It was with a palpable sense of relief last night that we welcomed the return of one of the eternal highlights of our "Social Calendar" - its final denouement, indeed - the Last Night of the Proms, in front of a (traditionally "rowdy") live audience again [and in the 150th anniversary year of Royal Albert Hall, no less]! The Madam and I, despite being on our own at home (not even a Zoom meet-up, as was the case with last year's "cut-down version"), grabbed our Union Jacks and cleared our voices for the traditional sing-along...
For once, there wasn't too much dross to sit through in the run-up to the finale, thank goodness [of course we only joined it in part 2, after the interval], as it opened with the jolly Juba Dance by Florence Price.
The duo of Tango numbers (Piazzolla's Libertango and Aníbal Troilo's Sur) featuring the rising star accordionist Ksenija Sidorova was actually rather brilliant [no footage our there yet; thanks BBC!]. The round-the-UK folk song segment, not so much.
Apart from the marvellous BBC Symphony Orchestra, the BBC Singers and the genial conductor Sakari Oramo, the real star of the show, however, was Australian "James Corden looky-likey" tenor Stuart Skelton. He had already tackled Wagner in the first half, and in the second not only sang the traditional Brigg Fair (as arranged by Percy Grainger) and the aforementioned Tango elegy Sur, but also performed a sentimental version of Peter Allen's I Still Call Australia Home - wearing a sequinned shirt in tribute to the uber-camp singer-songwriter [see here] (who was, of course, immortalised by the lovely Hugh Jackman in the musical The Boy from Oz).
That done, the "fun bit" began - starting with the customary opener, Sir Henry Wood's Fantasia on British Sea-Songs, with the audience all bobbing along to the shanties and doing the "fake dabbing-of-the-eyes" for "There's No Place Like Home" (Tom Bowling), before Mr Skelton returned to the stage, this time in full Aussie cricket gear, for the rousing Rule, Britannia!
We'd hardly put our flags down for a swig of booze, and we were off again, singing along with gusto to the "National-Anthem-in-all-but-name" Edward Elgar's Land of Hope and Glory:
After Sakari Oramo's heartfelt speech, highlighting the devastating impact the pandemic had had upon the lives and livelihoods of musicians and singers over the past year, as well as the traditional "three cheers" to the founder of the Proms Sir Henry, we headed to the finale, with that other magnificent sing-along number Hubert Parry's Jerusalem:
And, with The National Anthem and the closing Auld Lang Syne, that was it for another year...
Utterly wonderful - and a tradition that should be preserved against "the slings and arrows" of hand-wringing "wokeness", self-delusional Europhiles and the rest!
Read about this year's Last Night of the Proms in detail, song by song, courtesy of the BBC.
