Highclere proms bring out the best of English patriotism

Until very recently, public displays of patriotism were rare amongst the English.  Something seemed to
change last year, when the Jubilee and the Olympics combined to make flag waving cool.   The mood has continued this summer with the new royal baby, surprising sporting victories and remarkably sunny weather.

But, as I was explaining to my visiting American friend Christine, this is new and rare.  Not long ago there was only one reliable place to see English people in patriotic celebration:  a proms concert.

We were having this conversation walking along a line of flag-decked gazebos ringing the edge of the packed field at the Highclere Battle Proms.  More flags fluttered above the thousands on picnic blankets stretching away to the stage, as they happily donned red, white and blue and lifted Union Jack print paper products out of their hampers.  Proms concerts have always been a festival of national joy, but these days they're edging a bit over the top.

Just what is a proms concert?  For the benefit of my American readers ... the BBC has been running a series of classical concerts at the Royal Albert Hall every summer for 119 years.  The last night of this series, about which I've written before, ends with a stirring round of flag-waving tunes.  At some point in the slightly more recent past, owners of stately homes seeking cash-generating ideas hit on the realisation that they could create the "last night"fervour on their own lawns and charge entry fees that would more than cover their costs.

The grandest of these at the moment is the Battle Proms series; the same concert run at six stately homes across the country over the course of the summer.  Our local is Highclere Castle, a neo-Gothic Georgian pile now best known as the setting for Downton Abbey.  Admission is a not inconsiderable £31.50 each, but you do get a lot for your money.  The focal concert is preceded by 90 minutes of additional musical acts and attractions.

We kicked off with the Rockabellas, a modern version of the Andrews Sisters doing swing era hits.  Then an impressive show from the Blades Aerobatic Display, doing rolls, stalls, daring near misses and precision formations right over the crowd.  Then over to the field's edge, where re-enactors of English and French cavalries from the Napoleonic era had set up camp and were now showing off their equestrian skills.  (In the hours before had come the incongruous sight of them mixing and mingling in their 19th century finery, swords jangling and gold braid glinting, amongst the modern crowd.)  Finally, as the sun started to sink towards the tree line and the shadows lengthened, an evening gun salute.

All this time the crowds had been building.  The venue was the broad field in front of the house, sloping gently down to the beginning of the estate's woodlands.  The gothic towers sat to the left, a temporary bandshell straight ahead, and perhaps three football pitches of clear space before it for people to spread out their picnics.  Organised in an arc to set the margins of the al fresco auditorium was the gazebo area, three or four deep with open-sided tents.

Long experience teaches the English to expect rain at outdoor events, no matter the season.  Thus, even though the weather was glorious, we'd opted for our own pavilion.  This also allows for a more elegant and comfortable time, and proper seating.  So whilst the pre-show was going on, the six of us settled around our table quaffing nice wines and working our way through marinated cold prawns, slices of cold roast beef, a variety of salads and a box of wicked cakes brought to the Hampshire hills by Christine from one of London's trendy bakeries.

The main concert began at 7:30 with a bit of Elgar and a flyover by that most patriotic of planes, a spitfire.  Then on to a collection of light classical favourites like Suppe's Light Cavalry Overture and excerpts from The Marriage of Figaro.  Part One ended with the 1812 Overture.  And since there were cannon already on site, of course, they joined the orchestra on that one.

As twilight deepened, it was time to get serious.  A few more tunes off the symphonic hit parade before hitting the hard core patriotic stuff.  Every proms concert ends with the same music.  The traditional sailor's hornpipe.  Jerusalem.  Rule Britannia.  Elgar's Pomp and Circumstance March No. 1.  All finished up with a rousing God Save The Queen before seeing the evening out with Auld Lang Syne.  There are native rituals to all of this, from a traditional pattern of clapping in the hornpipe to knee bends in the right places for the Elgar and a precise way of joining hands and swaying for Auld Lang Syne.  And, of course, Jerusalem, Rule Britannia and God Save the Queen are all bellowed with the same fervour Americans use when punching out the Star Spangled Banner before a big ball game.  Throughout this whole section, fireworks blaze and the crowd waves flags of all sizes, transforming the audience to a churning sea of red, white and blue.  (Watch the video below for a sense of it.)

In some countries you can go to a folklore show where costumed locals sing traditional songs and perform accompanying dances.  In England, you go to a concert like this.  The ghost of imperial pride, sent to his grave by so much political correctness and hand-wringing in the decades after the war, returns to kindle those last embers of remaining national pride.

A welcome addition to this particular concert was Beethoven's Battle Symphony, written to commemorate Wellington's victory at the battle of Vittoria.  Thus the logic of the Napoleonic re-enactors.  And especially appropriate at this particular venue, a neighbouring estate to Wellington lands.  In addition to a stirring performance of a beautiful piece of music, the producers threw in 193 cannons, musketfire and fireworks choreographed to fit the music.  I must admit, this was far better than anything we'd seen over the July 4th holiday in the States.

Overall, probably the best country house concert I've been to and one that I suspect will return to the social diary next year.  We have learned our lesson, however.  "Gates Open at 4:30" means entry to the concert ground, not to the car park.  Though we arrived at the estate at 4:30, by the time we parked up and got our stuff to the venue we were one of the last gazebos to pitch up; third row back from the front line.  Next year, we're on for an earlier start.  And perhaps some sherpas to carry all the kit we're accumulating for these al fresco events.