Prom 34: BBC Philharmonic and Juanjo Mena in Britten and Copland

Live at BBC Proms: The BBC Philharmonic and their Chief Conductor Juanjo Mena in music by Britten, Walton, Barber and Copland. They are joined by soprano Sally Matthews.

Live from the Royal Albert Hall, London, presented by Ian Skelly.

Walton: Overture 'Portsmouth Point'
Copland: Connotations
Britten: Les illuminations

8.15
Interval: Proms Plus
Film-maker and biographer Humphrey Burton and Britten scholar Heather Wiebe explore Aaron Copland's influence on Benjamin Britten and Leonard Bernstein and Britten's relationship with America, in conversation with Louise Fryer. Recorded earlier today at the Imperial College Union.

8.40
Barber: Antony and Cleopatra - Two scenes
Britten: Four Sea Interludes from 'Peter Grimes'

Sally Matthews (soprano)
BBC Philharmonic
Juanjo Mena (conductor)

In Bernstein's centenary year, Juanjo Mena and the BBC Philharmonic celebrate with a transatlantic Prom, uniting music by British and American composers connected not just by generation but in many cases personal friendship. Commissioned and premiered by Bernstein, Copland's Connotations is a portrait of "the tensions aspirations and drama inherent in the world today". Its knotty confrontations find contrast in the sensuous beauty of Britten's orchestral song-cycle Les illuminations, while the sea provides inspiration both for Walton's bustling, bonhomous Portsmouth Point overture and Britten's boldly dramatic Four Sea Interludes from his opera 'Peter Grimes'. Sally Matthews joins the orchestra for two extracts from Samuel Barber's opera Antony and Cleopatra which complete the programme.