Plus ça change, plus c’est la même chose: Beethoven’s Ninth at the Proms. A regular annual fixture, for a long time it occupied the final Friday before the Last Night, the ultimate bit of seriousness before the buffoonery and good cheer with which to close the season. Here, it had been pulled forward to form the main work in this year’s fourth Prom night in sequence. Does it matter on which day of the week it is played? Or the time of day? How numerous the forces are? The size of the auditorium? With lashings of vibrato or lean and mean? A number of composers wrote nine symphonies, yet there is only one that has a legitimate claim to being called The Ninth. Because, as a piece of music, it is so unusual, so revolutionary in form, and has such an all-embracing message, all I ask is that the performers give their audience the conviction that this is a very special occasion.
That’s part of the problem: the expectations that critics and listeners have. How distinctive does the performance need to be? Nobody wants routine. How critical can a reaction be before it runs the risk of degenerating into mere nit-picking? To begin with an obvious point about all the Beethoven symphonies: they represent, in the words of the Latin tag Per ardua ad astra, a reaching out to the stars through struggle. On his return to the BBC Philharmonic Orchestra after a long absence, its former chief conductor Gianandrea Noseda had chosen one of the biggest tests any conductor can face.
There was not much sense of a struggle in the first movement. Not much awareness of two key markings, Allegro ma non troppo and un poco maestoso, either. Instead, I was reminded of a Prussian parade-ground, with soldiers strutting and long legs performing whiplash movements. For an Italian conductor, the complete absence of legato was worrying. To be sure, there was energy galore, and the character of being gruff and rough was suitably conveyed, though the very clipped phrasing suggested little more than military drill. Above all, I missed a true sense of mystery, of primeval beginnings emerging from a deep void, of tonality only slowly being established. At a technical level, the BBC Philharmonic played with commitment for their former boss, but the lower strings, shorn of their back desks, rarely provided a bedrock of sound on which the musical arguments could rest. Most of the dramatic highlighting came from elsewhere: Noseda frequently picked out horn and trumpet figurations, for instance. The coda, which should ideally strain to contain the forces within it, was dispatched with mere efficiency.
Noseda continued his emphasis on martial-like rhythms in the Scherzo, which often sounded like a succession of gunshot fire. There was no real surge of power from the strings and even the timpani’s contributions were less titanic than one might have wished. Noseda’s attention was directed more towards woodwind and brass, the role of the bass trombone being highlighted in the Trio section, which had a welcome and contrasting buoyancy to it.
Before the start of the slow movement, the four soloists took up their positions in the centre of the platform, just below the bust of Sir Henry Wood, flanked on either side by the hundred or so members of the Philharmonia Chorus on the highest risers. At just thirteen minutes, this Adagio molto definitely had cantabile character to it, yet the string textures failed to glow from within, while the briskness of the pacing never quite succeeded in unlocking a sense of repose and reflection. The composer Ernst Bloch once called this movement one of the “slow miracles of music”. On this occasion, that thought was far from my mind.
What Wagner called the Schreckensfanfare, the dissonant shriek of a terror fanfare which opens the Finale, should startle and unsettle, command immediate attention. Here, it was simply another element of detail. Equally, the “Janissary” variations in B flat major, just like the preceding bassoon farts, were glossed over.
All four soloists made a good impression, though in their final solo passage they were not entirely seamless. The American soprano Leah Hawkins, the British mezzo Stephanie Wake-Edwards, the German-Brazilian tenor Martin Muehle and the Australian bass-baritone Derek Welton made up a truly international quartet which was well-matched and both warm and generous in sound. Hawkins floated her high As and Bs with absolute security, Muehle’s lyrical intensity provided shafts of sunlight, and only in his opening peroration did Welton fail to make his mark in a suitably strong articulation of the final syllables of “freudenvollere”.
What of the chorus itself, which carries the full import of the Ode to Joy? The first entry of the Philharmonia Chorus was a little lacklustre, though they warmed up later. In unison passages they projected a rounded sound. It was in the detail that I found them wanting. Whether this was the fault of the chorus-master or the conductor is a moot point. When the tenors and basses call for one gigantic embrace in “Seid umschlungen, Millionen!”, these words should really stretch into every crack and crevice of an auditorium. Towards the end, “Ihr stürzt nieder, Millionen?” needed to have much more emphasis, and the repeated “Brüder” together with the final iteration of “Alle Menschen werden Brüder” had little of the beseeching, imploring quality that underlines the message of universality.
In some cases, Beethoven’s Choral is the stand-alone work. Finding something which is similar in mood, or just as revolutionary in approach, to occupy a first half is no mean task. I was less taken with the late Sir Andrew Davis’s arrangement of Bach’s Fantasia and Fugue in G minor, where the overriding impression was one of bellows being gradually expanded to maximum capacity only to give way to a slow release of air, though the tinkly contributions of the celesta provided a celestial touch.
Much more in tune with the soulfulness of Beethoven’s ideas was what amounted to a cello concerto by Jessie Montgomery, These Righteous Paths, here receiving its UK premiere in the presence of the composer. It benefited from the charismatic role assigned to the soloist, who in this instance was the South African Abel Selaocoe. His background as composer, solo performer and singer gave this work an extraordinary breadth of musical experience: short cadenzas, ostinato patterns, plaintive melodies, moments of desolation, adversity pitted against hope, hymn-like characteristics and mesmerising chants together with an astonishing range of vocalisations. Beethoven’s message of universality certainly came across in his improvisatory encore, dedicated to “a spirit of wellness”, in which there was space for audience participation.
Alexander Hall
Bach, Montgomery, Beethoven
J.S. Bach, orch. Andrew Davis – Fantasia and Fugue in G minor BWV 542; Jessie Montgomery – These Righteous Paths (BBC co-commission, UK premiere); Beethoven – Symphony No. 9 (Choral)
Abel Selaokoe (cello); Leah Hawkins (soprano); Stephanie Wake-Edwards (mezzo-soprano); Martin Muehle (tenor); Derek Welton (bass); Philharmonia Chorus (chorus-master Gavin Carr); BBC Philharmonic Orchestra, Gianandrea Noseda (conductor)
Royal Albert Hall, London, 20 July 2026
All photos © Chris Christodoulou
Facts Only
* The event is Beethoven’s Ninth at the Proms.
* It was pulled forward to form the main work in the fourth Prom night in sequence.
* The movement did not demonstrate much sense of struggle in the first movement.
* The first movement lacked awareness of the markings Allegro ma non troppo and un poco maestoso.
* The music displayed characteristics reminiscent of a Prussian parade-ground with whiplash movements in the first movement.
* The lower strings rarely provided a bedrock of sound for musical arguments.
* The Scherzo contained martial-like rhythms, sounding like gunfire.
* The Adagio much lacked repose and reflection despite its cantabile character.
* The chorus’s performance in the Finale required more emphasis on universal appeal.
* A cello concerto by Jessie Montgomery was presented as a superior embodiment of Beethoven’s ideas.
* Performers included Leah Hawkins, Stephanie Wake-Edwards, Martin Muehle, and Derek Welton for the solo quartet.
* The premiere took place at the Royal Albert Hall, London, on 20 July 2026.
Executive Summary
Full Take
The narrative navigates the tension between aesthetic expectation—the demand for revolutionary performance of a monumental work—and objective musical analysis. The critique shifts from judging surface-level execution (e.g., military precision in the first movement) to interrogating the fulfillment of the work's philosophical weight (the message of struggle and universality). This reflects a persistent cultural pattern where artistic artifacts are judged not just by their fidelity to structure but by their capacity to deliver prescribed emotional or intellectual resonance. The text implicitly questions the tyranny of expectation: if one accepts that perfection is elusive, what ethical responsibility remains for the performer? The ultimate move toward an alternative perspective, exemplified by the cello concerto, suggests a pattern where genuine expression may reside in methods that bypass conventional formal constraints—such as improvisation and personal experience—to achieve broader thematic congruence. The underlying implication is a critique of institutionalized seriousness and the performance of historical narrative, suggesting that value resides more in the dynamic interplay between artistic intent and audience reception than in rigid adherence to established ceremonial structures.
BRIDGE QUESTIONS:
If the emphasis shifts from objective sonic fidelity to subjective resonance, where should the locus of authority—the composer's intent, the critic's interpretation, or the audience's experience—reside in evaluating monumental works? What are the long-term consequences for musical performance when the demands of historical context conflict with contemporary expressive goals? How can institutions foster an environment where rigorous critique acknowledges the legitimacy of divergent aesthetic pathways outside established formalism?
Sentinel — Human
This text reads as an experienced, passionate musical critique, demonstrating complex subjective evaluation layered over factual observation rather than synthetic generation.