page_title: Royal Albert Hall
section_title: Events
hierarchical_section_title: Royal Albert Hall / Events
caption_attribution_description: English: Don McLean performing at London's Royal Albert Hall, October 2012
context_page_description: The Royal Albert Hall is a concert hall on the northern edge of South Kensington, London. One of the United Kingdom's most treasured and distinctive buildings, it is held in trust for the nation and managed by a registered charity. It can seat 5,272.
  Since the hall's opening by Queen Victoria in 1871, the world's leading artists from many performance genres have appeared on its stage. It is the venue for the Proms concerts, which have been held there every summer since 1941. It is host to more than 390 shows in the main auditorium annually, including classical, rock and pop concerts, ballet, opera, film screenings with live orchestral accompaniment, sports, awards ceremonies, school and community events, and charity performances and banquets. A further 400 events are held each year in the non-auditorium spaces.
  The hall was originally supposed to have been called the Central Hall of Arts and Sciences, but the name was changed to the Royal Albert Hall of Arts and Sciences by Queen Victoria upon laying the Hall's foundation stone in 1867, in memory of her husband, Prince Albert, who had died six years earlier.
context_section_description: The Hall has been affectionately titled "The Nation's Village Hall". The first concert was Arthur Sullivan's cantata On Shore and Sea, performed on 1 May 1871.
  Many events are promoted by the Hall, whilst since the early 1970s promoter Raymond Gubbay has brought a range of events to the Hall including opera, ballet and classical music. Some events include classical and rock concerts, conferences, banquets, ballroom dancing, poetry recitals, educational talks, motor shows, ballet, opera, film screenings and circus shows. It has hosted many sporting events, including boxing, squash, table tennis, basketball, wrestling including the first Sumo wrestling tournament to be held in London as well as UFC 38 (the first UFC event to be held in the UK), tennis and even a marathon. The hall first hosted boxing in 1918, when it hosted a tournament between British and American servicemen. There was a colour bar in place at the Hall, preventing black boxers from fighting there, between 1923 and 1932. Greats of British boxing such as Frank Bruno, Prince Naseem Hamed, Henry Cooper and Lennox Lewis have all appeared at the venue. The hall's storied boxing history was halted in 1999 when a court ordered that boxing and wrestling matches could no longer be held at the venue. In 2011 that decision was overturned. In 2019 Nicola Adams won the WBO Flyweight title which was the first fight for a world title at the venue since Marco Antonio Barrera took on Paul Lloyd in 1999.
  On 6 April 1968, the Hall hosted the Eurovision Song Contest which was broadcast in colour for the first time. The first Miss World contest broadcast in colour was also staged at the venue in 1969 and remained at the Hall every year until 1989.
  One notable event was a Pink Floyd concert held 26 June 1969, the night they were banned from ever playing at the Hall again after shooting cannons, nailing things to the stage, and having a man in a gorilla suit roam the audience. At one point Rick Wright went to the pipe organ and began to play "The End of the Beginning", the final part of "Saucerful of Secrets", joined by the brass section of the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra (led by the conductor, Norman Smith) and the ladies of the Ealing Central Amateur Choir. A portion of the pipe organ recording is included on Pink Floyd's album The Endless River.
  On 18 June 1985, British gothic rock band The Sisters of Mercy recorded their live video album Wake at the Hall. Between 1996 and 2008, the Hall hosted the annual National Television Awards all of which were hosted by Sir Trevor McDonald.
  Benefit concerts include the 1997 Music for Montserrat concert, arranged and produced by George Martin, an event which featured artists such as Phil Collins, Mark Knopfler, Sting, Elton John, Eric Clapton and Paul McCartney, and 2012 Sunflower Jam charity concert with Queen guitarist Brian May performing alongside bassist John Paul Jones of Led Zeppelin, drummer Ian Paice of Deep Purple, and vocalists Bruce Dickinson of Iron Maiden and Alice Cooper.
  In 2006, Pink Floyd guitarist, David Gilmour performed at the Hall for the first time since Pink Floyd's 1969 ban. He performed at the Hall as part of his On an Island Tour. The shows were filmed and used for the live video release, Remember That Night (2007). Rock band The Killers recorded their first live album, Live from the Royal Albert Hall in July 2009.
  On 5 April 2010, Swedish progressive metal band Opeth recorded In Live Concert at the Royal Albert Hall, as they became the first Death metal band to ever perform at the Hall. The concert was part of the band's Evolution XX: An Opeth Anthology tour, made in celebration of their 20th anniversary.
  On 2 October 2011, the Hall staged the 25th-anniversary performance of Andrew Lloyd Webber's The Phantom of the Opera, which was broadcast live to cinemas across the world and filmed for DVD. Lloyd Webber, the original London cast including Sarah Brightman and Michael Crawford, and four previous actors of the titular character, among others, were in attendance – Brightman and the previous Phantoms (aside fro
caption: Don McLean at the venue in October 2012
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