Virtual London - The best place to see London online

A well-established and highly popular British institution is the series of concerts held every year from around the middle of July to the middle of September.

In 1895 Robert Newman, manager of the newly-built Queen's Hall in London conceived what was to become the BBC Promenade Concerts and although Sir Henry Wood tends to be associated with the founding of the series it was Robert Newman who effectively launched the project.

His aim was to train the public in easy stages to appreciate good classical and modern music, using an informal approach, with tickets at 5p per concert and £1.05 for the series.

It was Newman who offered Henry Wood, as he then was, the conductor's baton of a permanent orchestra at Queen's Hall together with the first Proms season.

The tendency then was for the more serious items to be fielded in the first half, leaving the second half to become more of a composition of tasty numbers, with a Grand Fantasia of operatic tit-bits as a major attraction.

However, opera was not to achieve full programme status until 1961 when the Glyndebourne Festival Orchestra performed Mozart's Don Giovanni.

The Proms survived the anti-German tendencies of World War One; indeed in 1915 the musical publishers Chappell and Co added responsibility for the orchestra to their lease of the Hall, which became the New Queens Hall Orchestra.

Despite all this help and goodwill the Proms refused to show a financial profit, however much cultural seed was being sown, and in 1927 Chappell's pulled out. The BBC, with its wide remit to the public, took the Proms over and after a three-year interregnum the BBC Promenade Concerts were founded in 1930. They have run continuously ever since except for one night in 1996 when all the lights went out and the performance had to be cancelled.

Under Sir Henry Wood the initial aims of Robert Newman were preserved and have survived unscathed ever since. To this day, at the end of the season, a wreath is placed upon the bust of Sir Henry in the Albert Hall, by a promenade.

Nowadays The Proms (short for Promenade Concert) consists of over seventy concerts, one for each night of the season, supported by Chamber Music Concerts on Monday lunchtimes at the Victoria and Albert Museum and Poetry Proms on alternate Fridays at the Serpentine Gallery.

In 1966 the Moscow Radio Symphony Orchestra became the first foreign orchestra to perform at a Prom.

The finale is, by tradition, always referred to as The Last Night of the Proms and as well as some fine music always has an element of light-hearted enjoyment which generally follows a well-rehearsed pattern, seen by many millions the world over. Some may find its unashamed display of patriotism a trifle unfashionable, others will take heart that the ethos of the evening is one of unbridled enjoyment and pride in the well-tried institutions of their country.

The evening is rounded off with everyone singing Parry's Jerusalem, sometimes called England's unofficial National Anthem, perhaps lending fuel to the arguments of the clergyman in Shropshire who recently denied a couple permission to have it sung at their wedding. It says a lot about the attitudes of the English that the resulting furore completely eclipsed arguments about the Euro for several blessed days.

Promenaders have their own organisation, customs and contacts and some have been attending the concerts man and boy for a very long time.

It is generally advisable to book in advance, but in the spirit of the Proms a number of tickets are always held back until the day and can be bought by queuing (another well-established British custom) on the day of the concert. By definition a Promenade Concert is one where a considerable number of people stand and 1,000 standing places are available at every concert. Season tickets are also available and represent good value if you are attending a significant number of concerts.

The Proms are for enjoyment and they undoubtedly achieve that; hats off to Sir Henry Wood and Robert Newman and all those over the years who have worked to preserve a far-sighted initiative which has brought pleasure to countless millions world-wide.