Sunday 20 July 2025 at 7:30pm - 11:30pm

Ravel's Piano Concerto

Royal Albert Hall

BBC Proms presents: Ravel’s Piano Concerto for the Left Hand

All swagger, originality and ‘orgiastic power’, one of the great 20th-century symphonies, Walton’s Symphony No. 1, put the composer on the map – as the heir to both Elgar and Sibelius.

Ravel’s jazz-infused, darkly atmospheric Piano Concerto for the Left Hand also breaks new ground: only one hand plays, though the ear hears all the richness of two. Nicholas McCarthy – the world’s only professional one-handed concert pianist – makes his Proms debut.

The Bournemouth Symphony Orchestra opens its first Prom under new Chief Conductor Mark Wigglesworth with Shostakovich’s jovial Suite for Variety Orchestra, packed with tunes from the composer’s music for ballet, theatre and cinema.

Broadcast on BBC Four and BBC iPlayer

Programme

Shostakovich, arr. Atovmyan Suite for Variety Orchestra 22’ 

Ravel Piano Concerto for the Left Hand 19’

Interval

Walton Symphony No. 1 in B flat minor 43’

Nicholas McCarthy piano 

Bournemouth Symphony Orchestra

Mark Wigglesworth conductor