On 8 August 2025, Josep Pons returned to the BBC Proms to conduct the BBC Symphony Orchestra at London’s Royal Albert Hall. The programme brought together three works of exceptional orchestral colour and theatrical intensity: Paul Dukas’s La Péri, Sergei Rachmaninov’s Rhapsody on a Theme of Paganini, featuring pianist Beatrice Rana, and Béla Bartók’s The Miraculous Mandarin, with the participation of the BBC Singers.
The concert opened with La Péri, a poème dansé first performed in 1912 and one of Dukas’s most refined orchestral scores. From its celebrated opening fanfare, the work unfolds a world of mystery, sensuality and luminous orchestral colour. Conducting the BBC Symphony Orchestra, Josep Pons highlighted the suppleness of its phrasing, the delicacy of the woodwind writing and the breadth of the strings.
Beatrice Rana joined the orchestra for Rachmaninov’s Rhapsody on a Theme of Paganini. Built as a sequence of twenty-four variations, the work combines virtuosity, lyricism and wit while setting Paganini’s famous theme against the medieval Dies irae. The close understanding between soloist, conductor and orchestra allowed the music’s contrasts to emerge naturally, from its most brilliant episodes to the intimacy of the celebrated eighteenth variation.
The programme culminated in the complete concert suite from The Miraculous Mandarin, one of Bartók’s most radical and intensely theatrical creations. Obsessive rhythms, violent harmonies and highly complex orchestration evoke a brutal and dehumanised urban world, while the wordless contribution of the BBC Singers heightened the disturbing atmosphere of the final pages.
British critics praised Josep Pons’s ability to give coherence to such a demanding programme. Reviews highlighted the richness and flexibility of La Péri, the balance between piano and orchestra in Rachmaninov and the structural control with which he shaped the changing metres, recurring motifs and successive dramatic episodes of The Miraculous Mandarin.
The BBC Symphony Orchestra’s response confirmed the long-standing artistic understanding between conductor and ensemble. Broadcast live on BBC Radio 3, the performance marked another appearance by Josep Pons at a festival to which he has returned regularly throughout his career and became one of the major international events of his summer season.