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BBC Proms: 2016

BBC Proms: 2016: Prom 47: Ulster Orchestra and Rafael Payare

Performances & Events

Prom 47: Ulster Orchestra and Rafael Payare

21/08/2016

2016

BBC Radio 3 - BBC Proms, 2016, Prom 47: Ulster Orchestra and Rafael Payare

Ulster Orchestra under Rafael Payare in music by Piers Hellawell, Haydn and Tchaikovsky.

Rafael Payare conducts the Ulster Orchestra. Piers Hellawell: Wild Flow (world premiere). Haydn: Cello Concerto No 1 (soloist: Narek Hakhnazaryan). Tchaikovsky: Symphony No 5.

Live at BBC Proms: Prom 47: The Ulster Orchestra and Rafael Payare play Haydn and Tchaikovsky, and a new piece by Belfast-based composer Piers Hellawell.

Live from the Royal Albert Hall, London

Presented by Andrew McGregor.

Piers Hellawell: Wild Flow (BBC commission: world premiere)
Haydn: Cello Concerto No 1 in C major 

4.40 Proms Interval: The Dreamwalker
30 years after he was held hostage in Beirut, Brian Keenan reveals how 17th-century harper Turlough Carolan offered him salvation during the darkest days of his incarceration. 

5.00 Tchaikovsky: Symphony No 5 in E minor 

Narek Hakhnazaryan, cello
Ulster Orchestra 
Rafael Payare, conductor

In the late 1880s Tchaikovsky felt momentarily freed from the catastrophes that were haunting his private life and carving a tragic path through his career. His Fifth Symphony, which was taking shape on his desk, appears to ease the composer's own suffering. Light floods its textures; hopeful melodies invade its dark corners.
Venezuelan conductor Rafael Payare makes his Proms debut with his Ulster Orchestra to perform this most radiant of Tchaikovsky's symphonies, bringing with him Haydn's delightfully perky C major Cello Concerto and a brand-new work by Piers Hellawell.


PROMS INTERVAL: The Dreamwalker
When Brian Keenan was freed from the isolated, blacked-out cell where he had been held hostage for four-and-a-half years in Beirut - he was determined to pay a debt of honour to a mysterious musician who had befriended him in his solitude.

Turlough Carolan - a 17th-century harper and pivotal figure in Irish musical history - had come to offer Keenan salvation during the bleakest days of his incarceration. 

Like Keenan in his cell, Carolan lived in darkness. Blinded by smallpox as a child, he had come to show him how he might roam free in the vivid world of his imagination. Keenan began to piece together what little fragments of Carolan's story he knew - how Carolan had travelled through Ireland as an itinerant harper, just as Christianity took hold. Keenan's dream-like visions of Carolan began to have a healing effect.

Then came Brian Keenan's release in August 1990. But Carolan wasn't finished with him. Unlikely coincidences, signs... and then a letter from an Innuit woman, insisting that Carolan was a 'dreamwalker' who had visited Keenan for a reason. 

30 years on from his release, Brian Keenan now shares that reason with us. 

Producer: Owen McFaddenLive at BBC Proms: Prom 47: The Ulster Orchestra and Rafael Payare play Haydn and Tchaikovsky, and a new piece by Belfast-based composer Piers Hellawell.

Live from the Royal Albert Hall, London

Presented by Andrew McGregor.

Piers Hellawell: Wild Flow (BBC commission: world premiere)
Haydn: Cello Concerto No 1 in C major 

4.40 Proms Interval: The Dreamwalker
30 years after he was held hostage in Beirut, Brian Keenan reveals how 17th-century harper Turlough Carolan offered him salvation during the darkest days of his incarceration. 

5.00 Tchaikovsky: Symphony No 5 in E minor 

Narek Hakhnazaryan, cello
Ulster Orchestra 
Rafael Payare, conductor

In the late 1880s Tchaikovsky felt momentarily freed from the catastrophes that were haunting his private life and carving a tragic path through his career. His Fifth Symphony, which was taking shape on his desk, appears to ease the composer's own suffering. Light floods its textures; hopeful melodies invade its dark corners.
Venezuelan conductor Rafael Payare makes his Proms debut with his Ulster Orchestra to perform this most radiant of Tchaikovsky's symphonies, bringing with him Haydn's delightfully perky C major Cello Concerto and a brand-new work by Piers Hellawell.


PROMS INTERVAL: The Dreamwalker
When Brian Keenan was freed from the isolated, blacked-out cell where he had been held hostage for four-and-a-half years in Beirut - he was determined to pay a debt of honour to a mysterious musician who had befriended him in his solitude.

Turlough O'Carolan - a 17th-century harper and pivotal figure in Irish musical history - had come to offer Keenan salvation during the bleakest days of his incarceration. 

Like Keenan in his cell, O'Carolan lived in darkness. Blinded by smallpox as a child, he had come to show him how he might roam free in the vivid world of his imagination. Keenan began to piece together what little fragments of O'Carolan's story he knew - how O'Carolan had travelled through Ireland as an itinerant harper, just as Christianity took hold. Keenan's dream-like visions of O'Carolan began to have a healing effect.

Then came Brian Keenan's release in August 1990. But O'Carolan wasn't finished with him. Unlikely coincidences, signs... and then a letter from an Innuit woman, insisting that O'Carolan was a 'dreamwalker' who had visited Keenan for a reason. 

30 years on from his release, Brian Keenan now shares that reason with us. 

Producer: Owen McFadden.

Live music and the arts: broadcasts more live music than any other radio network. Classical music is its core. Genres include world and new music, jazz, speech and drama.

All broadcasts from the 122nd season of the BBC Proms

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