R. Strauss Burleske (20 mins) INTERVAL Mahler Symphony No. 6 in A minor (85 mins) Kirill Gerstein piano BBC Symphony Orchestra Semyon Bychkov conductor About this event For his second Prom this season, Semyon Bychkov conducts one of Mahler's most perfectly realised works, 'the only sixth, despite the "Pastoral" ', in the words of Alban Berg. This is music of exceptional range and power, whose fateful hammer-blows seem to portend the crises in Mahler's own life and the wider world. The curtain-raiser is a mini-concerto with echoes of Brahms and Liszt, especially in its treatment of the piano. Kirill Gerstein, an exceptional artist with roots in jazz as well as the classics, makes his first Proms appearance in the main hall.