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Quote of the Day: Rule, Britannia!
“I think it’s time we stopped our cringing embarrassment about our history, about our traditions, and about our culture, and we stopped this general bout of self-recrimination and wetness. I wanted to get that off my chest.”–Boris Johnson
Well, my dear Ricochet peeps, this is not the quote of the day post that I planned to lay on you when I went to bed last night. That one, a sweet little rumination on one of my favorite childhood authors, will have to wait.
Instead, I bring you heartening news from across the pond. News which concerns, of all things, that particular rite of British end-of-summer passage known as “The Last Night of the Proms.”
A bit of background: The Henry Wood Promenade Concerts (“the Proms”) are an annual series of classical summer concerts held at the Royal Albert Hall in London and broadcast by the BBC. The term ‘promenade’ is a throwback to the outdoor concerts of prior centuries, and here refers to the fact that the Hall, unusually, sells standing-room tickets for these concerts, so people are moving about much more than is typical at a classical music performance and the atmosphere is more relaxed than is usually the case at such events. That is particularly true each year on the “Last Night.”
The current series of promenade concerts traces its roots back to 1895 and the Queen’s Hall Orchestra conducted by 26-year old Henry Wood, funded by George Cathcart, a prominent London doctor, and managed by impresario Robert Newman. The concerts featuring accessible classical music and lower ticket prices than usual, proved popular and gained the then forty-two-year-old Henry Wood his knighthood in 1911.
The BBC took over the concert series in 1928, following Robert Newman’s death and the newly-formed BBC Symphony Orchestra took over the bulk of the performances. In 1947, Malcolm Sargent began his legendary career as Proms chief conductor, a position he held until 1966. He was the conductor of my childhood, the one I remember watching on Granny and Grandpa’s tiny black and white television with them when we were in the UK on the second Saturday in September, and the one I remember listening to on the old red short-wave transistor radio in Nigeria when we weren’t.
The Proms, as a series, remain popular still today, but “The Last Night of the Proms” has taken on a life of its own in popular culture and exists almost as a separate entity from the rest of the concerts. Its audience, both in-person in London and at associated “Proms in the Park” gatherings across the United Kingdom, is enormous. Its program, which was developed and set during Malcolm Sargent’s tenure, is lighter and more accessible even than the regular concert series, and is peppered with patriotic music and song, including “Pomp and Circumstance March #1” (Elgar), “Rule, Britannia” (Arne), “Jerusalem” (Parry), and the national anthem. The first contains, as part of its score, the music for which the words of the song “Land of Hope and Glory” were written. The second needs no explanation. The third is the music written for William Blake’s poem. And the national anthem is what it’s been since before 1831 when a man from the former Massachusetts Bay Colony stole the melody and put the words of “America: My Country ‘Tis of Thee” to it.
Well.
I’m sure, by now, that you’re beginning to spot the worm at the core of the apple, the serpent in the garden, the fly in the ointment. That which makes it impossible, in these woke times, for “The Last Night of the Proms” to continue any longer in its current form and content.
Patriotic. Songs.
The BBC (click here if you’d like to learn more about the very active, and increasingly popular, grass-roots campaign to “Defund the BBC”), in the audience-less age of Covid-19 and under real or imagined pressure from the social justice Left, has announced that this year’s “Last Night” although it will still feature “Rule, Britannia” and “Land of Hope and Glory,” will do so without lyrics. For once, even The Guardian sees through the charade:
The traditional flag-waving anthems Rule Britannia and Land of Hope of Glory could be dropped from the Last Night of the Proms because of their perceived links with colonialism and slavery.
The BBC is reportedly considering whether to axe the patriotic staples in the wake of the Black Lives Matter protests, and the Covid restrictions are seen as an opportunity to make the change.
In the immortal words of Rahm Emmanuel, “never let a good crisis go to waste.”
Although the BBC backed off its initial announcement that the songs would likely be dropped–probably a trial balloon–the subsequent announcement that they would just not be sung has not sat well with the Great British Public. Or, apparently, with its Prime Minister. (To give you an idea of the affection in which these traditions are held, and the enthusiasm, good humor, and spirit of fun in which they take place, here’s “Rule, Britannia,” from the 2011 Last Night. Trigger warning: The song contains two words “rule,” and “slaves” which are about to consign it to the ash-heap of history. Hide your children, stiffen your spines, and consider yourselves warned):
Enter, Stage Right, the actor Laurence Fox. And a lady and national icon I’ve written about here many times before.
And . . . it’s done.
Two months after her death at the age of 103, Dame Vera Lynn has once again topped the British music download charts and will, one supposes, have to be played on the BBC, on this upcoming weekend’s pops countdown program.
From the Telegraph:
Land of Hope and Glory has been propelled to the top of the charts by campaigners amid a growing backlash against the BBC’s choice of music for the Last Night of the Proms.
The corporation was accused of “panicking” about race after announcing that only orchestral versions of the rousing patriotic anthems would be performed at next month’s event.
As Lord Hall, the BBC’s outgoing director-general, admitted they had considered ditching the songs because of their association with Britain’s imperial history, almost 25,000 people signed a petition demanding they be saved.
Laurence Fox, the outspoken actor, led calls for the licence fee to be scrapped while Alok Sharma, the business secretary, urged the BBC to show subtitles amid a mounting campaign for a living room sing-along.
Here, apparently, is where the rot started:
The decision to buck tradition and reinvent the finale of the Proms season began when Finnish conductor Dalia Stasevska, who is conducting the Last Night, and David Pickard, the BBC Proms director, discussed changing the repertoire to reflect the international debates about racism.
No idea who “Dalia Stasevska” is, but perhaps she needs to start her own series of concerts somewhere else and stop ordering the British about. From the Guardian article linked above: “‘Dalia is a big supporter of Black Lives Matter and thinks a ceremony without an audience is the perfect moment to bring change,’ a BBC source told the Sunday Times.”
My native country disagrees.
Well done, Laurence Fox, Boris Johnson, and the late, great, Dame Vera Lynn.
Here she is:
Dad would be so proud. Somewhere, he’s applauding from the wings.
Gagara Yasin. (Loose translation: “Back atcha, BBC!”)
Published in General
“Give us the downbeat then get out of the way, Maestro.”
Q: What is the difference between an orchestra and a freight train?
A: A freight train needs a conductor.
Sweet She,
Here it is. Take it to the Proms.
Regards,
Jim
My last British car was manufactured in 1971, and surprisingly better than the last year they made the TR6 in 1976. The switch gear and electrical could in fact be made worst than what Lucas put in my 1965 TR4, and the 1971 TR6.
Socialism killed the British Auto Manufacturing.
Me, too. I’d only add that as long as they’re changing the lyrics to Imagine, perhaps they should have a go at changing the tune (to the extent it could be said to have a tune).
That’s Elgar, for cryin’ out loud! Leave it be. Leave it all be.
For a second I thought you meant Imagine was Elgar, and that I really had fallen down a rabbit hole.
I read that before and got it right, then I messed up. Sorry Suspira. They can dump the tune to Imagine too.
I do like both songs, and acknowledge our debt to Britain, birthplace of free government.
As an disagreeable Yank, I note that Britannia has not ruled the waves, even in part, since around 1943. And the 20-30 years before that was debatable, and even then, only because we Yanks were hoping not to have to spend all that money.
A good start. Unfortunately, things do downhill from here.
Glory be. Read comment #29.
Perhaps you and Ms. Stasevska could go out for a nice bowl of riisipuuro topped with luumuskiisseli *sometime. 😂
*Rice porridge topped with cold prune soup
I will put that on my reading list. Thanks for the recommendation.
I read that too. It is very good.
That’s okay. I’m not entirely sure we’re still the Land of the Free.
Quibble: Britain has precious little culture. England has culture. Scotland has culture. Wales has culture. Northern Ireland has culture. Cornwall has culture. Yorkshire has culture. One might even argue that London has culture. Britain, however, is a political institution rather than a cultural one.
But it grows on you after awhile.
Mis,
I don’t think you are being completely fair.
Regards,
Jim
Puzzled. Prior to your comment, I see only two references to “culture” on the thread. One was Boris’s reference to “cringing embarrassment about our traditions, our history and our culture” and the other was my own about how the “Last Night of the Proms” has taken on a life of its own in “popular culture.”
I’m not sure what you’re quibbling with. Because it seems pretty clear to me that it’s quite reasonable to posit a sense of British (i.e. Western) culture in the context that Boris is using the term, without picking it apart too much. And the term “popular culture” isn’t really nationally specific, but just refers to, well, what’s popular in any given culture. (And TLNOTP is popular pretty much across the board.)
If you’re saying that, largely, British culture is English culture, then I could mostly agree with that. After all, much of the griping in the annals of the perpetually aggrieved, from Scotland to Ireland, to Wales, to Australia, to India (and even, perhaps to Canada itself 😱) is that assimilation into the United Kingdom, or the “British Empire,” or the Commonwealth required the adoption of English values which were sometimes fiercely resisted by the native population or which, in some cases, the native population was trying to get away from in the first place.
But I don’t think that’s what BoJo actually meant.
The Scots still have their own customs. Burns suppers, St. Andrew’s Day, bagpipe music, the Highland Fling, sword dances, raiding Northumberland … okay, maybe they’ve given that last one a rest for now.
Indeed. But once you have established (even if only through conquest, political machination, or even economic and … err … cultural … domination) a polymorphous empire of some sort, are you, at any point, entitled to describe the overarching conceit of it as a culture? Is there a “United States” culture–I’m avoiding the phrase “American culture” for perhaps obvious reasons–or do the cultures belong only to its component peoples?
As for the customs you list above, many of them have been appropriated by the English, the Welsh and the Irish. And the reverse is true in countless cases.
Do “customs,” or national boundaries define a culture? Or is it something at a deeper level and perhaps more far-reaching?
This is a marvelous book, sent to me a couple of years ago by my sister (who’s a bit of an agitator, but who actually does live in Scotland, on the Isle of Skye), describing a bit of very non-PC cultural appropriation on the part of manly Scottish men who’ve taken up the practice of yoga.
Not messing in any part of the foregoing.
Here’s an article describing the generally-held view of the triggering that occurs when non-Indian “cultures” attempt yoga, and the conclusions and indignation that that the indigenous practitioners reach and feel when they see such things:
So, the fact that the Scots can drone (see what I did there) on ad nauseam about how badly done by they’ve been done by over the centuries by the English (Culloden, Highland Clearances, William Wallace, etc.), doesn’t win them any points, or insulate them from this sort of criticism.
From this old granny’s point of view, though, the truly illuminating thing about this book (and I think it’s the only book I have that I’ve hidden from my granddaughter) is that it does, once and for all, on the last page, answer the question of “What does a Scotsman wear under his kilt?”
There used to be. Parents and teachers used to instill it in their children/students. Some still do. History is only a part of what’s missing, but it is a significant part. I was reciting for young relatives recently:
… and I realized “oh, hell … it’s true.”
They hadn’t heard of Paul Revere, his ride, Lexington and Concord, any of it. When I was the age of the oldest of them, I knew that Revere was arrested halfway through his ride, that Billy Dawes evaded the British, but couldn’t get through to Concord and doubled back to Lexington, and that only Dr. Samuel Prescott made it through to alert the Concord militia. Instead of westerns and other historical dramas, today we have “reality” TV, a reality I both deride and reject. The “must see” movies are reduced to comic book characters. Old movies, once a staple of television, have been ensconced behind streaming paywalls. Since they know nothing of where we’ve been, however will they develop a vision of where we should be going?
Stealing from the Danes, are they? Well, fair is fair enough. There was a time when the Danes were doing a bit of stealing around Scotland.
I’m sure @therightnurse will be here shortly now that you’re bringing up scantily-clad men in kilts.
You know I can scoop her with my own kilt wearing, Bond villain cat petting images, but…. I will spare the non PIT eyes.
In that video, there is a 6th reason for a conductor. At the end of a held cord, the conductor indicates when to stop.
What is the difference between chimpanzees and conductors?
Science has shown that chimpanzees are capable of communicating with human beings.
What’s the difference between a bull and an orchestra?
On a bull, the horns are in front, and the ass is in back.
This is up there with the modeling walk off in Zoolander. You musicians take 10 steps, turn, and fire when ready. Thanks for the laughs.