Rattle to London

The London Symphony Orchestra announced yesterday that Liverpool-born Simon Rattle will be the orchestra's next music director, beginning in September 2017. Previous music directors have included André Previn, Michael Tilson Thomas, Colin Davis and Valery Gergiev.

After studies at London's Royal Academy of Music, Simon Rattle took on various conducting posts, including as principal guest conductor of the Los Angeles Philharmonic. In 1980 he was appointed principal conductor and artistic advisor of the City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra, and since 2002 has been chief conductor and artistic director of the Berlin Philharmonic.

During a short video interview (available on the LSO's website via the link below) Rattle commented: 'I had the feeling for a long time that LSO and I share so many of the same ideals, not only musically but in terms of the wider world and the communication and access to music, that it just made complete logical sense and emotional sense as well.

'Not only the extraordinary ability of the orchestra but this amazing warmth and family feeling that they carry with them. That's irresistible. I really do believe that given the right time and conditions and work that this can be the greatest orchestra in the world. Everybody is pointing in the same direction and London is an extraordinary vibrant multi-ethnic city in which almost anything is possible.

'We're fairly far into the twenty-first century and I'm not sure that any of us have cracked "well what is an orchestra now?" - but I think it definitely has to have access and education at its centre.

'The LSO have always been leaders in the pack, and if you really believe that this music is everybody's birth right, then the first thing you have to do is get out there and evangelise for it, and show people what it can do. And it's going to be just as important what happens in primary schools as what happens in the concert halls.

'Music was one of the first means of communication. It can say things that are impossible to say in words. At the very basis it can really change people's lives. That's why we're in it.'

Information: lso.co.uk

Posted: 4 March 2015

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