Welsh Proms begin with evocations of Englishness

Welsh Proms opening night, St David’s Hall, Cardiff

MUSIC is coming home to Wales with a festival of orchestral, jazz and folk delights at the Welsh Proms.

This opening concert featured the silky skills of the Welsh National Opera Orchestra with its inspirational leader David Adams playing a blinder, while singer Sian Cothi was on target with a cameo performance of technical skill and simple beauty.

Welsh Proms founder Owain Arwel Hughes was in charge of this concert of two halves, which met its goals of entertaining and inspiring the nearcapacity crowd.

The first half featured two quintessentially English works – The Lark Ascending, by Vaughan Williams, and the finale from Elgar’s Enigma Variations. Both pieces speak to a deep-rooted sense of “Englishness” and those blue remembered hills to which there is no return.

Yet they are also universal and fitting choices for a Welsh Prom which marked the centenary of the First World War.

David Adams, leader of the Welsh National Opera Orchestra, was the soloist in The Lark Ascending.

This was a gentle, thoughtful interpretation in which Adams was in perfect harmony with the orchestra and Owain Arwel Hughes.

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The second half was taken up with a magnificent performance of Sir Karl Jenkins’ The Armed Man which brought together the combined forces of the Welsh Proms Festival Chorus, Cardiff Ardwyn Singers, Cardiff Polyphonic Choir and the Llandaff Cathedral Choral Society.

It featured Ms Cothi and a man, uncredited in the programme, who made the Islamic call to prayer with gripping intensity.

There have been many memorable opening nights of the Welsh Proms over the years. This was one of the best.

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