When successive conductors from Sir Colin Davis to Mark Elder have voiced discomfort with the programme’s militaristic overtones they have

When successive conductors from Sir Colin Davis to Mark Elder have voiced discomfort with the programme’s militaristic overtones, they have met with fierce resistance. In the case of American maestro Leonard Slatkin – who presided over last year’s altered programme and will be conducting this season’s finale – that resistance has assumed a profoundly xenophobic quality. For some of the hard-core Prommers these xenophobic excesses are difficult to stomach. As one arena regular, whose own Last Night will be on Friday, told me: “This flag-waving and tub-thumping is jingoistic, embarrassing and acutely anti-musical. When even the Conservative party has dropped “Land of Hope and Glory”, one has to wonder why this country’s greatest musical institution continues to cherish it.”Why indeed? When classical music is in crisis over the apparent indifference of a younger audience, it seems deeply ironic that the most visible classical concert in the calendar should be this one. Not only are the politics distasteful and the presentation almost parodic of classical music’s perceived stuffiness, the music is second-rate But patriotic songs are rarely great pieces of music.

With the notable exceptions of “The Star-Spangled Banner”, the Marseillaise, and the powerfully lugubrious Russian national anthem, the melodies of most national anthems are unmemorable dross – though “God Save the Queen”, as Christopher Hitchens notes, at least “commends itself for its brevity”.So, if there’s little musical value to be found in these songs, is LNOP just an excuse for middle-brow, middle-class, middle-aged hooliganism? Orwell would have seen this question as an example of “the mechanical sniggers of the Bloomsbury highbrow”, but, as the indignant response from the Italian community to a recent recording of mafia songs has proved, unease with aspects of one’s heritage is not an exclusively English preoccupation. Music is powerfully associative; hence many people’s mistaken assumption that “Deutschland, Deutschland ? alles …” is still the first line of the German national anthem. To pretend that nationalist songs of whatever provenance are “just a bit of harmless fun”, as some have said, is to overlook their historical significance And here’s the rub. Should you want to express solidarity to your place of birth, there is no means of doing so in song without reference to empire, monarchy or the past.Except, perhaps, through “Jerusalem”, the only number on the LNOP’s song sheet that admits this nation still has room for improvement.

Who knows if we can ever attain William Blake’s utopia in this “green and pleasant land”? But if we can address this unwieldy tradition head on, we may at least have made a start. Whatever one’s feelings on the British Empire, the most contentious items in LNOP are eminently replaceable by works that evoke a less bellicose national identity; from Purcell to Tallis to Britten to Holst to Vaughan Williams It’s time to move on from our colonial past To invite other orchestras to this grand finale To play music of a more thoughtful and pacific nature. Last year’s Last Night was no blip: it was a sign that traditions can adapt and survive. If the Last Night of the Proms is to be more than museum culture, it must, like the Conservative party, stop pandering to the musical tastes of Colonel Blimp and look to a wider demographic.Prom 73, The Last Night, Royal Albert Hall, London SW7 (020 7589 8212), Sat; live on BBC2 (Part 1) and BBC1 (Part 2).