Nicholas Kenyon: How to keep a Proms crowd happy (and integrity intact)

Nicholas Kenyon is a consummate juggler. It comes with the territory, says Anna Picard

Got any complaints about the Proms? Does new music drive you nuts? Or do you feel that a fine patriotic tradition is being diluted by "lunatic political correctness"? The buck stops with Nicholas Kenyon; director of the season of concerts that gets columnists – and colonels – in a kerfuffle.

If Kenyon is fed-up with the Last Night's annual sing-along taking so much attention from the other 72 Proms – and eight chamber recitals – he's not about to show it. Tall, soft-faced and slightly clerical in manner, he has an oddly austere air for one whose years at Oxford saw a slew of sit-ins and a sexual revolution. Colleagues from his early days remember a shambling David Lodge character with a plastic bag for a briefcase and though his suits are corporate-smooth today, it's easy to imagine him in a duffle-coat. But is he unworldly? Hell, no. When he offers me a seat on his office's marshmallow sofa, the resulting difference between our head heights could be power-play from a management manual. And when I ask him about religion – Kenyon is a practising Catholic – in connection with one of this year's Proms themes, the Old Testament, his retort is quick: "I don't believe it's literal, you know!" Damn. So much for my CREATIONIST IN CHARGE OF PROMS scoop.

Kenyon's interest in broadcast music started with a childhood fascination for Radio Times schedules. After reading History he took a course in Arts Management before going on to edit Early Music and write reviews for The New Yorker, The Times and Observer; capitalising on the critical establishment's then disinterest in the burgeoning period instruments movement. From there, one wave of Auntie's magic wand took him to a "challenging" period as Controller of Radio 3, then, in 1996, to his present position – "the best job in music I can think of" – as the man in charge of the world's largest orchestral festival and a budget of £5.5m. Critic to controller to director of the Proms. Easy, no? Hmm. Nicholas Kenyon has to be scrupulously polite about the bobbing and chanting hard-core Prommers ("Yes... Yes... Well, you just get the impression that they're extremely knowledgeable enthusiasts who, for one reason or another, come out then rather than at any other time"), ready with the buzz-words ("Tradition refreshed!"), patient with the parodies ("Tradition rehashed!"), respectful of those who believe any alteration of the Last Night of the Proms is tantamount to defacing the Cenotaph, and – hard for a former critic, this – enthusiastic about music he may privately loathe. He is everywhere, all year long; from the glitzier recitals of visiting artists to obscure Handel oratorios to even more obscure world premieres by young composers. And though he'd happily fill the season with Latin American baroque music or Bach cantatas, Kenyon knows that "the measure of doing these jobs is that we look beyond our own enthusiasms and present a season which is balanced."

After a 25 year on/off relationship with the corporation, Kenyon swears he still isn't "a 'BBC man'" with the passion for rung-climbing that might imply. But when his answers invariably end with "...but the wonderful thing about the Proms is..." I suspect he's in denial. Duffle-coat man – the one who'll enthuse about topics other than the wonderfulness/informality/inclusivity/energy of the Proms – is warm, quirky and likeable. Suit man – who refers to the festival as "a brand" – less so. In one of a few moments without this sudden re-grouping into carefully en-nun-ci-at-ed soundbite, he starts to tell me about the difficulty of programming the various maestri the Proms attracts. Apparently they all want to do the same pieces. Once upon a time, it was Haydn, Brahms and Beethoven. Now they're "intimidated" by Classical style, Haydn has all but disappeared from the mainstream symphonic repertoire, and it's Shostakovich, Prokofiev and "anything by Mahler". So he has to juggle the egos? "Oh yes" he says. But he's not about to spill any beans over who gets to be top dog in the cat-fight. Is it politeness? (He is excessively polite about the "commercial pressures" on Classic FM.) Or caution? After an au point roasting during his term at Radio 3, Kenyon is used to flak. Following his Royal Philharmonic Society lecture in 2000, Andrew Clark of the Financial Times tore into what he called Kenyon's "ayatollah-like pronouncements" that no worthwhile music-making had been untouched by period performance with a counterblast of remarkable ferocity. Kenyon refers to this, after a long search for the correct adjective, as "a sti-mu-la-ting rubbishing". Last year's onslaught, however, must have been worse.

Following the announcement that the Last Night would be changed as a mark of respect to the victims of 9/11, the Proms office phones went into melt-down. Though Kenyon stresses that positive responses outnumbered the complaints, the Proms web-site message board was wet with invective against him and Leonard Slatkin (conductor of the BBC Symphony Orchestra). Few were surprised then that this year's Last Night programme is tantamount to a U-turn. Yes, there are changes – Rule Britannia will now be heard in the Fantasia on British Sea-Songs – but so slight (and sleight of hand) as to be virtually bullet-proof. Could he ever drop it altogether? "I don't think I could," says Kenyon. "I think the question is more – are we going to feel less awkward or threatened by it? I don't know. I think we've just got to test it and see."

When pressed to imagine a head-hunter approaching with an offer too good to refuse, Kenyon is speechless, stuck. What, not even the Lincoln Center? Or Salzburg? "No-oo," he says finally, "I can imagine someone saying 'don't you think after 25 years [on the job] there's a limit of time that one person should be doing the Proms?' But as long as I've got fresh ideas and the institution is moving on, no." Despite the flak, despite the albatross of imperialist anthems and the forbearance he feels he must exercise in programming the music he really loves, he simply cannot imagine a better job – Last Night or no Last Night.

BBC Proms 2002, Albert Hall, London SW7 (020 7589 8212) and live on BBC Radio 3, Friday to 14 September.