The Proms in the Park

To help ease the passing of summer for the British public the BBC has a big party—embracing everything that's good about music and about Britain. Or at least that's what the Proms in the Park felt like to me the first year I went. It's part picnic-part concert-part great British sing along. It’s here that I tried my first pig-in-a-blanket, drank my first warm white wine, first saw people standing for the national anthem draped in a union jack, and generally had a really good time. The music is always highly entertaining, and there’s a general feeling of goodwill going around. Proms in the Park is on the last night of the Proms, held in outdoor locations though out the UK—though I've only been to the one in Hyde Park across from the Albert Hall where the real thing takes place. They do a live televised link-up round the country and into the Royal Albert Hall. The whole affair is supposedly very democratic, but tickets aren't as cheap as I think they should be.