London Philharmonic Orchestra history

Beecham took the orchestra on a controversial tour of Germany in 1936.

As his sixtieth birthday approached in 1939, Beecham was advised by his doctors to take a year's break from conducting, and he planned to go abroad to rest in a warm climate, leaving the orchestra in other hands.

On Beecham's return to England in 1944 the LPO welcomed him back, and in October they gave a concert together that drew superlatives from the critics.

Founded in 1945, the Philharmonia is a world-class symphony orchestra for the 21st century.

Beecham, unwilling to be answerable to anybody, left the LPO and in 1946 founded a rival orchestra, the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra (RPO).

In 1947 the London Philharmonic Choir was founded as the chorus for the LPO.

In January 1951 Boult and the LPO made a tour of Germany, described by Boult's biographer Michael Kennedy as "gruelling", with twelve concerts in as many days.

In 1952, the LPO negotiated a five-year contract with Decca Records that was unusually rewarding for the orchestra, giving it a 10 percent commission on most sales.

In 1956 the LPO toured the Soviet Union, the first British orchestra to do so; the conductors were Boult, Anatole Fistoulari and George Hurst, and the soloists were Alfredo Campoli and Moura Lympany.

In 1958 the LPO appointed William Steinberg, also music director of the Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra, as chief conductor.

Pierre Monteux becomes Principal Conductor (1961–64) at the age of 86, stipulating a 25-year contract with a renewal clause.

In 1962 the orchestra undertook its first tour of India, Australia, and the Far East.

Board of Directors, 1963 Board of Directors, 1963

In March 1964 Legge announced the orchestra’s disbanding.

After the tour Boult retired as principal conductor, but remained closely associated with the orchestra, and was made its President in 1965.

In 1967 the LPO appointed Bernard Haitink as its principal conductor.

André Previn conducts his first concert as Principal Conductor, a Gala in aid of the LSO Trust, with Jacqueline du Pré. Previn spent eleven years as the LSO’s Principal Conductor (1968–79), the longest period of any LSO Principal Conductor thus far.

In Bernard Haitink…artistic director (1970–79) of the London Philharmonic Orchestra.

In 1973 the LPO was caught up in a recurring phenomenon of London orchestral life: the conviction in official circles that having four independent orchestras is too much for one city, and that two or more of the existing ensembles should merge.

In 1982 the orchestra celebrated its golden jubilee.

He became music director of the Royal Opera House, Covent Garden, in London in 1986, and…

He continued to appear with the LPO as a guest, with the title of "conductor laureate"; in 1989 Richard Morrison of The Times wrote that the LPO still played better for Tennstedt than for anyone else.

No successor was appointed until 1990 when Welser-Möst was named as the new principal conductor.

The two orchestras were interested in making a counter-proposal for a joint residency, but the matter was not resolved until 1995 when their plan was finally implemented.

Welser-Möst concluded his LPO tenure in 1996, after what The Guardian called "a fraught few years in which the high hopes placed in him were somehow not fulfilled."

By the time Tony Fell, formerly Managing Director of Boosey & Hawkes, took on the Chairmanship in 1997, a radical rethink was overdue.

Jurowski had first conducted the LPO at the Royal Festival Hall in December 2001, as an emergency substitute for Yuri Temirkanov.

In September 2007, Jurowski became the LPO's eleventh principal conductor.

In this article written to mark our 70th anniversary in 2015, Colin Anderson reflects on our long history.

September 2017 Vladimir Jurowski celebrates his 10th anniversary as the LPO’s Principal Conductor and Artistic Advisor.

August 2020With the 2020 Glyndebourne Festival cancelled, the Orchestra gave ten outdoor performances of Offenbach’s opera Mesdames de la Halle in Glyndebourne's gardens, conducted by Robin Ticciati.