News and Press

To mark the Orchestra’s platinum season, the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra (RPO) will host its 70th Anniversary Gala Concert at the Royal Albert Hall on Monday 19 September, featuring three all-time prestigious artists: Martha Argerich, Charles Dutoit (Artistic Director and Principal Conductor) and Pinchas Zukerman (Principal Guest Conductor). The thrilling concert will include Schumann’s Piano Concerto in A minor with Martha Argerich and Bruch’s Violin Concerto No.1 with Pinchas Zukerman (Violin/Director), and will conclude with Stravinsky’s epic ballet score, The Firebird Suite (1919), conducted by Charles Dutoit.

In a phone interview with Hannah Nepil, prior to his retirement last month, Ian Maclay reflects on his many decades of dedication and hard work as Managing Director of the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra.

He first arrived in 1972, when the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra was only twenty-five years old, and there was no shame in having excessive facial hair. Now, in the ensemble’s 70th Anniversary Year, Ian Maclay is retiring as its Managing Director. How does he feel? ‘It will be like cutting off my right arm,’ he says, ‘but it was always going to be difficult. And I wanted to go before the players were muttering in corners, and saying “Oh blimey, will he never go?”’ He laughs, ‘or perhaps they already are.’

Conductor Robert Ziegler and the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra (RPO) venture into space in a tour featuring music associated with outer space, including Gustav Holst’s The Planets accompanied by awe-inspiring NASA imagery projected high above the Orchestra.