- Dr Alka Sehgal Cuthbert stated the flag-waving anthem was ‘patriotic’
- Calls to ban it as some see it as too celebratory of Britain’s imperial previous
Rule, Britannia! isn’t a racist music, an educational insisted immediately after Prince Harry and Meghan Markle‘s marriage ceremony cellist referred to as for the flag-waving anthem to be dropped from the Last Night Of The Proms.
Sheku Kanneh-Mason advised Desert Island Discs that when he carried out eventually 12 months’s Last Night he left early to keep away from listening to the music.
The lengthy custom of a sing-along rendition of Rule, Britannia! is a spotlight of the annual Royal Albert Hall live performance.
But there have been calls to ban it as some see it as too celebratory of Britain’s imperial previous and its function within the slave commerce.
Dr Alka Sehgal Cuthbert immediately insisted that Rule, Britannia! was ‘patriotic’ relatively than racist. She advised Good Morning Britain : ‘I feel the music isn’t racist, it is a patriotic music and there’s a distinction.
‘I’m positive there have been lots of patriotic folks within the West African Squadron who had been concerned in stopping slaves ships and releasing lots of people. I feel over 160,000 African individuals who would have been slaves weren’t slaves due to the [Royal] Navy. So it is not a racist music.’
Today, Dr Alka Sehgal Cuthbert (proper) advised Good Morning Britain’s Susanna Reid that the flag-waving anthem was ‘patriotic’ relatively than racist
Celebrated black cellist Sheku Kanneh-Mason advised Desert Island Discs yesterday that when he carried out eventually 12 months’s Last Night he left early to keep away from listening to the music
The lengthy custom of a sing-along rendition of Rule, Britannia! is a spotlight of the annual Royal Albert Hall live performance
Dr Cutherbet was debating the difficulty with political activist Femi Oluwole, who felt the music celebrated Britain’s involvement within the slave commerce.
He stated on GMB: ‘It could have been the place the unique worry of Britain turning into slaves comes from, however it was actively sung by individuals who had been actively engaged within the slave commerce. So it was celebrated.
‘If you had a bunch of those that had been committing some type of assault and so they bragged about how they had been by no means going to be assaulted. That’s clearly not going to be a music that you just sing.’
The music, which originates from James Thomson’s 1740 poem Rule, Britannia and is about to music by Thomas Arne, incorporates the road: ‘Britons by no means shall be slaves’.
The BBC was branded woke in 2020 when it introduced that solely instrumental variations of Rule, Britannia! and Land Of Hope And Glory could be carried out at that 12 months’s occasion.
It later backed down within the face of a public backlash.
Kanneh-Mason was a soloist on the Last Night of the Proms final 12 months. But he stated he didn’t keep to listen to Rule, Britannia! being sung on the finish of the evening.
Kanneh-Mason advised Desert Island Discs: ‘I do not suppose it ought to be included and I did not keep for that. That’s simply my opinion. I feel possibly some folks do not realise how uncomfortable a music like that may make lots of people really feel.
‘The wealth of folks music from this nation is astonishing. I feel that might be a beautiful factor to take its place.’
The BBC stated the Proms had been constructed on ‘long-standing traditions’ which had been ‘beloved by folks all over the world’.
Rule Britannia and Land of Hope and Glory are historically sung by a vocal soloist, choir or each, because the viewers take part.
There was heavy criticism in 2020 after plans emerged that neither music could be sung at The Last Night of the Proms.
The BBC later backtracked and stated ‘choose’ group of singers would carry out the songs in any case.
The songs are greatest identified for being a triumphant end to the BBC’s protection of the Proms every year (file image)
Flags are waved throughout The Last Night of the Proms celebration at Hyde Park in London on September 14, 2019
The songs have turn out to be a preferred fixture within the BBC’s programming for the ultimate evening of the Proms, when hundreds of flag-waving ‘prommers’ usually descend on the Royal Albert Hall in Kensington, West London (pictured on September 8, 2012)
‘When you hear a few of these opera singers belting it out I do not suppose you’d say it is a skinny voice. Let’s simply have one voice singing these songs loudly, why not? It’s a practice and it is a gorgeous tune.’
However Kehinde Andrews, a black research professor at Birmingham City University, claimed the road ‘Britons by no means, by no means, by no means shall be slaves’ from Rule Britannia is ‘racist propaganda’ from the times of the British Empire.
His commens had been echoed by musicians Chi-chi Nwanoku, who based the primary BAME majority orchestra in Europe, and Wasfi Kani, founding father of Grange Park Opera in Surrey, who’re additionally uncomfortable with the road.
Nwanoku, founding father of the Chineke! Foundation which helps upcoming BAME musicians, advised The Guardian in 2020 : ‘The lyrics are simply so offensive, speaking concerning the ‘haughty tyrants’ – those that we’re invading on their land and calling them haughty tyrants – and Britons shall by no means be slaves, which means that it is OK for others to be slaves however not us.
‘It’s so irrelevant to immediately’s society. It’s been irrelevant for generations, and we appear to maintain perpetuating it. If the BBC are speaking about Black Lives Matter and their help for the motion, how might you probably have Rule Britannia because the final live performance – in any live performance?’