The York Guildhall Orchestra was founded in 1980 in response to the suggestion that there were a number of very talented players in the York area who would enjoy the experience of exploring the repertoire of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries and playing it to a very high standard – and that there was an audience who would enjoy the experience of listening to such a group.
The Orchestra - Our Story
Music Director - Simon Wright
Founder - John Hastie
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Music Director
As a conductor Simon Wright has earned universal respect and acclaim for his interpretations of wide-ranging and of challenging orchestral and choral repertoire. Throughout his professional career, which has also embraced roles as organist, accompanist, arranger and teacher, he has become established as a musician of enormous integrity, winning the admiration of musicians, audiences and critics alike.
Born in Sunderland, Simon was educated at Chetham’s School, Manchester and at the Royal Manchester College of Music. A regular accompanist of the Hallé Choir, often working with Sir John Barbirolli, he won, at the age of 16, a scholarship to the Royal Manchester College. In the UK, Simon has conducted many British orchestras including the Philharmonia, London Philharmonic Orchestra, Royal Philharmonic Orchestra, City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra, BBC Philharmonic, BBC Scottish Symphony Orchestra, Royal Liverpool Philharmonic, Bournemouth Symphony Orchestra, English Northern Philharmonia, English Chamber Orchestra, Northern Sinfonia and Manchester Camerata. He has also conducted student orchestras at the Royal Academy of Music and Trinity College of Music in London and the Royal Scottish Academy of Music and Drama in Glasgow.
A prize-winner in the 1986 Leeds Conducting Competition, Simon has been Conductor and Artistic Adviser of the Leeds Festival Chorus since 1975 and Musical Director and Principal Conductor of the York Guildhall Orchestra since 1992.
He is deeply committed to the music of the 20th and 21st centuries and has conducted many orchestral and choral premières, including Sir Peter Maxwell Davies’ Canticum Canticorum and Dominic Muldowney’s The Fall of Jerusalem, both with the Leeds Festival Chorus and the BBC Philharmonic, David Gow’s Marimba Concerto with Evelyn Glennie and the York Guildhall Orchestra, Michael Stimpson’s Clouds of War with the Tallis Chamber Choir and English Chamber Orchestra and, most recently, David Matthews’ Fanfares and Flowers with the Trinity College of Music Wind Orchestra, Geoffrey Kinder’s The Bells of London Town with the Leeds Festival Chorus and Judith Bingham’s Shakespeare Requiem with the Leeds Festival Chorus and the BBC Philharmonic. Simon has toured extensively within Europe, and made his American début in New York in 1986.
Recordings, both as conductor and keyboard player, with John Wallace OBE, the Wallace Collection and with the Philharmonia form a major part of his discography which includes recordings on the EMI, Nimbus, Collins Classics, GMN and IMP Masters labels. In 2003 he made his début with the BBC Scottish Symphony Orchestra, conducting a recording of British trumpet concertos with John Wallace, a recording which was released on the Sanctuary Classics label in January 2006. In January 2006, Simon made his début with the Bournemouth Symphony Orchestra and Chorus recording Elgar’s Music Makers and Sea Pictures with Sarah Connolly for Naxos. This recording was released in December 2006 and was nominated for a 2008 Grammy Award.
Recent among his European engagements have been recordings and concerts with the Philharmonisches Staatsorchester Bremen and the Philharmonie und Kammerphilharmonie des Mitteldeutschen Rundfunks Leipzig. Recent engagements have also taken him to the USA, Canada, Italy, France, Germany, Switzerland and Spain as well as to the Caribbean with the English Chamber Orchestra, Viktoria Mullova and Mischa Maisky and to Oman. For four years he conducted the English Chamber Orchestra at the Classical Brit Awards and broadcast on national television, working with Plácido Domingo, Dame Kiri Te Kanawa, Renée Fleming, Bryn Terfel, Andrea Bocelli and Sir James Galway.
In April 2007 Simon made his début with the London Philharmonic Orchestra in a televised concert from the Royal Albert Hall; he returned to conduct the orchestra again in December that year. In December 2007 he also made his début with the Royal Scottish National Orchestra and in April 2008 he conducted the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra for the first time. In December 2010 he made his début with the Ulster Orchestra – and in October 2011, he travelled to South Africa for the first time to conduct the Johannesburg Philharmonic Orchestra in three concerts. Future engagements include concerts with the Vancouver Symphony Orchestra.
In July 2018 Simon was awarded an Honorary Fellowship of York St John University.
Founder
Founder's Reflections
“In 1977, I had the great pleasure of conducting a performance of the Verdi Requiem in York Minster given by the choirs of all the Quaker Schools in the country. I was a comparative newcomer to York, having taken up the appointment of Director of Music at Bootham School in September 1975, and knew little of the orchestral life of the city. During the planning of this epic event in the early months of my appointment, it became clear the choir would exceed 300 youngsters, and that although I could expect some instrumental support from the schools, it seemed more sensible for me to attempt to find orchestral players locally.
"Little did I realise, as I set out to make contact with the many players who lived in or around York, just where the journey would lead me, nor just what a treasure-house of orchestral excellence York truly was in those days; it still is. In the event, I assembled an orchestra of 80 players who came together for a short but intensive period of rehearsal (five rehearsals in three weeks).
"Together with a choir of 385 and four professional soloists, we gave a memorable account of that truly stirring work. Of course, the focus of that event was on the involvement of the young singers, but as the dust settled it did occur to me that it would be perfectly possible to find enough good players to give a purely orchestral concert. I subjected this notion as with so many of my ideas to a process of masterly inactivity. However, the following year, the committee of the York Musical Society kindly invited me to conduct their summer concert while Dr Jackson was in Australia. It was the 150th anniversary of Schubert’s death and they were to do the Mass in A flat and the Unfinished Symphony.
"Once again, I drew players together for a short but intensive period of rehearsal. It was a chance remark made by one of the players over a pint of beer after the concert that proved to be the turning point; a remark to the effect that, whilst it was always a pleasure to be asked to play for choral works, this concert had been special because the orchestra had been able to do something in their own right.“
"This remark, coupled with the very evident enthusiasm of the players, and the fact that York in the late 1970s did not hear much orchestral music from the Romantic and early twentieth century repertoire, led me to give serious consideration to the idea of putting on an orchestral concert. Just the one! The formula of a short but intensive rehearsal period clearly worked; it suited busy people with their many other commitments and there was no doubt about finding players who would be willing to come and play. But I needed a leader who would commend the respect of the string section in general and the violinists in particular. “We’re a highly-strung lot” I was told “and need careful handling”; I could imagine! Talking amongst friends, one name constantly came to the surface; Herbert Whone.“
"I went to see Bert and talked through the idea of the concert and the carefully structured pattern of the rehearsals and sectionals for both strings and wind and the programme, Weber’s Overture to Oberon, Ravel’s Mother Goose Suite and to end with, Brahms’ Symphony No. 1. They were all works that I had studied with George Hurst and felt confident that I could bring some of that great man’s magic to them. To my delight, Bert agreed to occupy the leader’s chair and said he would “see what he could do” in the string sectional. Such modesty! The concert was duly set up. The city’s then Chief Executive, Roy Howell (who was a strong and loyal supporter), gave permission for the use of the Guildhall and, better still, for the use of the name. The Guildhall Orchestra was born.
"The one-off concert took place on 9 February 1980 in front of a capacity audience and provoked an overwhelming response from players and audience alike: 'You can’t stop now! Do another quickly. Strike while the iron is hot'. And from the brass players came a special request for something a bit more exciting “Try Tchaik. 4” they said: “give us something to do”. Another date was found and shortly after Easter we gave a concert “To Celebrate the Arrival of Spring” with Delius’ On hearing the first Cuckoo, Copland’s Appalachian Spring and Tchaikovsky Symphony No.4. They had plenty to do!
“Now there was no turning back. Bert, who had already shown his great gift of being able to convey the gesture behind the written notes in a really inspirational way, agreed to continue as leader. Over the twelve years of our collaboration, he did more to lift and transform the standard of orchestral playing in York than anyone I know. Players would emerge from a sectional rehearsal feeling two feet taller and brimming with confidence. Even I, whose string playing expertise is zero, would leave Bert’s house after a three-hour bowing session in which Bert would have played every note of every piece explaining how and why it was done that way, believing that I could pick up a fiddle and make music.
“The rest is history and will perhaps one day be written. Suffice to say that during the late 1980s, I recognised that the orchestra needed a musical director who would be able to lift them from the point we had reached onto the next level, and so a search for my successor began. During this time, I was able to take “my band” into the newly completed Barbican Centre and establish them there before handing over the musical future of the City of York Guildhall Orchestra to the safe baton of Simon Wright.”
John Hastie
2006
The orchestra's concert on 9th February 2025 was dedicated to the memory of the founder of the orchestra, John Hastie. the text was as follows:
Tonight we mark the passing of the York Guildhall Orchestra’s founder, John Hastie, by performing two of the works that John conducted in the early years of the Orchestra: The Karelia Suite by Sibelius (October 1983) and Tchaikovsky’s Romeo and Juliet (February 1987). John was born and educated in the North East, first as a Chorister at Durham Cathedral and then at the Royal Grammar School, Newcastle upon Tyne. After studying music at Cambridge, where he was organ scholar at Sidney Sussex, John spent a post-graduate year at Durham University during which time he sang in the Cathedral choir as their very first Choral Scholar.
John studied conducting with the great British conductor, George Hurst, and the Guildhall Orchestra’s first concert was of works that John had studied with Hurst. John even had percussion lessons, which stood him in good stead when he transferred from conducting the orchestra to playing bass drum and triangle in the percussion section!
John Hastie's wide ranging musical career encompassed teaching, organ playing and choir training, orchestral, choral and operatic conducting. In 1975 John moved his young family to York, when he became Head of Music at Bootham School.
John founded the Guildhall Orchestra in February 1980 with the vision of bringing players together under the coaching expertise of a professional leader, with an intensive schedule that included sectionals as well as full rehearsals. The orchestra was named after our original concert venue in the 1980s - York's historic Guildhall. Throughout John’s twelve years as conductor there was a true and fruitful partnership with the orchestra’s leader, Herbert Whone. John said of Bert:
"Bert taught and trained the violins, giving them wisdom and insight from his long career as a professional player and from his vast experience as a much-admired teacher. Nuggets of philosophy would nestle alongside landslides of semi-quavers in sectional rehearsals much to the delight and enlightenment of the players. Bert’s influence spread throughout the whole string section and, ultimately, to the whole orchestra. Even I, whose string playing expertise is zero, would leave Bert’s house after a three-hour bowing session believing that I could pick up a fiddle and make music.”
John took early retirement from teaching in 1992 and handed the orchestral baton to Simon Wright. John continued to support the orchestra generously as its manager but was able to devote more energy to church music. John became Director of Music at St Olave's Church (1997-2011) and St Gregory’s Minster, Kirkdale (2012-2023).
In 2001 John made the first of many visits to Paris to study the organ music of Messiaen, Franck, Dupré and Jongen with Naji Hakim, Messiaen’s successor at La Trinité. Whilst director of the Academy of St Olave’s (1997-2009), John conducted the UK première of Hakim’s Third Organ Concerto with Hakim and the Academy strings.
John was a skilled improviser, arranger and composer. On the topic of composing, he wrote:
"The skill of re-harmonisation and inventing a more florid organ part for a final verse is something I cultivated in my teens when, instead of listening to the sermon, I would stare at the next hymn and try to imagine different ways of harmonising the tune and of creating a whole new organ part.
"Occasionally the result of this untried exercise (clearly, I couldn’t ‘have a go’ at it during the sermon!) was a spectacular disaster though generally it worked and the better examples were eventually written down. This development of musical imagination as well as the techniques needed to support and articulate my musical imaginings was an important step towards the art of improvisation, the area closest to composition…“I’m afraid I have no ready answer to the question why do I do it. There are moments when it seems inevitable, unavoidable just as there are times when I simply have to paint. As far as the music is concerned, I do it in the hope that it will enrich our already enriched liturgy, bring an extra frisson of excitement and emphasise something which seems important.”
Pursuing his passion for painting, John graduated with a degree in Fine Art (University of Hull) in 2001. His work was essentially informed by landscape, particularly the North Yorkshire Moors, the Lake District, Offa’s Dyke and the Pembrokeshire coast.
John Hastie leaves a legacy of unpublished anthems, carols, handbell and carillon arrangements, mass settings, responsorial psalms and hymn descants. He also wrote larger-scale works: a two-act opera, Mara, and, for Bromsgrove School, The Vision of Tom Clark. More recently, John composed the Celebratory Fantasy Variations for Simon Wright and the York Guildhall Orchestra, performed at the orchestra’s 40th birthday concert in February 2020.
John’s contribution to York’s musical life was immense and he brought his energy, skills and enthusiasm to all that he did, be it teaching, accompanying, composing, arranging, conducting or coaching. York’s aspiring and accomplished musicians from 8 to over 80 have been the beneficiaries of his talent for 50 years; he will be missed.
