Take Away English-The Proms 漫步音乐会（在线收听）

Classical Music For All 面向大众的古典音乐

Are you a fan of classical music? Then perhaps The Proms is for you. The Proms is a series of summer concerts which for the last 110 years has been presenting a wealth of classical music to large audiences at low prices. In fact the Proms, has become a British institution as loved and valued by the British public as Wimbledon or the Oxford and Cambridge boat race.

The Royal Albert Hall, home to the Proms concerts

The Proms first took place in 1895 and was the idea of Robert Newman, a concert hall manager in London . Hall had organised many concerts, but wanted to reach a wider audience by keeping prices low and offering popular programmes in a less formal environment. The informal atmosphere was encouraged by cheap tickets - one shilling (5p) for a single concert, or a guinea (￡1.05) for a season ticket .

His partner was the conductor Henry Wood who had just begun to make a name for himself . Wood and Newman wanted to introduce the public to a wider and wider range of music, and introduced new works each year. Wood also promoted young, talented performers and raised standards in orchestras, although this sometimes made him unpopular.

However, by 1927 The Proms were losing money. Fortunately the BBC decided to broadcast The Proms on the radio, reaching an even larger audience. The radio broadcasts were halted during the Second World War, although the live concerts continued until Wood died, aged 75, in 1944.

After the war the BBC started to broadcast The Proms once more, and it grew in popularity during the 1950s until by the 1960s it had become a major international festival .

Nowadays the Proms can be heard on radio and watched live on television. It is also interactive . Viewers of certain digital channels can e-mail their thoughts and questions to be used during the live broadcasts as well as receive programme notes to help them enjoy The Proms even more.

Although The Proms have changed enormously since Robert Newman and Henry Wood founded it in 1895, the concept has remained the same – to provide high quality classical music to a large audience for a low price, and long may it continue!