TV Times

This summer I managed to make just one of this years record breaking Proms concert season which had audiences of over 300,000 for the first time. I heard the BBC Philharmonia play Schubert and Mozart symphonies as well as a new work by Robin Holloway, a 'reharmonisation' of Schumann songs entitled 'Reliquary: Scenes from the Life of Mary, Queen of Scots'. I must admit to being a bit doubtful about the latter but was actually blown away by the achingly beautiful song cycle. I should have known better as I have often before enjoyed clever Proms programmes of new commissions combined with popular pieces. So although I only attended one concert, together with over 12 million others in Britain, I watched more on TV as the BBC broadcast more concerts than ever before. To quote Michael Henderson of The Spectator, together with the Chamber Proms at Cadogan Hall and the pre-concert talks at the next-door Royal College of Music, the Proms "amount to nothing less than an Open University course, with the tuition fees paid". Not quite for free though, as we do contribute via the licence fee. The BBC subsidises the Proms to the tune of (ha, ha!) £5million. With threatened cuts to the licence fee from 2012, I wonder how the Proms will be affected.
Meanwhile, the BBC recently announced another TV watching statistic, that 93% of live TV watching still takes place in the living room. So despite the rise of catch-up or on-demand viewing taking place on laptops or on TVs around other rooms in the house, we still all want to be together to share dramatic moments of news, sports and 'X Factor' finals. It seems that tribal instincts still compel us to gather together for broadcasts of reality events. Yet whilst I believe that the presentation of the Proms on the TV this year was better than ever before, you can't beat actually being there. I wouldn't describe my own experiences there as ever being tribal but communal listening in a packed Albert Hall is always such a thrill.