The Academy of St Martin in the Fields celebrates Neville Marriner's 90th birthday

In April 2014 Sir Neville Marriner is 90. Founder and Life President of the Academy of St Martin in the Fields (ASMF), a celebration of the conductor's birthday is a feature of ASMF's season next year. Still highly active as a conductor, Marriner will be conducting ASMF in a number of celebratory concerts starting with a birthday concert at the Royal Festival Hall on 1 April 2014.

On 1 April 2014 Marriner and the orchestra will be joined by the group's current artistic director, violinist Joshua Bell, for a performance of RVW's The Lark Ascending in  programme which includes Mozart's Piano Concerto No. 20 with Murray Perahia (who is ASMF's principal guest conductor). Then on 20 May 2014 Marriner conducts the orchestra in a concert at St Martin in the Fields which includes Mozart's overture to The Marriage of Figaro and Symphony No. 24 plus RVW's Fantasia on a Theme of Thomas Tallis. The orchestra's celebratory season also includes concerts in Hamburg, Hanover and Munich.

Sir Neville Marriner with ASMF
and Los Romeros
(c) Mike Evans

Neville Marriner studied as a violinist at the Royal College of Music and the Paris Conservatoire. Joining the London Symphony Orchestra in 1956 as principal 2nd violin, he also helped found the Academy of St Martin in the Fields in 1958. Originally the ensemble was a 12 piece group.

Marriner initially directed from the leader's chair, but from the late 1960's he started conducting the group and went on to have a distinguished career conducting both the ASMF and a number of other orchestra including the Los Angeles Chamber Orchestra and the Stuttgart Radio Symphony Orchestra.  Marriner and ASMF recently released a disc of concertos by Howard Blake on the Pentatone Classics label (see my review).

Further information from the Academy of St Martin in the Fields website.



Elsewhere on this blog:

• WIN an evening with Divas and Scholars: History of Opera
• Hilliard Ensemble's 40th birthday party
• War and Peace: Music for Remembrance Choir of Jesus College, Cambridge - CD review
• National Children's Orchestras at the Royal Festival Hall
• Christmas at the Chapel Royal Alistair Dixon and Chapelle du Roi
• Two Dutchmen: Marc Minkowski and Les Musiciens du Louvre Grenoble perform Wagner and Dietsch - CD review
• Les Apotheoses Christophe Rousset and Les Talens Lyriques
• Mark Padmore & Heath Quartet - Tippett Songs and Quartets
• The Barber of Neville - Howard Blake concertos - CD review
• Christmas Sparkle with Voces8 and Edition Peters
• Astonishing - Peter Grimes on Aldeburgh Beach - DVD review
• British Composer Awards
• Ancient and Modern Il Cor Tristo Hilliard Ensemble - CD review
• Nocturne, Lucy Parham, Samuel West and Juliet Stevenson in the life of Chopin
• Home