page_title: British Symphony Orchestra
section_title: 1919
hierarchical_section_title: British Symphony Orchestra / Second formation: 1919 - 1923 / 1919
caption_attribution_description: English: Title: Albert Coates Abstract/medium: 1 negative&#160;: glass&#160;; 5 x 7 in. or smaller.
context_page_description: The British Symphony Orchestra is the name of a number of symphony orchestras, active in both concert halls and recording studios, which have existed at various times in Britain since c1905 until the present day.
  There were gaps of several years when the orchestra's name disappeared from the public view. The orchestra was only active for about fifteen years between 1905 and 1939.
  Its first conductors from 1905 included William Sewell, Julian Clifford senior and Hamilton Harty. After WW1 Raymond Roze reformed the orchestra as a properly-constituted, full-time body of musicians. Roze died unexpectedly in 1920 and was succeeded as chief conductor by Adrian Boult, who gave numerous public concerts over several years. Other musicians conducting the orchestras at the time included Samuel Coleridge-Taylor, Franco Leoni, Ralph Vaughan Williams, and Edward Elgar. Members of the orchestra during this period included Albert Sammons and § Frederick Holding as leaders, and Eugene Cruft on bass.
context_section_description: At the time of its founding in summer 1919, it was the only permanent London orchestra apart from the LSO, which was founded in 1904 by disgruntled players from the Queen's Hall orchestra.
  The orchestra under Roze gave a Royal Command Performance at Buckingham Palace for George V and Queen Mary. The concert included Reels and Strathspeys for strings and wind by Josef Holbrooke and Roze's overture to his incidental music for Julius Caesar.
  Roze conducted the orchestra's first public concert at the Royal Albert Hall on 21 September. The London critic of The Musical Times remarked on the familiar faces on the platform:
  "The words 'first appearance,' however, read oddly in connection with a band largely made up of players whose names are well known to London audiences, some of them soloists. The 'British Symphony Orchestra' begins by claiming attention on the ground that all its members have served in the Army, mostly abroad, but it should soon take a prominent position on its musical merits. Mr. Raymond Rose conducted, and Mr. Tom Burke sang.
  The orchestra, again conducted by Roze, gave a programme in the Albert Hall, Nottingham on 4 December 1919, "embracing Rossini's ever-green William Tell overture, Grieg's Peer Gynt Suite, and the third movement of Tchaikovsky's 'Pathétique' symphony."  Katherine Goodson (piano), Watkin Mills (baritone), and Bronislaw Huberman (violin), were "cordially appreciated. M. Paul Frenkel acted as accompanist."
  Another concert took place on 12 December 1919, with Tchaikovsky's sixth symphony, two Passacaglias by Cyril Scott who also conducted, plus Scott's Idyllic Phantasy for voice, oboe and 'cello, (performed by Astra Desmond, Arthur Foreman and Cedric Sharpe respectively). "[The orchestra] has been heard by the King and Queen; it has a very strong list of naval and military patrons; and is a first-class orchestra, the tone of the strings being particularly full and rich, and the wood-wind conspicuously mellow."
  On 27 December 1919, the BSO appeared at the Royal Albert Hall with Albert Coates conducting a piano concerto with Leopold Godowsky, and the tenor Clarence Whitehill accompanied by Harold Craxton.
caption: Albert Coates, who conducted a concert in 1919
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