Alison has announced that this month’s Last Night of the Proms performance at London’s Royal Albert Hall will mark her grand finale as a concert trumpeter.
“I’ve been so lucky to play with some of the greatest orchestras in the world. The light hits them in a new way, and they feel different every time.”
Alison with the BBC Symphony Orchestra’s David Robertson at The Last Night of the Proms 2009. Photograph: BBC
She’s going out on a high, as part of the celebratory evening’s programme on September 13th, which will be broadcast live internationally on the World Service, and Euradio & EBU network.
The BBC Proms, and the Last Night of the Proms particularly, is a British cultural institution. It inspired her own journey as a musician when she was a child, watching on TV. “There is an indefinable atmosphere about the night,” she says.
The Proms series has kept pace with her career. Her first concerto at the Last Night of the Proms in 2009 (Haydn Trumpet Concerto in E flat) was a sign she had firmly become a household name.
Always pushing to expand the repertoire for the trumpet, she gave world premieres of new trumpet concertos at the Proms in both 2014 and 2015.
Read about Alison’s extraordinary career to date, and her plans for what comes next, in this Harper’s Bazaar exclusive interview.
This year, she has also drawn on her experience as a TV presenter, introducing programmes of Dvorak, Beethoven, and Mahler on the BBC.
As part of an all female lead line-up, she will perform for the second time at the Last Night of the Proms on Saturday September 13th. She’ll play another cornerstone of the repertoire, the Hummel Trumpet Concerto. She confesses that she loves the piece, which she recorded in 2008 and has been playing for her whole career.
“This chance to play the Hummel at the Last Night Of The Proms, it feels very final for me. I know what I want to say about this piece, but I don’t think I’m going to have anything more to say after this.”
For more details of Alison’s career and the point that she has now reached, listen back to the full interview with the BBC’s John Wilson on ‘This Cultural Life’ .
It’s partly because many of the classical “giants” never wrote for solo trumpet that finding new things to play is such a struggle. She’s been travelling and performing internationally for 24 years, and has released 17 albums, on an instrument so physical she likens playing it to being a professional tennis player!
No one could doubt Alison’s resilience and discipline, to have blazed such a dazzling trail in a tough profession, and with the trumpet formerly being a male preserve. She admits that one of the biggest tests of the last 15 years has been balancing her career with having children. She looks forward now to having more time with her family. She remains a passionate advocate for music education, and will be pursuing new creative projects - watch this space!
“I’ve followed my particular path very honestly and with authenticity, and I feel that I’ve come to the end of that path.”
Alison Balsom’s very special Last Night of the Proms performance will be live on British TV on 13th September on BBC Two and iPlayer, and streaming on BBC Radio 3 and the World Service, as well as on syndicated European radio stations.