Prom 11 Simon Holt

Goethe's Colour Wheel in music ? that's one of the premises of Simon Holt's Troubled Light premiered tonight at the Proms. Holt is one of the big names in current British music so no surprise he's been named composer in residence for BBCNOW (National Orchestra of Wales) But "newly written" isn't the same as "new". Holt's five-part piece is way better than some previous Proms commissions (not Holt's) but the point is that The BBC and the Proms actively encourage living composers which is extremely important. In the long term better to hear lots of possibles than dismiss the new unheard.

Troubled Light certainly fulfils the purpose of its commission, in that it gives each member of the orchestra plenty to do and it's easy on the ear. It's ambitious and certainly busy. Perhaps, though it was not a good idea to sandwich it between two great masterpieces of "colour" in music Debussy's Nocturnes and Ravel's orchestration of Mussorgsky's Pictures at an Exhibition. In the second, the fanfare held the "pictures" together, putting the "pictures" in structured context. Nowadays composers don't have it quite so easy ! Nocturnes was ground breaking in its time, and it still gives me goosebumps ! Those wordless songs ! Sadly, nearly 100 years after Nocturnes, there are still nutters who think singing must be in plain text, or we "can't understand". So what hope is there ? Yet, only listen....