1 The Greatest Happiness Principle
In contemporary music in Britain, second performances are always much harder to come by than premieres. It’s a problem that the PRS Foundation has set out to solve with its Resonate scheme, intended to promote performances of neglected British scores from the last 25 years. David Sawer’s athletic orchestral piece from 1997, inspired by the ideas of philosopher Jeremy Bentham, is a welcome beneficiary of the initiative; it’s performed by the BBC Philharmonic under Mark Wigglesworth in a concert that also includes Brahms’s first piano concerto, with Stephen Hough as the soloist.
Royal Albert Hall, SW7, 29 July
2 National Youth Orchestra of Great Britain
Thomas Adès conducts these NYO concerts, with a programme that makes no concessions to the age of the musicians. It includes the British premiere of the most ambitious orchestral work to date by Francisco Coll, his five-movement symphony Mural, as well as Adès’s own “voyage for orchestra” Polaris. There’s also The Rite of Spring, which will be a thrilling experience with an orchestra the size of NYO.
Snape Maltings Concert Hall, Snape, 3 August; Symphony Hall, Birmingham, 4 August
3 Vespers of 1610
Baroque choral works feature prominently in this week’s proms. The 450th anniversary of Monteverdi’s birth is marked by his Vespers of 1610, with the French period-instrument ensemble Pygmalion, while Tuesday sees William Christie conduct the 1739 version of Handel’s Israel in Egypt, and Wednesday has John Eliot Gardiner and the Monteverdi Choir offer a programme of Heinrich Schütz and JS Bach.
Royal Albert Hall, SW7, 31 July
