The London Symphony Orchestra comprises over 100 players and gives around 90 concerts a year in the Barbican, its home in the City of London. In addition, the LSO tours about a dozen times a year, giving concerts all over the world. The LSO's award-winning education and community programme, LSO Discovery, brings over 30,000 people into contact w...
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The London Symphony Orchestra comprises over 100 players and gives around 90 concerts a year in the Barbican, its home in the City of London. In addition, the LSO tours about a dozen times a year, giving concerts all over the world. The LSO's award-winning education and community programme, LSO Discovery, brings over 30,000 people into contact with the Orchestra every year, and has its home in LSO St Luke's, the UBS and LSO Music Education Centre.
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LSOh!
At the start of its 101st season the London Symphony Orchestra is riding the crest of a wave. Valery Gergiev takes over as Principal Conductor in January 2007, Daniel Harding joins Michael Tilson Thomas as Principal Guest Conductor in 2006, and Sir Colin Davis stays on as President, only the fifth in the Orchestra’s entire history. The LSO’s roster of conductors is second to none.
LSO St Luke’s, the UBS and LSO music education centre on Old Street, is expanding its artistic programme to include more BBC Radio 3 lunchtime chamber concerts, Asian Music Circuit promotions and UBS recitals with top artists from diverse musical backgrounds. LSO Discovery is facilitating music education using new technology and building ever-stronger links with the local community and in Hackney and Islington schools. LSO Live is the best-selling orchestral own-label in the world and is regularly No 1 in the classical downloads charts on iTunes.
At its Barbican home the LSO promotes more concerts than any other classical music organisation in the capital. Audiences here and at LSO St Luke’s are growing: more and different people are coming to LSO concerts, and average attendance has grown by 15% in the last three years. Recordings now take the Orchestra to a global audience of millions – this year in films such as Star Wars: Revenge of the Sith and Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire – and you can hear the LSO on radio, TV, in the movies, on computer games, on planes, in elevators and just about anywhere where music is enjoyed.
New Managing Director, Kathryn McDowell, musicians and staff are looking forward to a future of constant exploration of the LSO’s quality and access mission, re-defining the role of the Orchestra in its second century. We will develop and change what we do to connect to audiences in new, enlightening and dynamic ways.
We will be searching for young talent through our Sound Adventures, annual Academy, String Experience, Wind, Brass and Percussion schemes and Conducting Masterclasses. We will discover new ways to exploit technology for music-making, using the National Grid for Learning to conduct simultaneous live music sessions with multiple schools in Hackney and Islington and beyond. Our concert audiences will be able to contact us using their technology of choice. You will be able to invite your relatives to special concerts tailored for families. Student and community Ambassadors will bring along first-timers to Sampler and Discovery concerts. New ideas and initiatives funded by Arts Council England, the Corporation of London, UBS, Takeda and Rolls Royce, and broadcast on BBC Radio 3 and Classic FM.
The LSO’s pioneering spirit was strong even in its infancy. It was the first British orchestra to tour abroad (1906) and the first European orchestra to travel to America (1912). Since its inception the LSO has given literally hundreds of first performances and commissioned some of the most important music ever written. The Orchestra has the ability to capture the public imagination: it made its first recording in 1913; its first film in 1935; its first popular TV programme (André Previn’s Music Night) in 1971; its first ringtone in 2004 and it’s first digital download in 2005. Always outspoken and inventive, the LSO has led the way in orchestral development and initiative.
The Orchestra now has deep roots, having evolved and adapted to a constantly changing world for over 100 years. So if you think that an orchestra is just a group of people who get together a few times a month to give concerts, you are about to have your ideas challenged.
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