VICE-president Lyndon Jenkins gave a talk about the BBC Symphony Orchestra, which recently celebrated its 75th anniversary, the first concert having taken place on October 1, 1930.
The orchestra's first conductor was Sir Adrian Boult, and guest conductors of the time included Richard Strauss, Alban Berg, Igor Stravinsky, Kodaly and Villa-Lobos.
Mr Jenkins related tales of Arturo Toscanini, Sir Malcolm Sargent, Bruno Walter, and Sir Thomas Beecham, and events and incidents over the last 75 years, including when the orchestra was moved to Bristol, then Bedford, in the Second World War.
Examples of the orchestra over the years included an early recording of the finale of Vaughan Williams's fourth symphony, and Boult's 1936 recording of Walton's Portsmouth Point.
The Prometheus Overture, a Slavonic Dance by Dvorak, and sections of Elgar's Symphony No 2, and Sibelius's Second Symphony were played. he programme ended with Antal Dorati conducting the London Symphony Orchestra in Brahms' Hungarian Dance no 5.
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