Adrian Brown comes from a distinguished line of Sir Adrian Boult’s most gifted pupils, studying intensively with him for some years after graduating from the Royal Academy of Music. Sir Adrian wrote: “He has always impressed me as a musician of exceptional attainments who has all the right gifts and ideas to make him a first-class conductor.” Adrian remains the only British conductor to have reached the finals of the Karajan Conductors’ Competition: the Berlin Philharmonic was the first professional orchestra he conducted.
In 1992 Adrian was engaged to conduct the St. Petersburg Philharmonic. In 1998 Sir Roger Norrington recommended him to conduct the Camerata Salzburg. Adrian has also conducted the City of Birmingham, the BBC and BBC Scottish Symphony Orchestras, and the London Sinfonietta. He is a great proponent of contemporary music and has given several first performances.
Adrian has made a particularly invaluable contribution to British musical life working with young musicians. Between 1972 and 2013 he was Music Director of Stoneleigh Youth Orchestra, his tenure honoured with a Celebratory Concert in Cadogan Hall in March 2013. He has frequently conducted both the National Youth Orchestra (working with Sir Colin Davis and Norrington) and the National Youth Wind Orchestra. He runs courses for young musicians, coaches young conductors, and was given the Novello Award for Youth Orchestras at the 1989 Edinburgh Festival. Adrian was one of a hundred musicians presented with a Classic FM Award at their 10th Birthday Honours Celebration in June 2002. In 2013 he was awarded the Making Music NFMS Lady Hilary Groves Prize for services to Community Music.
Adrian is particularly highly-regarded for his interpretations of Berlioz and Elgar: he was presented with the Berlioz International Society Medal in December 2017, and, coinciding with his 70th birthday in October 2019, the Elgar Medal. Adrian founded his own orchestra, the Elgar Sinfonia, in 2018: highlights include Falstaff in June 2021 and, to mark the Elgar Society 50th anniversary, Sea Pictures, Polonia and the Crown of India in the presence of Dame Janet Baker. The Sinfonia has performed a complete cycle of all the Elgar Symphonies and rarely heard choral works, The Light of Life and the Black Knight, with the London Chorus. He has also led performances of Verdi’s Requiem and Beethoven’s Missa Solemnis with the Royal Orchestral Society and the London Chorus.
He has also maintained his connections with his place of birth Suffolk, has conducted the Waveney Sinfonia for 45 years and is returning to conduct the Trianon Music Group in Ipswich.
Adrian recently collaborated with Rustam Khanmurzin in the Bliss Piano Concerto with the Elgar Sinfonia and plans include more Bliss, George Lloyd, Holst, Berloz and Finzi. In the future he hopes to bring more Elgar to the public, continue to explore new repertoire with Bromley (and his other orchestras), and to share his joy of music through illustrated talks.