Sir Thomas Beecham, 2nd Baronet, CH (29 April 1879–8 March 1961) was an English conductor and impresario best known for his association with the London Philharmonic and the Royal Philharmonic orchestras. He was also closely associated with the Liverpool Philharmonic and Hallé orchestras. From the early 20th century until his death, Beecham was a major influence on the musical life of Britain and, according to the BBC, was Britain's first international conductor.
Born to a rich industrial family, Beecham began his career as a conductor in 1899. He used his access to the family fortune to finance opera from the 1910s until the start of the Second World War, staging seasons at Covent Garden, Drury Lane and His Majesty's Theatre with international stars, his own orchestra and a wide repertoire. Among the works he introduced to England were Richard Strauss's Elektra, Salome and Der Rosenkavalier and three operas by Frederick Delius.
Together with his younger colleague Malcolm Sargent, Beecham founded the London Philharmonic, and he conducted its first performance at the Queen's Hall in 1932. In the 1940s he worked for three years in the United States where he was music director of the Seattle Symphony and conducted at the Metropolitan Opera. After his return to Britain, he founded the Royal Philharmonic in 1946 and conducted it until his death in 1961.
For a while he worked as the village postman in Kidlington but in 1847 he moved to Wigan where he started selling Beecham's Pills which were a laxative. By 1859 he was based St Helens where he started advertising as well as selling his pills. He created a network of agents throughout Lancashire and Yorkshire and by 1880 he had expanded his business so much that he was able to open his first factory.
In 1893 he moved to Southport where he fully retired within three years. He died in Southport in 1907 and is buried in St Helens.
Family
In 1847 he married Jane Evans and together they went on to have two sons and two daughters. He subsequently married Sarah Pemberton in 1873 and Mary Sawell in 1879.
Jean Rondeau, Purcell Room, Dec 6. NOT everybody likes the harpsichord. Sir Thomas Beecham, the conductor famous for sharpness of tongue as well as smartness of beat, described its sound as like “skeletons copulating on a tin roof” ... kingsplace.co.uk*.
from Weill’s Cabaret songs to Jarvis Cocker... That was it? ... You need to learn the notes (although some interpreters clearly differ here) – otherwise why would Schoenberg have written them? Thomas Beecham might have famously commented ... Photograph. PR ... .
... best remembered for his choral works.The Critic was the penultimate of nine operas by Stanford and considered one of his best, having been well-received initially and later revived by Thomas Beecham.
... best remembered for his choral works.The Critic was the penultimate of nine operas by Stanford and considered one of his best, having been well received initially and later revived by Thomas Beecham.
Picture a typical day at a Medieval English castle. It will probably involve a tea room ...Perhaps a historical re-enactment ... Glamorous ... It was briefly occupied by brewer, F.J Tennant, and then Henry Beecham, brother of English conductor, Thomas Beecham ... .
Grade. A-. One of the best one-liners attributed to Sir Thomas Beecham refers to the stridently avant-garde Karlheinz Stockhausen... only he could have written a string quartet in which each player is recorded in a separate helicopter. Most popular ... .
After Richard Strauss’s masterpiece Metamorphosen—a composition that mourned the destruction of German culture by the Nazis—premiered in Zurich in 1946, its composer was welcomed to London the following year as a guest of Sir Thomas Beecham.
“There shall be music.” Thomas Beecham was a notable example, doing it several times over. And a latterday Beecham is John Wilson, the genial Geordie whose own Sinfonia of London has created a unique place for itself in Britain’s orchestral hierarchy.
