The BBC Proms Guide to Great Concertos

Description

The BBC Proms Guides provide all the background and information you need about some of the most exciting works in the repertory. As one of the world's leading music festivals, the BBC Proms has over the years published unrivalled, highly praised programme notes by today's leading writers on music.This volume provides an accessible guide to the some of the most familiar and best-loved concertos in the repertory. From Vivaldi's 'Four Seasons', through Mozart's glorious piano concertos and the great virtuoso display-pieces of the nineteenth century by Brahms, Tchaikovsky and many others, this volume brings us musically right up to date with the modern masterpieces of Prokofiev and Britten, Lutoslawski, Ligeti and John Tavener.The thrilling duel between soloist and orchestra which is at the heart of concerto form has remained constant through centuries of change and many different musical languages. If you want to know more about how the great concertos were written and what to listen out for as you encounter these remarkable pieces, this is the place to start.

Nicholas Kenyon has been Managing Director of the Barbican Centre since 2007. He was Director of the BBC Proms from 1996 to 2007, and Controller, BBC Radio 3, from 1992 to 1998. He read History at Balliol College, Oxford, and his first post was with the English Bach Festival 1973-6. He was a music critic for The New Yorker, The Times, and the Observer, and has written the history of the BBC Symphony Orchestra, the biography of Simon Rattle, edited the influential volume Authenticity and Early Music, and co-edited The Proms: A New History. He is a member of the boards of English National Opera and Sage Gateshead, a Trustee of Dartington Hall and a member of Arts Council England.