NEWCASTLE'S MUSICAL HERITAGE AN INTRODUCTION By ...

CHAPTER THIRTEEN
NEWCASTLE PHILHARMONIC ORCHESTRA
‘An Association has been formed in Newcastle for the purpose of giving Concerts
of the best
Orchestral Music. It is proposed that during the coming season four matinee
Concerts should
be given by the Newcastle Philharmonic Orchestra under the conductorship of
Mr Edgar L. Bainton.’
This was the opening paragraph in a notice put out in 1911 announcing a
series of concerts by the newly formed Philharmonic Orchestra comprised of
around fifty professional musicians. The movement leading to the establishment
of the orchestra began in the previous year when Mr Rogers, conductor of the
Tyne Theatre Orchestra, was asked by some members of the band to institute
rehearsals for the purpose of practising good music. As a result of these
rehearsals an invitation concert was given on Thursday , May 12 th 1910. The
programme included Beethoven’s Fifth Symphony, Sir William Sterndale
Bennet’s Overture ‘The Naiades’, and the Hungarian March from Berloiz’ ‘Faust’
and was so successful that it encouraged the idea of placing the orchestra on a
more permanent footing. A provisional committee was formed and for the season
of 1910-11 a series of three orchestral concerts was given in the Tyne Theatre.
The first programme included Haydn’s ‘Clock’ Symphony and Mendelssohn’s
‘Hebrides’ Overture and subsequent programmes included Brahm’s Third
Symphony, Wagner’s ‘Siegfried Idyll’, Stanford’s First Irish Rhapsody and
Schubert’s C Major Symphony. The press welcomed this new venture, which the
following review testifies and I make no apologies for quoting it in full:
‘The announcement of the formation of another orchestral organisation for
Newcastle suggest the adage ‘It never rains but it pours’. Only a fortnight has
elapsed since I announced the formation of the Newcastle Symphony Orchestra
and now comes the news that the local theatre players have banded themselves
together under the title of the Newcastle Philharmonic Orchestra with Mr E. J.
Rogers as their conductor. At the annual concert under the auspices of the
Amalgamated Musicians’ Union, and also at the Good Friday concerts given in
the Theatre Royal during the past few years, these players have shown genuine
musical ability and temperament and many local musicians have expressed the
wish to me that this fine body could be brought together on more frequent
occasions. At the time of writing this paragraph I am in the dark as to the aim and
objects of the new organisation but if present expectations are realised, my
impressions of the Newcastle Philharmonic Orchestra, who gave their inaugural
concert yesterday, will be found recorded in another part of this mornings issue.
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