I've filled in the Forum calendar with listings for this summer's Proms, and also 14 of the 15 Edinburgh Festival concerts that will be broadcast on Radio 3 this summer. It's not quite a 100% complete job (maybe 97%, in terms of overall content), as exact music selection details on some Proms & EIF concerts are missing, for example, especially the crossover Late Night Proms. But it's certainly enough to start for now, and anyone can just jump ahead in the Calendar to July, August or September to have a look.
As in past years, it's not a simple copy and paste job, but perhaps rather more in the nature of BSP's 'riff' on the Proms and EIF roster. This is for a number of reasons, not least of which is the presence of a number of errors in the online BBC Proms listings (which don't seem to be the case in the hard copy version, per maestro267's comment in the other thread), in addition to BSP's inherent tendency to make life difficult for himself, all the more ironic given how little traffic the R3 calendar gets during The Proms (at a guess). That aside. some comments on each:
(A) Proms: in general, I kept my format in the same style as last year. Instances include:
1. For the most part, a blank line in the music listings indicates the interval. Exceptions are in one or two of the PCM's at Cadogan Hall, where I put some blank lines between composers in a few cases to aid visual presentation, where a group of short works by a single composer is performed in succession.
2. Hyperlinks to the BBC Proms' own listings for each Prom are included, as standard.
3. One small change from last year is that I've included the hyperlink to the TV schedule for each of the Proms that is televised.
Places where I deviate from the BBC Proms' versions, some of which are in keeping with last year's practice, are that:
4. I don't generally include running times for works, out of personal idiosyncracy (same as last year).
5. I corrected obvious errors and omissions, such as missing singers in the Verdi Requiem in Prom 74, the missing Kristina in The Makropoulos Case, the missing Don Basilio in The Barber of Seville, and one missing presenter for the Ten Pieces Proms. I based the corrections on information from the Royal Albert Hall's on-line entries for each RAH Prom, since I obviously don't have a hard copy of the season book. In fact, in gratitude to the RAH for their 'help' to me, I expressed my thanks in my way, on each Prom listing at the RAH. (You might be able to guess how.) I also suspect that the BBC Proms' on-line listing mistakes will eventually be corrected, in due course, however long that takes.
6. I include "Proms debut artist" and "Proms debut ensemble" where appropriate. There seem to be rather fewer here this year compared to past years, but a few rather prestigious surprises in the former this summer, one especially in the last week.
7. Likewise, after cross-checking with the Proms archive, I've put "first performance at The Proms" next to such works where appropriate, in cases where it is not a world, UK, or London premiere. Again, somewhat fewer surprises here compared to last year (well, one Haydn symphony, for example).
8. For a few Proms, I've given my own personal name that is not the BBC's official name for that Prom. Thus the Gewandhaus Orchestra's Prom becomes "Beethoven Night", the Budapest Festival Orchestra's Prom "Mozart Night", and the John Wilson Orchestra's Prom "Gershwin Night". Again, my titles there are by no means 'official' titles with any sort of sanction from the BBC or the RAH, but just my personal quirk.
9. For the "Proms at..." series, I've included links where available to the external venue's sites. (I haven't done this for the PCM's at Cadogan Hall yet, as I'm not sure now whether to go with the RAH's links or wait for Cadogan Hall itself to do their own, unless they don't do their own.)
10. Other personal whimsies include putting in both the librettist and the composer for the operas in concert (in 2 cases, it's the same person for both duties, so just one name there), or using the original language titles of 2 operas (not the same 2 as earlier in this sentence) ahead of the English titles. (You'll have to look in the Calendar for those. Virtual brownie points to anyone who bothers to look.) Also, for the NYOGB Prom, I gave Colin Matthews' Pluto, the Renewer its own separate line as a programmed work, rather than presenting it as "rolled into" the end of Holst's The Planets, even though CM's work will obviously be performed attacca from "Neptune, the Mystic". This was more out of respect to Colin Matthews rather than indicating that actual presentation of it as truly "separate".
(B) Edinburgh: things are a bit quirkier here and there this year compared to last year, on a very granular level.
1. What's the same is that 15 Queen's Hall concerts at 11 AM are scheduled for broadcast in August. As before, not all of them will be live. This year, 3 will be delayed relays (Australian CO, Magdalena Kozena, Danish String Quartet). I've noted in the ACO and Kozena relays both the dates of the original concert and the date of the R3 relay. These are entered in the calendar under their date of relay. The Danish SQ's concert is not yet scheduled for relay, and it is the last of the 15 chronologically.
2. There are some overall weekly differences from the past:
(a) In the 1st week of EIF relays, there is no Thursday concert (Simon Keenlyside's classical/jazz mix concert), but rather a Saturday concert with Danielle De Niese, the first Saturday at 11 AM EIF relay that I can ever recall.
(b) Likewise, the next Monday, there is no relay of the Monday August 16 concert (Emerson String Quartet), so that week, the EIF relays don't start until that Tuesday. The 3rd week is the only standard week of relays M-F @ 11 AM.
3. The EIF concert programs don't show the intervals, so I've guessed those out of the blue. (At least 1/3 of the guesses will probably be wrong.)
4. This year, where the EIF summary material mentions that the artist or ensemble is making their EIF debut, I've added "EIF debut artist" or "EIF debut ensemble" where appropriate.
Of course, the usual caveats apply:
(A) With me correcting the BBC on-line errors here, my own changes run the risk of introducing new errors of my own to replace old errors of others. So any errors on the Forum calendar entries for the Proms and EIF are truly my own, and not the BBC's or the EIF's. Any errors that I find down the line, I'll correct.
(B) Inevitably, artist cancellations and program changes will occur (although last year, there were very, very few of either, that I recall). I can monitor off and on from here on and make changes as needed. Because historically, I tend to hear about the changes late, the Forum calendar tends to be the last of the different calendar listings to get changed (and probably gets the least on-line traffic, if anyone has the Google Analytics data).
Anyway, happy reading, for those very few of you who do read the Forum Calendar
.....
As in past years, it's not a simple copy and paste job, but perhaps rather more in the nature of BSP's 'riff' on the Proms and EIF roster. This is for a number of reasons, not least of which is the presence of a number of errors in the online BBC Proms listings (which don't seem to be the case in the hard copy version, per maestro267's comment in the other thread), in addition to BSP's inherent tendency to make life difficult for himself, all the more ironic given how little traffic the R3 calendar gets during The Proms (at a guess). That aside. some comments on each:
(A) Proms: in general, I kept my format in the same style as last year. Instances include:
1. For the most part, a blank line in the music listings indicates the interval. Exceptions are in one or two of the PCM's at Cadogan Hall, where I put some blank lines between composers in a few cases to aid visual presentation, where a group of short works by a single composer is performed in succession.
2. Hyperlinks to the BBC Proms' own listings for each Prom are included, as standard.
3. One small change from last year is that I've included the hyperlink to the TV schedule for each of the Proms that is televised.
Places where I deviate from the BBC Proms' versions, some of which are in keeping with last year's practice, are that:
4. I don't generally include running times for works, out of personal idiosyncracy (same as last year).
5. I corrected obvious errors and omissions, such as missing singers in the Verdi Requiem in Prom 74, the missing Kristina in The Makropoulos Case, the missing Don Basilio in The Barber of Seville, and one missing presenter for the Ten Pieces Proms. I based the corrections on information from the Royal Albert Hall's on-line entries for each RAH Prom, since I obviously don't have a hard copy of the season book. In fact, in gratitude to the RAH for their 'help' to me, I expressed my thanks in my way, on each Prom listing at the RAH. (You might be able to guess how.) I also suspect that the BBC Proms' on-line listing mistakes will eventually be corrected, in due course, however long that takes.
6. I include "Proms debut artist" and "Proms debut ensemble" where appropriate. There seem to be rather fewer here this year compared to past years, but a few rather prestigious surprises in the former this summer, one especially in the last week.
7. Likewise, after cross-checking with the Proms archive, I've put "first performance at The Proms" next to such works where appropriate, in cases where it is not a world, UK, or London premiere. Again, somewhat fewer surprises here compared to last year (well, one Haydn symphony, for example).
8. For a few Proms, I've given my own personal name that is not the BBC's official name for that Prom. Thus the Gewandhaus Orchestra's Prom becomes "Beethoven Night", the Budapest Festival Orchestra's Prom "Mozart Night", and the John Wilson Orchestra's Prom "Gershwin Night". Again, my titles there are by no means 'official' titles with any sort of sanction from the BBC or the RAH, but just my personal quirk.
9. For the "Proms at..." series, I've included links where available to the external venue's sites. (I haven't done this for the PCM's at Cadogan Hall yet, as I'm not sure now whether to go with the RAH's links or wait for Cadogan Hall itself to do their own, unless they don't do their own.)
10. Other personal whimsies include putting in both the librettist and the composer for the operas in concert (in 2 cases, it's the same person for both duties, so just one name there), or using the original language titles of 2 operas (not the same 2 as earlier in this sentence) ahead of the English titles. (You'll have to look in the Calendar for those. Virtual brownie points to anyone who bothers to look.) Also, for the NYOGB Prom, I gave Colin Matthews' Pluto, the Renewer its own separate line as a programmed work, rather than presenting it as "rolled into" the end of Holst's The Planets, even though CM's work will obviously be performed attacca from "Neptune, the Mystic". This was more out of respect to Colin Matthews rather than indicating that actual presentation of it as truly "separate".
(B) Edinburgh: things are a bit quirkier here and there this year compared to last year, on a very granular level.
1. What's the same is that 15 Queen's Hall concerts at 11 AM are scheduled for broadcast in August. As before, not all of them will be live. This year, 3 will be delayed relays (Australian CO, Magdalena Kozena, Danish String Quartet). I've noted in the ACO and Kozena relays both the dates of the original concert and the date of the R3 relay. These are entered in the calendar under their date of relay. The Danish SQ's concert is not yet scheduled for relay, and it is the last of the 15 chronologically.
2. There are some overall weekly differences from the past:
(a) In the 1st week of EIF relays, there is no Thursday concert (Simon Keenlyside's classical/jazz mix concert), but rather a Saturday concert with Danielle De Niese, the first Saturday at 11 AM EIF relay that I can ever recall.
(b) Likewise, the next Monday, there is no relay of the Monday August 16 concert (Emerson String Quartet), so that week, the EIF relays don't start until that Tuesday. The 3rd week is the only standard week of relays M-F @ 11 AM.
3. The EIF concert programs don't show the intervals, so I've guessed those out of the blue. (At least 1/3 of the guesses will probably be wrong.)
4. This year, where the EIF summary material mentions that the artist or ensemble is making their EIF debut, I've added "EIF debut artist" or "EIF debut ensemble" where appropriate.
Of course, the usual caveats apply:
(A) With me correcting the BBC on-line errors here, my own changes run the risk of introducing new errors of my own to replace old errors of others. So any errors on the Forum calendar entries for the Proms and EIF are truly my own, and not the BBC's or the EIF's. Any errors that I find down the line, I'll correct.
(B) Inevitably, artist cancellations and program changes will occur (although last year, there were very, very few of either, that I recall). I can monitor off and on from here on and make changes as needed. Because historically, I tend to hear about the changes late, the Forum calendar tends to be the last of the different calendar listings to get changed (and probably gets the least on-line traffic, if anyone has the Google Analytics data).
Anyway, happy reading, for those very few of you who do read the Forum Calendar
.....
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