Concerto for Two Pianos and Orchestra
During the 1930s the BBC Symphony Orchestra became renowned for its high standard of playing and for Boult's capable performances of new and unfamiliar music. Like Henry Wood before him, Boult regarded it as his duty to give the best possible performances of a wide range of composers, including those whose works were not personally congenial to him. His biographer, Michael Kennedy, writes that there was a very short list of composers whose works Boult refused to conduct, "but it would be difficult to deduce who they were." Boult's pioneering work with the BBC included an early performance of Schoenberg's "Variations," Op. 31, British premières, including Alban Berg's opera "Wozzeck" and "Three Movements from the Lyric Suite", and world premières, including Vaughan Williams's Symphony No. 4 in F minor and Bartók's Concerto for Two Pianos and Orchestra. He introduced Mahler's Ninth Symphony to London in 1934, and Bartók's Concerto for Orchestra in 1946. Boult invited Anton Webern to conduct eight BBC concerts between 1931 and 1936.