Prom 5: BBC Singers/Endymion/Cleobury/Williams, Royal Albert Hall, London

Tucked away in late evening slots, safely segregated from the main repertoire, with no cameras in sight, lurk the avant-garde and early-music Proms. Here may be encountered some of most enriching and exciting sounds of the season.

Tucked away in late evening slots, safely segregated from the main repertoire, with no cameras in sight, lurk the avant-garde and early-music Proms. Here may be encountered some of most enriching and exciting sounds of the season.

This year's first late-night Prom combined celebrations of Harrison Birtwistle's 70th birthday and the centenary of Luigi Dallapiccola, whose Canti di prigonia received an admirably well-prepared reading, with the BBC Singers convincingly charting the fluctuating emotional temperature of the opening setting of Mary Stuart's prayer. Arguably there was room for even more attack in the climaxes, mindful of the work's original impetus as a protest against Mussolini's race laws of 1938. But these "songs of imprisonment" were beautifully shaped by Stephen Cleobury, whose meticulously moulded interpretation did not preclude moments of genuine warmth and poignancy.

The brief centrepiece of the concert continued the isolationist theme of the evening with a quirky arrangement for flute, clarinet, violin, cello, glockenspiel and bells by Birtwistle of a motet attributed to the 15th-century Flemish composer Ockeghem, entitled "Ut heremita solus", roughly translated as "Alone as a hermit".

Birtwistle has more recently shown his skills as an arranger of Bach's music, though not to such brilliant and lustrous account as in this earlier example originally written for the Pierrot Players and first performed by them in June 1969. The Endymion soloists gave a vigorous and charismatic account of Birtwistle's eccentric but sparkling instrumentation.

Pure Birtwistle rounded off the evening, with the UK premiere of The Ring Dance of the Nazarene. The ritualistic text, by David Harsent, is a free setting of passages from the Apocryphal Gospel of St John. The score is one of the composer's liveliest, with dance rhythms kick-started by an Iranian drum, the tombak (played by Martin Allen). The piece requires a baritone soloist - here the impressive Roderick Williams, making light of the demands on his voice and creating a genuine character in the Christ-like figure of the text - accompanied by a wind sextet, who also occasionally act as a chorus.

The BBC Singers had the most fun, clapping for joy, shouting "Amen" and "Alleluia" and even forgetting themselves and assuming the role of Christ, as if their traditional role as onlookers and commentators was far too dull. The Ring Dance... was so pulse-driven and kinetic that there must surely be several choreographers itching to realise its theatricality.

Real musicianship always satisfies, and this rounded, impeccably performed and intelligently planned programme merited far less shadowy billing.

Proms to 11 September. Prom 5 available online until tonight (020-7589 8212; www.bbc.co.uk/proms)