LPO Tune In newsletter – Spring/Summer 2016

– SPRING / SUMMER 2016 –

PLAYING THE BARD

– 04 –

Music inspired by Shakespeare through the centuries

FOYLE FUTURE FIRSTS

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The LPO helps young instrumentalists bridge the gap between college and

a professional music career

BACKSTAGE

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Bang on a drum: Henry Baldwin on all things percussion

Shakespeare, coming upon me

unawares, struck me like a thunderbolt.

Hector Berlioz

Julian Anderson In lieblicher BläueAlleluiaThe Stations Of The SunVladimir Jurowski conductor Carolin Widmann violinLondon Philharmonic Choir

£9.99

LPO-0089 | Release date March 2016

Corporate MembersAccenture Berenberg

Carter-Ruck We are AD

Appleyard & Trew LLP BTO Management Consulting AG

Charles Russell SpeechlysLazard

Russo-British Chamber of Commerce

Preferred PartnersCorinthia Hotel London

Heineken Lindt & Sprüngli Ltd

Sipsmith Steinway

Villa Maria

In-kind SponsorsGoogle Inc

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New releases on the LPO Label

Browse the catalogue and sign up for updates at lpo.org.uk/recordings

CDs available from lpo.org.uk/recordings, the LPO Ticket Office (020 7840 4242), all good CD outlets, and the Royal Festival Hall shop.

Download or stream online via iTunes, Amazon, Spotify and others.

Principal Partner

Principal Supporters

Education Partner

The Genius of Film Music:Hollywood Blockbusters 1960s to 1980sJohn Mauceri conductor

£10.99 (2 CDs)

LPO-0086 | Released September 2015

Coming soon

Mahler Box Set Symphonies 1, 2, 6 & 8A set of live recordings of the London Philharmonic Orchestra conducted by Klaus Tennstedt.

£49.99

LPO-0100 | Released November 2015

Beethoven Coriolan OvertureSymphony No. 5Klaus Tennstedt conductor

A BBC recording

£6.99

LPO-0087 | Released October 2015

Rachmaninoff Symphony No. 310 Songs (arr. Jurowski)Vladimir Jurowski conductor Vsevolod Grivnov tenor

£9.99

LPO-0088 | Release date February 2016

Coming soon

lpo.org.uk/recordings


TUNE IN – SPRING / SUMMER 2016 –

Welcome to the Spring 2016 edition of the London Philharmonic Orchestra’s newsletter, Tune In, keeping you up-to-date

with news and highlights of the season and future events.

We are extremely excited to be part of Shakespeare400, a collaboration with some of the UK’s leading cultural, creative and educational institutions, marking the 400th anniversary of the nation’s most famous playwright’s death. We play our part with a series of concerts celebrating the Bard’s love of music, culminating in an Anniversary Gala Concert directed by Simon Callow on 23 April. On page 4, Hugo Shirley investigates Shakespeare’s undeniable impact on composers from around the world, from Thomas Adès to Wagner. As well as concerts, the series also includes many pre-concert events that should not be missed, such as performances by our Foyle Future Firsts students, more of which later. On page 6 is an overview of the Festival with useful information on how to follow the series and keep abreast of connected news items on all our social media platforms. All relevant events are signposted throughout the magazine with the ‘Shakespeare400’ logo.

If you want to play your part there are several ways to get involved, as you will discover on page 10 such as the ‘Sounds & Sweet Airs’ Gala or the Shakespeare Appeal and Syndicate.

Education and community work is a core activity at the LPO, the benefits of which are gained, not just by the participants of projects, but also the players who take part. In this issue we turn our attention to Foyle

– TIMOTHY WALKER – Chief Executive and Artistic Director

Editor Sarah BreedenPublisher London Philharmonic OrchestraPrinter Conquest Litho Ltd

While every effort has been made to ensure the accuracy of this publication, we cannot accept liability for any statement or error contained herein. © 2016 London Philharmonic Orchestra.

The paper used for printing this magazine has been sourced from responsibly managed forests, certified in accordance with the FSC (Forest Stewardship Council). It is manufactured to the ISO 14001 international standard, minimising negative impacts on the environment and is manufactured from pulp that has been bleached without the use of chlorine compounds using oxygen (elemental chlorine free), which are considered harmful to the environment.

WELCOME

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KEEP UP TO DATE

JOIN US ON FACEBOOK facebook.com/londonphilharmonicorchestra

FOLLOW US ON TWITTER twitter.com/LPOrchestra

LISTEN TO OUR PODCASTS lpo.org.uk/explore

Future Firsts, a successful scheme for talented instrumentalists that bridges the difficult progression from college to fully fledged professional musicians. Pieter Schoeman, Leader of the LPO, talks of the personal satisfaction he gains from being one of the mentors (see page 8).

Also integral to the Orchestra’s life is touring, and highlights of the 2015/16 season so far can be found on page 12, alongside a sneak preview of Glyndebourne 2016.

Do please join us at some of our forthcoming concerts in London or further afield (see pages 13–15). If you can’t get to one of our venues in person there are many other ways to hear the Orchestra. Some of our concerts are broadcast on BBC Radio 3 and subsequently available online for 30 days, or you can now hear us via ‘Classical Live’: a new online platform showcasing live performances from top international orchestras (see page 7). Alternatively ‘Listen Again’ offers the opportunity to hear at least six live classical concert recordings over the season available online for free. Sign up for alerts via lpo.org.uk.

Full details of the UK season are available in our brochures, and details of all concerts at home and abroad can be found on our website. We hope you can join us soon.

2016/17 seasonThe next LPO season will be launched on Thursday 28 January 2016 when all details of concerts and events can be found on the website. Booking opens on Thursday 11 February (online and via the LPO Box Office only). To take advantage of priority booking (from Tuesday 2 February), become a Friend of the London Philharmonic Orchestra for as little as £50 a year. Call Helen Yang on 020 7840 4225 or visit lpo.org.uk/support/memberships

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CONTENTS

PLAYING THE BARD 04–05 SHAKESPEARE400 06

NEW & NOTEWORTHY 07, 12FOYLE FUTURE FIRSTS 08–09

SOUNDS & SWEET AIRS 10PREFERRED PARTNERS 11CONCERT LISTINGS 13–15

BACKSTAGE 16

Full concert listings and booking information on pages 13–15

facebook.com/londonphilharmonicorchestra

twitter.com/LPOrchestra

lpo.org.uk/explore

lpo.org.uk

lpo.org.uk/support/memberships

lpo.org.uk/shakespeare

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‘Shakespeare, coming upon me unawares, struck me like a thunderbolt,’ wrote Berlioz in his Memoirs about his first encounter with the playwright – and Hamlet

– in Paris in 1827. ‘The lightning flash of that discovery revealed to me at a stroke the whole heaven of art, illuminating it to its remotest corners.’ Setting aside for one moment the fact that that fateful performance also marked the French composer’s first encounter with the English actress Harriet Smithson – playing Ophelia, she became the object of Berlioz’s ardent obsession and inspiration for the Symphonie fantastique – this was a monumental event in his life. And Berlioz went on to compose his opera Béatrice et Bénédict and the ‘symphonie dramatique’ Roméo et Juliette, premiered almost exactly a decade after that first encounter with the Danish play.

Berlioz and his unusual, genre-bending take on Romeo and Juliet are perhaps a good place to start a discussion of both the powerful effect that Shakespeare had on composers, especially in the 19th century, and the strange, almost paradoxical challenges involved in translating the finely wrought poetry of his plays into dots and squiggles on the musical stave. Berlioz is also a good starting point to note the very different reception of Shakespeare on the Continent. For example, Hamlet, Berlioz tells us, offered him a chance to ‘measure the utter absurdity of the French view of Shakespeare which derives from Voltaire’.

When another English troupe had brought Shakespeare to the French capital in 1820, the reaction had been hostile, with audiences much preferring the sanctioned ‘Frenchified’ versions. These subsequent performances therefore represented quite a breakthrough. The timing was propitious, too, with the ‘real’

As the LPO joins forces with other cultural institutions for Shakespeare400, a celebration of the anniversary of Shakespeare’s death, Hugo Shirley

looks at the influence the Bard has had on composers across continents and through the ages.

Shakespeare asserting himself in the Parisian cultural imagination around the same time that Beethoven did, a fact that might have helped Wagner – who tried to ‘break’ the French capital late in the following decade – decide that Beethoven and Shakespeare were the creative spirits he wished to unite in his Music Dramas.

The French rediscovery of Shakespeare post-dates the German rediscovery of him, which took place around 1770. In the German-speaking world his plays, read primarily in prose translations, became emblematic of the wildness and freedom from literary convention that became tenets of the Sturm und Drang (‘Storm and Stress’) movement of early Romanticism. For the young Goethe and other members of the movement, Shakespeare’s importance was more symbolic than specific: he represented the ‘Poetic Genius’, according to one Goethe biographer, whose plays were populated with

Promethean characters who themselves contained the spark of genius.

So what can such literary pre-history tell us about the Shakespeare-inspired musical works that form the backbone of the London Philharmonic Orchestra’s part in the Shakespeare400 celebration? First, it gives a clue as to how Shakespeare has been so central to music in the largely wordless world of the concert hall, an institution that was formed in the 19th century, as well as the opera (and ballet) stage. It gives a clue also to his broad power for artists of all stripes, as well as going some way to explain how composers, in particular, found ways of translating his characters, drama and ‘Poetic Genius’ into their own medium.

Of course the most apparently straightforward transformation came with operatic adaptations, even if it arguably took the combined genius of Arrigo Boito and the Shakespeare-obsessed Giuseppe Verdi to create the first fully successful Shakespearean operas in their Otello and Falstaff, the aged composer’s final two operas. The former showed how an original play could be condensed and pared down to shattering dramatic effect, while the latter gained much of its richness from amalgamating the different incarnations of the Fat Knight found in The Merry Wives of Windsor and both parts of Henry IV. Later Shakespearean operas have tended to follow Boito’s lead with the words either judiciously but extensively cut (as Benjamin Britten and Peter Pears did for A Midsummer Night’s Dream) or, in the case of Meredith Oakes’s libretto for Thomas Adès’s The Tempest, rewriting them. Otto Nicolai’s The Merry Wives of Windsor (1849), whose comic overture we hear opening the third concert of the festival, simplified matters by interspersing spoken dialogue and musical

Lilli Paasikivi performs Sibelius’s The Tempest, on 10 February

LPO 2015/16 SEASON

PLAYING THE BARD


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1944 film starring Laurence Olivier. Mendelssohn’s incidental music for

A Midsummer Night’s Dream is something of an exception. All but the Overture was written for a performance of the play at the behest of the King of Prussia in 1843. But the

Overture itself was composed by the 17-year-old Mendelssohn in

1826, the precocious young composer’s musical

expression of certain poetic elements of Shakespeare’s world. As such, Mendelssohn’s A Midsummer Night’s Dream Overture is in the

tradition of those other purely instrumental

concert works featured in the LPO’s celebration, works

that perhaps best demonstrate the genre-crossing power of

Shakespeare’s poetic ideas. Tchaikovsky’s Hamlet fits into one branch of this tradition, one of three fantasy overtures on Shakespearean subjects he composed (the most famous being the Fantasy Overture on Romeo and Juliet) but which he later reworked into incidental music for a St Petersburg production of the play.

Richard Strauss’s Macbeth (1886–8), one of his less commonly heard tone poems, is also a more general reaction to the play, concentrating (as Liszt had done in his own



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numbers. While arguably one of the greatest Shakespearean scores of all, Prokofiev’s ballet version of Romeo and Juliet, of course eschews words altogether, and does so incredibly effectively, replacing them with the universal language of dance.

We also hear one of the finest of a myriad of settings of Shakespeare’s own verse in Vaughan Williams’s Serenade to Music (1938) – its text adapted from The Merchant of Venice – as well as music designed to accompany the words of other plays. Sibelius’s music for The Tempest was not composed until 1925–7 despite the suggestion being made in 1901 that he tackle the subject (a friend pointing out that Tchaikovsky had already composed his Hamlet Overture) and having contemplated composing a work based on Macbeth as early as 1889. The eventual score, composed for a lavish production in Copenhagen, is seen as one of the composer’s greatest achievements for the theatre, and the two concert suites he assembled from the music contain an array of brilliantly concise and descriptive short movements. William Walton’s Henry V Suite, meanwhile, presents music written for the

Shakespearean and Goethean tone poems) on character portraits rather than plot and, unusually for the composer, having little or no autobiographical content (he was yet to meet his formidable wife, Pauline, in case one is tempted to see her in the characterisation of Lady Macbeth). Dvořák’s Othello Overture, on the other hand, was initially not named as such: in the swirling aesthetic debates of the 19th century, many held ‘merely’ descriptive music to be of limited value. Instead, it and two other overtures of 1891–2 formed a triptych initially given the vague title of Nature, Life and Love. The autograph score of the Othello Overture is filled with references to the play, even if these were left out in the printed edition.

However all these works – the tip of a Shakespearean musical iceberg – show Shakespeare’s ability to inspire across both centuries and national boundaries. How some of the greatest composers did – or didn’t – engage with his poetry and plays is doubly fascinating, telling us about the Bard and those who were inspired by him. This celebration provides a welcome opportunity to explore those questions for ourselves.

FIND OUT MORElpo.org.uk/shakespeare

Left to right: Countertenor Iestyn Davies, LPO Principal Conductor and Artistic Advisor Vladimir Jurowski, Simon Callow OBE: all perform at the Shakespeare400 Gala Concert, 23 April




LPO 2015/16 SEASON

SHAKESPEARE400

A festival of concerts, talks and exploratory events at Royal Festival Hall, celebrating the musical legacy of the world’s greatest playwright

CONCERTS

WEDNESDAY 3 FEBRUARYOthello | Dvořák

WEDNESDAY 10 FEBRUARYThe Tempest | Sibelius

FRIDAY 12 FEBRUARYThe Merry Wives of Windsor | Nicolai

FRIDAY 26 FEBRUARYMacbeth | R StraussA Midsummer Night’s Dream | Mendelssohn

FRIDAY 15 APRILRomeo and Juliet | Prokofiev

SATURDAY 23 APRILAnniversary Gala ConcertFeaturing very special guests

SUNDAY 5 JUNEBottom’s Dream | FUNharmonics

IN THE SPOTLIGHT FREE PRE-CONCERT TALKS

WEDNESDAY 3 FEBRUARYAdapting Othello

WEDNESDAY 10 FEBRUARYLate works of Shakespeare and others

FRIDAY 12 FEBRUARYShakespeare’s Windsor

FRIDAY 26 FEBRUARYThe Macbeths

FRIDAY 15 APRILThink you know Romeo & Juliet?

SPECIAL FREE PERFORMANCES

WEDNESDAY 27 JANUARYHamlet in Russia: Shostakovich’s Hamlet

WEDNESDAY 10 FEBRUARYNew Horizons: Inspired by Shakespeare

SATURDAY 5 MARCHOphelia Dances

SATURDAY 9 APRILLPO Soundworks & Quicksilver: Inspired by Shakespeare

SATURDAY 30 APRILRoyal College of Music Big Band: Such Sweet Thunder

SHAKESPEARE400 IN THE 21ST CENTURY

For exclusive online content around our Shakespeare400 series, including interviews, blog posts, pictures and videos, keep an eye on our social media channels and visit our dedicated Shakespeare400 webpage at lpo.org.uk/shakespeare



#shakespeare400

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LPO RECORDING WINS AWARD

CONGRATULATIONS!

Congratulations to Education Director Isabella Kernot on the birth of Thomas Richard Kernot Slaney in September, weighing a very healthy 8 pounds 12 ounces.

Helen Yang (née Etheridge), our Development Assistant, married Chen Yang on 25 September in West Wickham, Kent. They met while Helen was working in China and the wedding reception featured a variety of music, from traditional Chinese music played on a guzheng, the ancient Chinese zither, to Irish ceilidh music.

Ji-Hyun Lee, First Violin, also got married in the autumn after a whirlwind romance. Her boyfriend, a tenor who has sung at the Royal Opera House, proposed when they were in Italy for LPO violinist Lorenzo Gentili-Tedeschi’s wedding in July (reported in the last edition of Tune In). She and her husband share the same first name which means ‘destiny’. No more to be said.

Education and Community Project Manager Lucy Sims (née Duffy) married Mike Sims in a wintery wedding on 12 December in Hythe in Kent. Lucy’s outfit included some magnificent white wedding wellington boots! The newlyweds went on honeymoon to the Dominican Republic in January.

We are delighted that we have added to our list of awards: Limelight, Australia’s classical music and arts magazine, has named the LPO’s live recording of Messiaen’s Des canyons aux étoiles as Orchestral Recording of the Year 2015. The work features four soloists including LPO Principal Horn John Ryan and LPO Principal Percussion Andrew Barclay (on xylorimba, a slightly larger xylophone), and received critical acclaim on its release. Andrew McGregor on BBC Radio 3’s CD Review described it as ‘an extraordinary achievement ... the playing of the LPO is exemplary’. Philip Clark of Limelight writes: ‘these canyons are brought alive with the sound of sound, this extraordinary score inviting your ears to footslog through a living, breathing, evolving aural environment ... Christoph Eschenbach revels in all this elemental, psycho-geographic splendour, chiseling the mosaic together piece by piece until the final movement where the music takes to the heavens and celestial harmony returns.’

CLASSICAL LIVE

The Orchestra is delighted to be part of Classical Live, a brand new online platform exclusively on Google Play showcasing the great orchestras of the world in recent live performances. It’s yet another way the Orchestra is able to expand its reach to new audiences across the globe. The first release is of a concert performed in March last year featuring excerpts from Prokofiev’s Chout (‘The Buffoon’), LPO Composer in Residence Magnus Lindberg’s Piano Concerto No. 2 with Yefim Bronfman as soloist, and Stravinsky’s Petrushka. Vladimir Jurowski conducts. classical-live.com

Messiaen Des canyons aux étoiles

Christoph Eschenbach conductorTzimon Barto piano | John Ryan hornAndrew Barclay xylorimbaErika Öhman glockenspiel

£10.99 (2 CDs)LPO-0083

CDs available from lpo.org.uk/recordings, LPO Ticket Office 020 7840 4242

READ THE FULL REVIEW HERElpo.uk/limelightwinner

CAROLS AT WATERLOO

As in previous years, members of the LPO played everyone’s favourite carols with singers from the London Philharmonic Choir on Thursday 10 December 2015 at Waterloo station. This year the collection was in aid of Save the Children. We managed to raise a total of £2884.69 beating last year’s record, so thanks to everyone who supported us!

Vladimir Jurowski makes a special appearance on cymbals

PRINCIPAL SECOND VIOLIN

The long quest is over! We have appointed a Principal Second Violin and extend a very warm welcome to Andrew Storey who started with the Orchestra in January 2016.

Andrew joins us from the Royal Philharmonic

Orchestra where he was Principal Second Violin. He has worked as a guest principal with the Philharmonia, BBC Symphony, Hallé, Orchestra of the Royal Opera House, ENO and various chamber orchestras. Andrew performs the occasional recital and recent chamber performances have included a career highlight (so far) of Schubert’s wonderful quintet alongside Pinchas Zukerman. His free time is consumed by his four children and two cats.

Of his appointment he says: ‘I’m really excited about my move to the LPO. It’s a fantastic orchestra of brilliant musicians and lovely people. I’m particularly looking forward to the exciting repertoire ahead at the Royal Festival Hall and getting to know lots of operas at Glyndebourne.’

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LPO NEWS

NEW & NOTEWORTHY

lpo.org.uk



lpo.uk/limelightwinner

lpo.org.uk

– 08 –

LPO EDUCATION AND COMMUNITY

FOYLE FUTURE FIRSTS

The London Philharmonic Orchestra’s annual Foyle Future Firsts Development Programme (FFF) bridges the transition between college and the professional

platform for up to 16 outstanding young musicians as they take their first tentative steps into the real world.

Instrumentalists endure a rigorous audition process and out of the 150 who audition, just sixteen are given the unique opportunity to spend 12 months with the Orchestra. The benefits include participation in a series of mock auditions, training in creative and community leadership by working on LPO Education and Community projects, and participation in a high-profile concert and access to new professional networks via their fellow cohorts and LPO musicians.

A significant part of the scheme – and one that is often quoted as a major reason for applying for a place – is that each

instrumentalist is allocated an LPO Principal as a mentor through whom they receive advice and support in one-to-one lessons and in a series of ‘sit-ins’ during rehearsals with the full Orchestra. As we discovered in our last Tune In edition, LPO musicians also derive benefits from taking part in education schemes, as explained by Anne McAneney (Trumpet) and Alice Munday (Oboe), participants in the Creative Classrooms scheme. Pieter Schoeman, LPO Leader agrees: he derives a great deal of pleasure from being a FFF mentor. We caught up with him at the auditions for the 2015/16 intake.

‘Our role as mentors is to help the participants find jobs one day and it’s very satisfying to see how that happens,’ Pieter says. They build up a special relationship that can last for years. He goes on to explain: ‘We spend a substantial amount of time with the students and they can call up any time to discuss anything. Even after they have finished the programme they are free to call and ask advice about what they should do. They will discuss sensitive things about their career.’ The relationship with their mentor means much to the participant, too, one FFF commenting that it was ‘the part of the scheme which I value most. I am very grateful to my mentor for all I’ve learned from her through the year’.

Pieter clearly believes helping these talented young professionals is extremely important and has reaped dividends for both the Orchestra and the students. ‘We have a successful track record of students getting trials with orchestras while on the programme. This past season three violinists got trials for very good jobs and of course Ilyoung [Ilyoung Chae, First Violin] actually got


a job with the LPO while on FFF.’ This comment is backed up by FFF’s impressive ‘next-step’ results. Many are well on the way to securing their first orchestral jobs in only a matter of months, including trials for section principal roles.

The audition process can be daunting and quite rightly so as the programme is high-profile and has a strong reputation amongst not only the UK’s young classical musicians, but also those from overseas. A previous FFF commented: ‘The scheme is really unique compared to side-by-side schemes offered by other orchestras. I’d say this is the most comprehensive. It’s really appropriately placed for college leavers.’ As Pieter says, it can be a cruel, nasty world and there are many good

The Foyle Future Firsts Development Programme helps talented young instrumentalists on the road to becoming professional

musicians. Mentor and LPO Leader, Pieter Schoeman, explains what makes a successful candidate and his personal pleasure of being

involved in the scheme.

Pieter Schoeman, LPO Leader and Foyle Future Firsts mentor

FFFs enjoy their first education session

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lpo org.uk/education

lpo.org.uk/education

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players, so what is the panel looking for at the audition? It’s not just an exceptional musicality and technique – personality plays an important part. ‘We have some people who are incredible players but their individual sound might not be so good in a group and so we are not really sure how they will fit into the orchestra’, explains Pieter. ‘I’m not saying we are looking for faceless people – not at all – we need those with a personality but you have to be able to contain that personality.’

Pieter does have some sound advice for those at the audition stage, and that’s to make sure they take as much effort over the symphonic extract parts they are asked to perform as well as the concertos: it can be make or break. ‘If you want a job in the Orchestra you will have millions of notes to play so you can’t be expected to play perfectly all the time, but in the audition it’s such a small amount, so it is expected to be technically flawless. If you can’t do that, how are you expected to play all those notes you are going to play in the rest of your career?’ A true eye-opener to the world of the orchestral musician. He also suggests performing it in front of a trusted advisor before the actual audition.

Once they have a coveted place on the

scheme then the hard work really begins for the students, culminating in a concert showcasing FFFs at the Royal College of Music, as well as two pre-concert performances (see right), and being involved in Education and Community projects, giving it an all-round, holistic aspect, again much

appreciated by the students: ‘The scheme showed me the variety

of projects in the LPO, and its philosophy regarding

education work is one that I really admire’, said one participant.

One last word from Pieter: ‘FFF can be time-

consuming but that’s fine, that’s what we’re here for –

to help the young musicians – and, especially if they appreciate

the help you give, you are willing to go out of your way to help them. And you get personal pleasure to see them succeed. It’s amazing to get that text to say they got the job. It makes it all worthwhile.

Foyle Future Firsts Development Programme is generously funded by The Foyle Foundation with additional support from Help Musicians UK, The Barbara Whatmore Charitable Trust and the Lord and Lady Lurgan Trust.

Pieter Schoeman’s chair is supported by Neil Westreich


2015/16 Foyle Future Firsts and Young Composers cohorts

We are here to help the students. I get personal

pleasure seeing them succeed. It’s amazing to get that text to say they got the job. It makes it

all worthwhile.

Pieter Schoeman

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FOYLE FUTURE FIRSTS FREE PRE-CONCERT EVENTS

AT ROYAL FESTIVAL HALL

Wednesday 27 January 2016 6.00 –6.45pm

Shostakovich Hamlet, Op. 32a – Suite from the Theatre Music

Vladimir Jurowski conductor

Saturday 5 March 20166.00 –6.45pm

Oliver Knussen Ophelia Dances Brett Dean Wolf-Lieder (Wolf Songs)

Ben Gernon conductor Jenavieve Moore soprano

DEBUT SOUNDS AT ROYAL COLLEGE OF MUSIC

Monday 4 July 2016 | 7.30pm

Five new concertinos by the five LPO Young Composers played by LPO soloists and Foyle Future Firsts, conducted by Magnus Lindberg. Also included is a performance by Royal College of Music students.

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lpo org.uk/education

lpo.org.uk/education

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SOUNDS & SWEET AIRSLPO NEWS

PLAY YOUR PART IN 2016


In 2016 we are inviting audiences to help us build a community of 400 donors to support our landmark celebration of the legacy of Shakespeare in music.

By donating to our Shakespeare Appeal you will become one of our Shakespeare400 and enable us to deliver:

• Five Shakespeare-themed concerts• Eight free pre-concert events with leading experts• A series of education and community events to inspire hundreds of young people in south London and beyond with the spirit of Shakespeare in music.

Donations of any amount will make a difference. Those able to give £400 or more will be invited to associate their contribution with a year on our Shakespeare-in-music timeline.

To support our creative ambition for the Shakespeare400 Festival and help us build our Shakespeare400 visit lpo.org.uk/supportshakespeare, or contact Kathryn Hageman on 020 7840 4212 or email [email protected].

HENRY WOOD HALL

On Tuesday 23 February 2016 we will be hosting our annual Behind the Scenes evening in the intimate surroundings of Henry Wood Hall.

An event not to miss, this year will feature an In

Conversation piece with acclaimed Russian conductor Vasily Petrenko (pictured) as he gives an extraordinary insight into his working process. A performance of Brahms’s Clarinet Trio will follow and guests will also have the opportunity to ask questions.

The evening will begin with a drinks reception in the Crypt and will include a post-talk informal supper with the musicians, LPO staff and other supporters of the Orchestra.

Tickets available for members only and are priced at £45. To book, or for further information, please contact Rebecca Fogg on 020 7840 4209 or [email protected] by Friday 12 February.

lpo.org.uk

SOUNDS & SWEET AIRS GALA 2016

We are delighted to announce that ‘Sounds & Sweet Airs’, the 2016 London Philharmonic Orchestra Gala evening, will be held on Wednesday 27 April amidst the stunning surroundings of the Old Royal Naval College, Greenwich.

The evening, curated in partnership with acclaimed actor Simon Callow CBE, will include performances inspired by Shakespeare as we celebrate his 400th anniversary. Guests will enjoy a Champagne Taittinger reception on the Colonnades before moving on to the beautiful Chapel for an orchestral showcase with Vladimir Jurowski at the helm. Guests will then adjourn to the stunning Painted Hall to enjoy a three-course gala dinner and a live auction in support of the work of the London Philharmonic Orchestra.

For further information and to book your ticket please contact Catherine Faulkner on 0207 840 4207, email [email protected] or visit lpo.org.uk/support/gala.html

lpo.org.uk/supportshakespeare

mailto:[email protected]


lpo.org.uk


lpo.org.uk/support/gala.html

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Corinthia Hotel London

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PREFERRED PARTNERS: COMPETITION & NEWSLPO NEWS

WIN VIP TICKETS AND WINE WITH VILLA MARIAIt’s not easy to tell your dad that you’re quitting a career in carpentry to try your hand at making wine. But in 1961, at the age of 21, that’s exactly what Sir George Fistonich did. He leased five acres of land from his father, planted one acre with grapes and started making wine under the name Villa Maria. From the outset Sir George was determined to be at the cutting edge of quality winegrowing and as a result, Villa Maria Estate has claimed the title of New Zealand’s Most Awarded Winery for over 30 consecutive years.

With a mutual focus on excellence in their respective fields Villa Maria is a perfect fit as the official wine partner to the London Philharmonic Orchestra, and is delighted to offer one winner a pair of VIP tickets to a concert of their choice in the current season (full listings can be found on page 13). These tickets provide some of the best seats in the house along with a complimentary invitation to the Orchestra’s private bar where guests can enjoy Villa Maria wines and canapés. The prize also includes six bottles of Villa Maria’s exceptional Reserve Wairau Valley Sauvignon Blanc. Additionally two runners up will each receive a bottle of this delicious wine.

lpo.org.uk

To enter, please email [email protected] with your answer to the following question:

What is your favourite grape variety?

Please include your name, address and telephone number, and put ‘LPO Competition’ in the Subject line.

Terms and conditions

All entrants must be aged 18 years or over.

A full UK mainland address and telephone number must be provided for delivery purposes.

Competition closes on 12 February 2016

CORINTHIA HOTEL ARTIST IN RESIDENCE

In January 2016 Corinthia Hotel London will host the world premiere of Found and Lost, a site-specific opera-inspired project written by composer Emily Hall.

For its fourth Artist in Residence programme since it opened in 2011 the hotel, one of the LPO’s Preferred Partners, invited proposals for opera-themed works to take place within the building. The Artist in Residence programme is an annual initiative to support emerging talent and the Arts.

Emily beat eleven other composers to win the commission. Timothy Walker, the Orchestra’s Chief Executive and Artistic Director, was on the panel of judges alongside Royal Opera House Chief Executive Alex Beard, tenor Joseph Calleja, English Touring Opera Artistic Director James Conway and Guardian journalist Imogen Tilden.

Emily embarked on a month’s residency at the Corinthia to develop material for her opera which reveals the secret life of a hotel. Guests will embark on a sonic journey through some of Corinthia Hotel London’s most beautiful spaces in this guided experience of discovery where rooms can break into song, and real or imagined dramas could be waiting just around the corner.

The opera will run from 25 January to 3 February 2016. To book tickets call 084 4477 1000 or visit corinthia-air.com.

lpo.org.uk


corinthia-air.com

– 12 –

2016 sees the centenary of one of the nation’s favourite children’s authors, Roald Dahl. As part of the celebrations, for the LPO’s FUNharmonics family concert on Saturday 20 February, his much-loved story The BFG, adapted for performance by award-winning writer and Olivier nominee Hattie Naylor, will be brought to life by a special performer and the London Philharmonic Orchestra playing well-known pieces to support the action of this wonderful tale.

On Sunday 5 June we present Bottom’s Dream – lose yourself in the woods with the LPO and Globe Education in this special musical version of A Midsummer Night’s Dream. Expect enchantment and confusion, and a bit of silliness along the way.

As is usual with all our FUNharmonics concerts there will be free activities throughout the morning for children, including art workshops and have a go at an orchestral instrument.


lpo.org.uk

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NEW & NOTEWORTHYLONDON PHILHARMONIC ORCHESTRA

GLYNDEBOURNE FESTIVAL OPERA 2016

The Orchestra has toured for many years and this season is no exception. So far the Orchestra has visited Verona, made its debut at La Scala, Milan and revisited the Concertgebouw, Amsterdam. Vladimir Jurowski conducted concerts in Barcelona, Alicante and Madrid, with Leonidas Kavakos performing the Sibelius Violin Concerto alongside Tchaikovsky’s Symphony No. 5, and in December the Orchestra travelled to Germany.

A definite highlight was the Orchestra’s visit to Mexico in September as part of the Dual Year of UK and Mexico (tied in with a concert at Royal Festival Hall on 6 November), with performances led by Mexican conductor Alondra de la Parra. The Orchestra enjoyed fantastic audiences in Mexico, particularly on the Mexican Day of Independence, and you

can now share the experience: our performance of Mahler’s Symphony No. 2 with the CBSO Chorus, live from the Palacio de

Bellas Artes in Mexico City, is now available to watch on Medici TV:

lpo.uk/ParraMahler2.Jennifer Pike joined the

Orchestra on 14 and 15 September to perform Vaughan Williams’s The Lark Ascending. You can watch her in rehearsal on

Alondra’s Facebook feed: lpo.uk/AlondraFBMexico.

Our upcoming tours are to the Canary Islands in January,

Brussels in March and a return visit to Madrid a few days later. Full details are

on page 15 and tickets are available for all tour concerts. Other visits are in the pipeline for this season so keep an eye on our website: lpo.org.uk/tours.

For four months of the year, the Orchestra players bid a fond farewell to the Royal Festival Hall and head for the Sussex countryside for the Glyndebourne season where the LPO is the Resident Symphony Orchestra. Glyndebourne’s contribution to Shakespeare400 (see pages 4–6) is a production of Britten’s A Midsummer Night’s Dream, a revival of the 1981 production and directed by Peter Hall, and a new production of Berlioz’s Béatrice et Bénédict. Also included is Wagner’s Die Meistersinger von Nürnberg conducted by Glyndebourne Music Director, Robin Ticciati. The DVD of the previous production in 2011, with the LPO’s Principal Conductor and Artistic Advisor, Vladimir Jurowski at the helm, won the BBC Music Magazine Award 2015 for Best Opera. We are looking forward to revisiting the opera with Robin. The other operas with the LPO are Rossini’s Il barbiere di Siviglia and Janáček’s The Cunning Little Vixen. Early access to tickets is available for corporate and individual supporters of the LPO.

FIND OUT MORElpo.org.uk/about/glyndebourne

lpo.org.uk/support

LPO ON TOUR

Free time in Mexico

The best came in the second half with a perfectly balanced Tchaikovsky’s Fifth

Symphony … the LPO’s performance was outstanding.

Pablo L Rodrígue El País, October 2015, review of

Barcelona concert

GLORIUMPTIOUS FUNHARMONICS AT ROYAL FESTIVAL HALL

Saturday 20 February 2016 12.00 noon–1.00pmA ROALD DAHL CELEBRATION: THE BFG

Sunday 5 June 2016 12.00 noon–1.00pmBOTTOM’S DREAM

ALL FUNharmonics Tickets: Children £5–£9 (recommended age range 6–11) Adults £10–£18Tel 020 7840 4242 | lpo.org.uk

lpo.org.uk

lpo.uk/ParraMahler

lpo.uk/AlondraFBMexico

lpo.org.uk/tours

lpo.org.uk/about/glyndebourne

lpo.org.uk/support

lpo.org.uk


– 13 –

lpo.org.uk

CONCERT LISTINGSLONDON PHILHARMONIC ORCHESTRA

SOUTHBANK CENTRE

Unless otherwise stated, standard prices £9–£39 Premium seats £65

London Philharmonic Orchestra Ticket Office

020 7840 4242 Mon–Fri 10am–5pm lpo.org.uk

Transaction fees: £1.75 online, £2.75 telephone

Southbank Centre Ticket Office 0844 847 9920 Daily 9am–8pm

southbankcentre.co.uk Transaction fees: £1.75 online, £2.75 telephone No transaction fee for bookings made in person

JTI Friday Series is supported by

Saturday 23 January 2016 | 7.30pm

Mozart Serenade No. 8 (Notturno), K286 Lindberg Gran Duo Mozart Wind Serenade No. 12 (Nacht Musik), K388 R Strauss Four Last Songs

Vladimir Jurowski conductor Soile Isokoski soprano

Wednesday 27 January 2016 | 7.30pm

Schnittke Pianissimo Shostakovich Cello Concerto No. 2 Bruckner Symphony No. 3

Vladimir Jurowski conductor Natalia Gutman cello

Live broadcast on BBC Radio 3

Free pre-concert event | 6.00pm–6.45pm Royal Festival Hall

For his 1964 film adaptation of Shakespeare’s Hamlet, the avant-garde Russian director Grigori Kozintsev transformed the classic text into something far more modern and scandalous. Hear a Suite from Shostakovich’s intriguing film score performed by musicians from the London Philharmonic Orchestra’s Foyle Future Firsts Development Programme (see pages 8–9) and LPO Players, conducted by Principal Conductor and Artistic Advisor Vladimir Jurowski.

Foyle Future Firsts is generously supported by the Foyle Foundation with additional support from Help Musicians UK and the Lord & Lady Lurgan Trust.

Saturday 30 January 2016 | 7.30pm

Beethoven Symphony No. 6 (Pastoral) Alexander Raskatov Green Mass (world premiere)*

Vladimir Jurowski conductor Elena Vassilieva soprano Iestyn Davies countertenor Mark Padmore tenor Nikolay Didenko bass Choir of Clare College, Cambridge

* commissioned by the London Philharmonic Orchestra


Alexander Raskatov discusses the world premiere of his Green Mass.

Wednesday 3 February 2016 | 7.30pm

Dvořák Overture, Otello Brahms Double Concerto for violin and cello Dvořák Symphony No. 6

Yannick Nézet-Séguin conductor Lisa Batiashvili violin Maximilian Hornung cello


Professor Russ McDonald, Goldsmiths University of London, and Professor Clare McManus, University of Roehampton, reflect on Othello’s popularity with adaptors and composers, and the play’s role as a lightning rod for perceptions of ethnicity, religion and gender.

Friday 5 February 2016 | 7.30pm

Gershwin Piano Concerto in F Rachmaninoff Symphony No. 2

Yannick Nézet-Séguin conductor Jean-Yves Thibaudet piano


Dvořák Piano Concerto Sibelius The Tempest, Suites 1 & 2 (excerpts)

Osmo Vänskä conductor Stephen Hough piano Lilli Paasikivi mezzo soprano Simon Callow narrator


GCSE student composers showcase new music inspired by Sibelius’s The Tempest.


Gordon McMullan, Academic Director of Shakespeare400, explores the ‘late styles’ of writers, artists and composers, including Sibelius and Shakespeare.


Nicolai Overture, The Merry Wives of Windsor Korngold Violin Concerto Elgar Symphony No. 1

Osmo Vänskä conductor Hyeyoon Park violin


Oliver Urquhart Irvine, Royal Librarian, talks about Shakespeare in the Royal Collections at Windsor, while Sonia Massai, Professor of English, King’s College London, looks at global adaptations of The Merry Wives of Windsor.

Saturday 20 February 2016 | 12.00pm–1.00pm

FUNharmonics Family Concert A ROALD DAHL CELEBRATION: THE BFG

See page 12

This concert is part of Southbank Centre’s Imagine Children’s Festival

Tickets: £10–£18 adults £5–£9 children (recommended age range 6–11)

lpo.org.uk

lpo.org.uk

southbankcentre.co.uk


– 14 –

CONCERT LISTINGS CONTD.LONDON PHILHARMONIC ORCHESTRA


Tchaikovsky Violin Concerto Tchaikovsky Manfred Symphony

Vasily Petrenko conductor Augustin Hadelich violin


Mendelssohn Overture, A Midsummer Night’s Dream

Khachaturian Violin Concerto R Strauss Macbeth Stravinsky The Firebird Suite (1919 version)

Andrés Orozco-Estrada conductor Kristóf Baráti violin


Dr Lucy Munro, Lecturer in Shakespeare, King’s College, London, places Strauss’s Overture in the context of the history of spectacular theatrical productions of Macbeth in the late 19th century.

Saturday 5 March 2016 | 7.30pm

Tchaikovsky Symphony No. 3 Zemlinsky Six Maeterlinck Songs Szymanowski Stabat Mater

Vladimir Jurowski conductor Elżbieta Szmytka soprano Anne Sofie von Otter mezzo soprano Andrzej Dobber baritone London Philharmonic Choir

Organised in collaboration with the Adam Mickiewicz Institute as part of the Polska Music Programme


Oliver Knussen Ophelia Dances Brett Dean Wolf-Lieder (Wolf Songs)

Ben Gernon conductor Jenavieve Moore soprano LPO Players | Members of Foyle Future Firsts (see pages 8–9)

Foyle Future Firsts is generously supported by the Foyle Foundation with additional support from Help Musicians UK and the Lord & Lady Lurgan Trust.

Wednesday 9 March | 7.30pm

Rachmaninoff Piano Concerto No. 3 Zemlinsky Die Seejungfrau (The Mermaid)

Vladimir Jurowski conductor Marc-André Hamelin piano

Live broadcast on BBC Radio 3

Friday 18 March 2016 | 7.30pm

Rachmaninoff Piano Concerto No. 2 Brief Encounter (film with live orchestra)

David Charles Abell conductor Jayson Gillham piano

Saturday 9 April 2016 | 7.30pm

Schoenberg Verklärte Nacht* Brahms A German Requiem

Christoph Eschenbach conductor Sarah Tynan soprano Matthias Goerne baritone London Philharmonic Choir

*Please note change of work from that originally advertised


Our creative cross-arts ensemble, LPO Soundworks, takes the characters and words of The Bard of Avon as inspiration for its latest collaborative performance.

Friday 15 April 2016 | 7.30pm

De Falla The Three-cornered Hat (Suite No. 2) Rodrigo Fantasía para un gentilhombre Prokofiev Romeo and Juliet (excerpts)

Jaime Martín conductor Miloš Karadaglić guitar


Think you know Romeo and Juliet? Gordon McMullan, Academic Director Shakespeare400, and colleagues set out to dispel the myths of this well-known story.

Wednesday 20 April 2016 | 7.30pm

Honegger Pacific 231 Saint-Saëns Piano Concerto No. 5 (Egyptian) Dukas La Péri Debussy Images

Vladimir Jurowski conductor Javier Perianes piano

Concert supported by an anonymous donorLive broadcast on BBC Radio 3


ANNIVERSARY GALA CONCERT

Scenes from: Verdi Otello | Tchaikovsky Hamlet Vaughan Williams Serenade to Music Britten A Midsummer Night’s Dream Mendelssohn A Midsummer Night’s Dream Berlioz Roméo et Juliette Prokofiev Romeo and Juliet Thomas Adès The Tempest Walton Henry V | Verdi Falstaff

Vladimir Jurowski conductor Simon Callow director London Philharmonic Orchestra The Glyndebourne Chorus | Trinity Boys Choir

Soloists including: Kate Royal soprano | Allison Bell soprano Dame Felicity Palmer mezzo soprano Iestyn Davies countertenor Ronald Samm tenor | Toby Spence tenor Andrew Shore baritone Simon Keenlyside baritone

Concert generously supported by Victoria Robey OBE

Tickets: £12–£48 | Premium seats £75


Rachmaninoff Piano Concerto No. 4 R Strauss An Alpine Symphony

Vladimir Jurowski conductor Alexey Zuev piano

Free post-concert event | 9.45pm–10.30pm Clore Ballroom, Royal Festival Hall

In a rousing finale to our Shakespeare celebrations, the Royal College of Music Big Band, directed by Mark Armstrong, performs Duke Ellington’s Such Sweet Thunder, based on the work of William Shakespeare.

lpo.org.uk

lpo.org.uk

– 15 –


Sunday 5 June 2016 | 12.00pm–1.00pm

FUNharmonics Family Concert BOTTOM’S DREAM

See page 12

Tickets: £10–£18 adults £5–£9 children (recommended age range 6–11)

AROUND THE UK

Saturday 16 January 2016 | 7.30pm Brighton Dome Box Office: 01273 709709 brightondome.org

Mozart Overture, Lucio Silla Brahms Piano Concerto No. 2 Beethoven Symphony No. 7

Adrian Prabava conductor Stefan Ćirić piano

Sunday 31 January 2016 | 3.00pm Eastbourne Congress Theatre Box Office: 01323 412000 eastbournetheatres.co.uk

Wagner Prelude to Act 1, Die Meistersinger von Nürnberg

Bruch Violin Concerto No. 1 Khachaturian Masquerade Suite Tchaikovsky Swan Lake (excerpts)

Matthew Wood conductor Tianwa Yang violin

Sunday 14 February 2016 | 3.00pm Eastbourne Congress Theatre Box Office: 01323 412000 eastbournetheatres.co.uk

Nielsen Helios Overture Schumann Piano Concerto Sibelius Symphony No. 5

Christian Kluxen conductor Jayson Gillham piano

INTERNATIONAL CONCERTS

For full details of all our tours, visit lpo.org.uk

Friday 11 March 2016 | 8.00pm Klara Festival, Brussels klarafestival.be/en

Gubaidulina Seven Words Zemlinsky Psalm 23Szymanowski Stabat mater*

Vladimir Jurowski conductor Kristina Blaumane cello Elsbeth Moser bayan Elżbieta Szmytka soprano Agnieszka Rehlis mezzo soprano Andrzej Dobber baritone

*Organised in collaboration with the Adam Mickiewicz Institute as part of the Polska Music Programme

Sunday 13 March 2016 | 7.30pmAuditorio Nacional de Música, Madridauditorionacional.mcu.es

Rachmaninoff Piano Concerto No. 3 Tchaikovsky Symphony No. 3 (Polish)

Vladimir Jurowski conductor Nicholas Angelich piano

Monday 14 March 2016 | 7.30pm Auditorio Nacional de Musica, Madridauditorionacional.mcu.es

Mahler Symphony No. 7

Vladimir Jurowski conductor

lpo.org.uk

Saturday 21 February 2016 | 2.00pm and 4.00pm Saffron Hall, Saffron Walden, EssexBox Office: 0845 548 7650saffronhall.com

FUNharmonics Family Concert A ROALD DAHL CELEBRATION: THE BFG

Programme as 20 February, Royal Festival Hall

Saturday 27 February 2016 | 7.30pm Brighton Dome Box Office: 01273 709709 brightondome.org

Mendelssohn Overture, A Midsummer Night’s Dream

Khachaturian Violin Concerto R Strauss Macbeth Stravinsky The Firebird Suite (1919 version)

Andrés Orozco-Estrada conductor Kristóf Baráti violin

Sunday 6 March 2016 | 3.00pm Eastbourne Congress Theatre Box Office: 01323 412000 eastbournetheatres.co.uk

Medtner Piano Concerto No. 2 Tchaikovsky Symphony No. 3

Vladimir Jurowski conductor Marc-André Hamelin piano

Saturday 16 April 2016 | 7.30pm Brighton Dome Box Office: 01273 709709 brightondome.org

De Falla The Three-cornered Hat (Suite No. 2) Rodrigo Fantasía para un gentilhombre Prokofiev Romeo and Juliet (excerpts)

Jaime Martín conductor Miloš Karadaglić guitar

Sunday 17 April 2016 | 3.00pm Eastbourne Congress Theatre Box Office: 01323 412000 eastbournetheatres.co.uk

Programme as 16 April, Brighton

brightondome.org

eastbournetheatres.co.uk


lpo.org.uk

klarafestival.be/en

auditorionacional.mcu.es

auditorionacional.mcu.es

lpo.org.uk

saffronhall.com

brightondome.org


brightondome.org


– 16 –

building. I played dozens and dozens of instruments in the roof, underneath the stage, in the boxes, up in the gallery, in corridors ... The instruments included scaffolding poles I had cut to specific lengths and giant binsasaras (a traditional Japanese instrument), and they had to be pre-set in all the different spaces before every rehearsal. I got very fit that week!

What might we find surprising about the life of a percussionist?People, even other instrumentalists, don’t always realise that we spend hours and hours planning instrument hire, working out who plays what and decrypting scores just to find out what the composer really wants. Often the instructions aren’t specific enough for example, if a bell is requested, that could mean orchestra bells, glockenspiel, hand bells, song bells, tubular bells, ship’s bell, door bell ... the list goes on. It’s our job to contact composers (if they’re alive) and publishers to find out what’s needed. Often the planning can take longer than the practice, rehearsals and concert combined. Luckily for me the Principal, Andy Barclay, has to do most of it.

If you could commission a piece, who would you ask?I really like Anna Meredith. She always writes interesting works and challenging but fun things to play on percussion. I’ve yet to play a piece she’s written where the orchestra is positioned in a traditional format. I love the way she likes to think out of the box.

And beyond hitting instruments?I’m a keen cyclist. I like setting myself big challenges so last year I decided I wanted to tackle the Mont-Ventoux challenge – you cycle up the mountain via three different routes in one day, a total of 70km of climbing. I’m now a proud member of the Club des Cinglés du Mont-Ventoux [the ‘Madmen of the Windy Mountain’]. I’m currently training for my second marathon in Manchester. Our Principal Bass Trombone, Lyndon, is a brilliant runner and is a great help with my training. Also, I’m getting into growing apples and making cider, but I can’t drink too much of it. Training with a hangover is no fun!

lpo.uk/guiro: top tips for Henry

Henry Baldwin’s chair is supported by Jon Claydon


Since joining, what have you discovered about the LPO? Once I knew there was the possibility of a job at the LPO I delved into the history of the Orchestra. It has a fantastic lineage of conductors and legends of the percussion business, including the current section, who have helped make percussion such an important part of the orchestra. There was a time when percussion wasn’t taken very seriously but in the last half century, a wave of players coming in, including Keith Millar, have set the standard and helped make it much more respected. Keith has been an LPO member since 1972 and I feel very fortunate to have joined him, Andy Barclay and Simon Carrington. It’s the passing on of the baton that I’m really excited about: learning the ropes and being schooled in a sound that has developed over decades, and also bringing my own ideas.

Do you have a musical background?My parents were keen for me to get involved in music but they didn’t force it on me. I had piano lessons at an early age and I started on the drum kit at middle school. That was in the days when peripatetic music lessons were still free. Because I played piano I progressed quite quickly and was suddenly in demand in local bands because I could play tuned percussion, unlike the other drummers at school. I auditioned for the National Youth Orchestra, not expecting to get in, but I did. At the first rehearsal my jaw dropped – that was the moment I decided that I wanted to be a professional musician. The NYO is still special to me. I met my fiancée there and have some fantastic memories of playing with them at the BBC Proms.

Any favourite or least favourite instruments?I love playing pretty much all percussion instruments. I sometimes find tuned percussion frustrating, not because I’m not well trained but because I hate playing wrong notes. There is a much bigger margin for error when hitting a drum compared to a xylophone bar. I still really enjoy playing tuned instruments when I hit all the right notes though (which I promise is most of the time!). I discovered I’m definitely not a guiro expert when we were on tour in Mexico. Sometimes you don’t play a certain instrument for ten years, then it’s suddenly handed to you, and

Tune In published by the London Philharmonic Orchestra 89 Albert Embankment, London SE1 7TP Tel: 020 7840 4200 Fax: 020 7840 4201 Ticket Office: 020 7840 4242 lpo.org.uk

– HENRY BALDWIN –Henry joined the LPO as Co-Principal

Percussion in May 2015. Here he talks about the difficulties of playing a guiro and being

a ‘Madman of the Windy Mountain’.

you have to play it to a professional standard. That can lead to some serious pre-concert panicked practice!

You’re pretty exposed in the percussion section. Any scary moments?A phrase I once heard a trumpeter use is ‘we’re either bored to death or scared to death’, and that could be equally applied to percussionists. Actually, I’m never bored. I love listening to the Orchestra but I am fairly regularly quite scared! I have such a lot of respect for my colleagues in the Orchestra that I often find rehearsals just as nerve-wracking as performances.

What’s the most number of instruments you’ve played in one concert?The most outrageous project I’ve been involved with was Benedict Mason’s Meld at the 2014 BBC Proms with Aurora Orchestra [Henry is a founding member of Aurora]. I would bet that it’s the most complicated project the Proms have ever done. It was written specifically for performance in the Royal Albert Hall. We had to learn not only all our music by heart but also a map of the

BACKSTAGELPO PEOPLE

lpo.uk/guiro

lpo.org.uk

LPO Tune In newsletter – Spring/Summer 2016

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Transcript of LPO Tune In newsletter – Spring/Summer 2016