Arcangelo return to the BBC Proms with “the spiritual and musical summation of a life”

Image (c) BBC Proms

First published 21 April 2026

Arcangelo's fourth appearance at the BBC Proms has been announced today as part of the eight-week 2026 season. 

Directed by Jonathan Cohen, Arcangelo will perform Bach's monumental Mass in B Minor BWV232, described by the Proms as "the spiritual and musical summation of a life... one of the most powerful and universal statements in art, [and] one of the most joyous musical experiences of the repertoire."

An orchestra of 40 and a choir of 50, Arcangelo's largest-ever ensemble, will be joined by soloists Jeanine De Bique, Eva Zaïcik, Hugh Cutting, Nick Pritchard and Florian Störtz for the performance at the Royal Albert Hall on Thursday 10 September, the antepenultimate night of the season. The concert will be broadcast on BBC Radio 3 and BBC Sounds.

The concert will conclude a major South American and European tour, with four dates in Sao Paulo and following appearances at the Rheingau Festival and the Gstaad Festival.

Arcangelo first appeared at the BBC Proms in 2016, with a Shakespeare-inspired programme at the Sam Wanamaker Playhouse. 2018 saw the ensemble move to the Royal Albert Hall to give the BBC Proms premiere performance of Handel's 'Theodora' while 2021 witnessed an emotional televised concert of Bach's 'St Matthew Passion': the first major UK public performance of the work following the Covid-19 pandemic and the end of lockdown restrictions.

Arcangelo's Hyperion Records release of the Mass in B Minor was a Gramophone Editor's Choice and 2015 Awards Finalist. The magazine wrote: "Cohen's rejection of the generic, within a grand and ravishing overview, is what propels an overwhelming sense here that this reading deserves to be taken very seriously...The work infrequently speaks with such gracefulness, freedom or conviction."

General booking opens on 16 May via the BBC Proms website.