Subsidising' the Proms?

[NickWraight]

During the run of the Proms there are very few other "Classical" concerts in London as compared to the rest of the year. It could be argued that during the Summer there are more people in London (UK residents on holiday, foreign visitors) and therefore the series fills a significant gap. You could also, of course, argue the reverse that more UK residents are on holiday and therefore do not require the Proms -audience sizes seem to put the lie to that one.

There are more Summer (I use the word broadly!) UK music festivals but how many in and around London major on the orchestral repertoire? Yes, there is the "official "Edinburgh Festival" but that is broadly based on most artforms and not just the orchestral repertoire and itself is heavily subsidised by the City Council and commercial sponsorship. All paid for at the bottom of the chain by you and I!

The BBC licence fee is always a hot topic and increasingly high up the Governmental agenda mainly because they have little control of how that particular "tax" is used. Advertising pays for Commercial broadcasting and who might I ask ends up paying for that - as always the general public through the the price paid for products and services. If the Public wants something they will pay for it one way or another.

One rumour currently doing the rounds is that the 2013 season will be crunch time for the Proms when you would imagine the only real savings could be made with the length of the season being severely cut. However, if the Proms are relatively cheap broadcasting there would need to be large savings elsewhere (orchestras; Radio/TV channel(s) and associated staff support etc) to make any real economic sense.

Should this line be taken the accusations of cultural vandalism on the UK's and London's music life as well as the BBC would be huge. Surely the reactions to the Radio 6 and World Service debacles show what could happen?!

[aeolium]

The loss of say 2 weeks off the Proms season would not have a huge impact on London concert life. After all, London has probably more orchestral concerts than other parts of the country put together, going right through the year. We are talking about a rebalancing so that there could be more R3 coverage of other UK festivals including Edinburgh. I can't believe there would be a significant impact on costs if this happened. Why on earth would it be cultural vandalism to broadcast Edinburgh Festival concerts rather than the Proms, unless one has a uniquely London-centric view of the musical universe?

Would we really think now, if we were not constrained by the long tradition, that an eight-week long festival of concerts in a large old Victorian hall would provide the best vehicle for R3 broadcasts between mid-July and mid-September every year?

[Lee McLernon]

I can't believe there would be a significant impact on costs if this happened.

Well, for a start, there the fixed cost of placing the OB team and query whether that OB team would need to move around venues in Edinburgh, thus increasing the cost further. Then there's the fact the BBC has no control over the programme/artists and there could be cost implications as a result of broadcast rights, particularly as the artists would have the upper hand in negotiations. In the past the Beeb has not been afraid to say no to orchestras who want too large a broadcast fee to play at the Proms.

[aeolium]

R3 already do broadcast some concerts from the EIF, so they would have a team there. The EIF main festival combines chamber music, piano and song recitals, orchestral and opera. EIF chamber music concerts would presumably be cheaper to record and broadcast than the large scale orchestral performances in the Proms.

But as I said, the issue is not principally about cost - it's about quality and diversity.

[barber olly]

...And the hugely, extravagantly expensive Radio 3 has an annual budget of £37.3m whereas cheapo Radio 2's budget is now £46.7m (what do they spend it on?).

Maybe their employment of, often sub-standard, Celebrity Presenters accounts for some of this!

[NickWraight]

The BBC is having to cut costs in the near future by a significant amount due to various factors including the Licence Fee pitiable increases; general economic climate and the extra expenditure it is having to taken on at the wish of the Government.

EIF concerts are indeed broadcast on the Radio but not on TV and presumably by BBC Scotland who I'm sure could TV some events providing extra budget could be found - unlikely at present I feel.

Quality and diversity does exist on Radio 3 not perhaps in areas of the country, venues or the repertoire on which everyone agrees but personal prejudices are not what it is about. London-centric perhaps (the largest city with a huge catchment area of residents and visitors) but I know of no other suitable (pace 'aeolium' and many other peoples' view of the Kensington Drum) UK venue which could take the Proms and receive audiences of the same size. To fill a space twice the audience capacity of the RFH for a significant number of nights is no mean feat which draws in much income to start to cover expenditure and balance the books. It would be interesting to see a set of Proms Accounts but I doubt if that exists.

The BBC Proms (Henry Wood's name vanished years ago) are here to stay largely in the same format with perhaps a change to the balance and make-up of the events and the season length.

As to 'aeoliums' interpretaion of cultural vandalism, I was not just referring to cutting the Proms season as very little savings, if any, would be made with that alone. In order to make major savings orchestras would need to be cut along with a radio and tv channel or two and that is what the BBC must achieve. The headline grabbing high salary earners, and expense claimers, are an easy soft target (pandering to the tabloid media prejudices and the general public's jealousy - if they can have it why can't I?) but the BBC are in the general market place for the field and have to act accordingly.

[aeolium]

The BBC Proms (Henry Wood's name vanished years ago) are here to stay largely in the same format with perhaps a change to the balance and make-up of the events and the season length.

NickWraight, I suspect you're right at least in the short term, but I think it's a pity. I hope that, as concert halls start to consider their own direct-to-internet broadcasting (as some are now doing) there will be sufficient diversity provided in that way.

Btw, I apologise for misunderstanding your reference to 'cultural vandalism' - I thought you were referring just to cutting the Proms season, but reading what you wrote again I see that you were talking about more savage cuts including potentially orchestras, and on that I am in agreement with you. On the other hand, radio still remains incredibly cheap in comparison with TV, and generally is of higher quality. There are surely savings that could be made in the latter which would have much less damaging impact, not just the obvious reduction in excessive executive and celebrity salaries, but also on things like having 500 or so staff being flown to Beijing to cover the Olympics, newscasters flown out to the scene of a major news story even though a specialist correspondent is already there, documentaries where the presenter is pointlessly flown to many different parts of the world etc. The BBC in the last couple of decades (at least up to 2009) got into the habit of spending money lavishly in a way it never used to previously, not least because its revenue was increasing by above inflation every year.

[NickWraight]

True enough "aeolium" and a period of re-balancing is always a good idea: minds get concentrated on what is actually the business of an organisation. The BBC has rather spread its wings into areas it should not have on the pretence of raising income and losing sight of its core and what it should be doing is broadcasting in its various modern guises. Would I include the plethora of websites? Possibly only those of an informative nature that support programming as well as digital broadcast platforms.

Personally, there is no broadcasting facility that approaches attendance at a live event but I willingly appreciate many do not have that opportunity, or the funds, to do so. The growing net broadcast, both "live" and "recorded", is another threat to the BBC's output in someways but might be better looked at as being diverse.