The enthusiasm with which Laura Mvula had promoted her Late Night Prom on the radio, in the press and on Twitter in the preceding few days was tangible the minute she walked on stage at the Royal Albert Hall, resplendent in a black gown with silver embellishments.
It is fair to say that urban and classical music would not normally share an audience, let alone a stage, but, in the first-ever Urban Classic Prom, rising and established stars of the urban music scene met and collaborated with the BBC Symphony Orchestra under dynamic young conductor (and arranger of some of the evening’s numbers) Jules Buckley, in a showcase of two very different musical culture