On 11 October 1960 the English Chamber Orchestra made its debut with a concert of Monteverdi opera extracts at the Royal Festival Hall, edited and directed from the keyboard by Raymond Leppard. Within the year it had already made its first recording and embarked on its first national tour - both conducted by the young Colin Davis. 1961 also saw the Orchestra take up a residency at the Aldeburgh Festival, beginning the fruitful relationship between the ECO and Benjamin Britten which was to last until the composer's death in 1976 and which saw the premieres of masterpieces such as Curlew River and the Cello Symphony (with Mstislav Rostropovich).In 1967 the ECO was chosen to open two major new concert venues - London's Queen Elizabeth all and the Snape Maltings in Aldeburgh - and was involved in the BBC's first classical music recording to be filmed in colour. Two years later the Orchestra made its first world tour, undertaking 28 concerts from America to Italy (via Australia!) directed from the piano by Daniel Barenboim, another of the great performers to have formed a lasting relationship with the ECO.The 1970s saw another world tour (1973), for which Barenboim was joined by Jacqueline du Pré, Andrew Davis and Pinchas Zukerman, residencies at the Edinburgh International Festival (1973-76), the first of many Paquet Lines Music Cruises (1974-97) around the Caribbean and the first of the Orchestra's three recordings of the complete Mozart Piano Concertos directed by Barenboim (Murray Perahia directed the second recording in the early 1980s).The 80s were marked by the appointment of Jeffrey Tate, in 1985, as the ECO's first Principal Conductor. Recordings of the complete Mozart Symphonies with Tate soon followed, along with the Orchestra's third complete recording of the Piano Concertos, with Tate conducting and Mitsuko Uchida as soloist. The 80s also saw the ECO record one of the highest-selling classical albums of all time (Vivaldi's Four Seasons with Nigel Kennedy) and reach an estimated audience of 1,000 million listeners when it played for the wedding of its patron, HRH The Prince of Wales.1991 was Mozart 200: an epic series of 21 concerts at London's Barbican Centre containing - in chronological order - the composer's major works from 1770 to 1791. In the same year the young violinist Stephanie Gonley became the ECO's Leader (only the 3rd in the Orchestra's history) and she was joined in 1994 by Co-leader Paul Barritt.The ECO continues to attract musicians of the stature few chamber orchestras can match, many of whom have long associations with the Orchestra. 2000 saw concerts with Itzhak Perlman and Jeffrey Tate in Europe and with Pinchas Zukerman in America, Christian Zacharias directed the Orchestra for a series of Mozart Piano Concertos in Paris and London, and Maxim Vengerov directed (and conducted) the Orchestra to capacity audiences in the Barbican Hall and at the BBC Proms.These and other relationships continue to be cultivated and in autumn 2000 the widely acclaimed Finnish pianist and conductor Ralf Gothóni was appointed as the Orchestra's Principal Conductor. 2001 saw musical cruises in the Caribbean and the Mediterranean, tours to Finland and South Africa with Gothóni and recordings for radio and CD. The 2001-02 London Concert Season has included, for the first time, concerts in all three of London's major venues: the Barbican, Wigmore Hall and South Bank Centre.Highlights of 2002 include a European tour with Maxim Vengerov and another mediterranean music cruise with Vladimir and Dimitri Ashkenazy, Emanuel Ax, Christine Brewer, Nobuko Imai, James Judd, Sergej Krylov, Arto Noras, Vengerov ... and others! The ECO also appeared at the Classical Brit Awards in the Royal Albert Hall - televised across the world, and will be giving two concerts at this year's BBC Proms. Future plans include concerts and tours with Sir Thomas Allen, Radu Lupu, Bryn Terfel, Maxim Vengerov and Christian Zacharias ... to name but a few!
Festivals
7th Ludwig van Beethoven Easter Festival
