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Leaked Olympic closing ceremony details suggest London could put on another impressive show

Andrew Bucholtz

The Olympic closing ceremonies may not always get the hype of their opening counterparts, but leaked details of what might be to come Sunday (1 p.m. Eastern) indicate that the Brits could put on another impressive show. It's titled A Symphony of British Music, appropriate considering the role of music at these Games, and Muse, George Michael and Ed Sheeran are already confirmed to be involved. Rumoured other acts include Adele, Elton John, Kate Bush, Paul McCartney, the Spice Girls and members of Queen. There are reports of comics involved too, including Eric Idle of Monty Python fame and Russell Brand of Forgetting Sarah Marshall, Get Him To The Greek and BrandX, and there will certainly be thousands of volunteers doing elaborately-choreographed routines in front of stunning sets; set designer Es Devlin has worked with Rihanna and Lady Gaga, while ceremony director Kim Gavin is known for his involvement with Take That's renowned Circus Tour and lighting designer Patrick Woodroffe has worked with everyone from Cher to AC/DC to Bob Dylan. Musical director David Arnold, a composer renowned for his work on five James Bond films and the hit BBC series Sherlock, told The Telegraphexpectations are high:

'To me, this should be the greatest after-party in the world," says David Arnold, music director of the Olympic Closing Ceremony. "If the Opening Ceremony was the wedding, then we're the wedding reception. We're the one where everyone gets out of their cars at the village hall, goes 'Wasn't that lovely, everyone looked great, let's put on Blame It On the Boogie and have a laugh.'?" Arnold is joking. Sort of. "It needs to be something where everyone, including the athletes, is going to be able to let off steam. There are seven and a half thousand of them there, so it's a show for them all to get involved with, and hopefully it will wrap up the spirit of what these Games have been, which is slightly anarchic, slightly mischievous, funny, heartwarming, emotional, inspiring, and uniquely British."

As Arnold says, it's a lot of work putting together this sort of a production, though, especially when it relies so heavily on volunteers and when it's constantly in flux:

"Right now, it's 17-hour days. It is insane. There is just so much to do."

With the ceremony due to take place on Sunday and secret rehearsals under way at a disused site at the Ford factory in Dagenham, the team are still making tweaks and changes.

"We've got a cast of thousands and the bulk are volunteers, so we can only rehearse in the evenings. I get calls at midnight saying we've just found out it takes 20 seconds longer to get this amount of people in that amount of space, or we're going to do this with 600 people rather than 400, so we're constantly changing timings and anticipate parts where things potentially could change on the night. It's huge. If you've got drummers at one end of the stadium and singers at the other end and dancers in-between, they've all got to hear what's going on without getting out of sync. At one point, there are eight thousand in-ear monitor sets out on the deck."

It's clear this is going to be a pretty remarkable effort, and there should be at least something that appeals to everyone, as rumoured performers ranging from The Who to Jamiroquai. The music's obviously going to be impressive given the talent rumoured to be involved, but some comedy could certainly add to this too. The rumoured involvement of Idle in particular is impressive, and that brings to mind a whole variety of spectacular closing possibilities, from finding one's Grail to the advantages of a lumberjack's profession to the relative merits of various world currencies. Really, though, if organizers are thinking clearly, there's one ending that always tops all others: