Profile: Alastair Simpson – LIBRARIAN, BOURNEMOUTH SYMPHONY ORCHESTRA
SERIES EDITOR AL ASTAIR WARREN
Background and career path Born and bred in Dorchester, Dorset, I only took up music because the house my parents bought when I was a child had a piano left by the previous owner. Nearly three decades on I’m now Librarian for the Bournemouth Symphony Orchestra Apart from some choral singing, I played only piano until I attended the Thomas Hardye School, where the Head of Music gave me a bursary to learn an orchestral instrument. I toyed with the idea of the double bass and struggled with French Horn for a couple of weeks before the Brass Master, Kevin Penfold, said ‘Hmm, try the trombone’. It was fascinating to come to a new instrument so different from what I had made music with before, bringing diaphragm, mouth, and movement all together. After Grade 5, Kevin passed me on to Phil Humphries, who I knew a little through folk and early music circles, and he got me to Grade 8 before I left school. I also took up the church organ, being helped by the Salisbury Diocese Pipe-Up scheme, which helps young pianists to learn the organ in order to play for services. I studied Music at Royal Holloway College, University of London and took the trombone as my main instrument through to the end. The new Editor of this august publication licked me into shape for my final recital, pushing me far beyond my boundaries, both in range and extended techniques (this last especially in Rabe’s Basta, a title to which I often appended, in my head, ‘rd’!). By invitation, I joined the trombone section
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of the Strodes Big Band, a group grown from an adult education class to become the civic flagship for the town of Egham. I’ve long enjoyed playing jazz, and I can think of little else that brings me more joy than tight playing in a good trombone section in a big band. I always knew I’d return to Dorset after graduating, though I had little idea of what to do when I got back there. A chance meeting with a school friend in a pub tipped me the wink of a couple of internships at Bournemouth Symphony Orchestra. My contact with our ‘local symphony orchestra’ had been mild; I’d been to a few concerts, usually with a party from school, and I spent my 18th birthday listening to them perform Stravinsky’s Rite of Spring, but I had no idea of the large team behind the scenes. I started out as PR and Marketing Intern, mostly writing press releases about upcoming concerts, but I showed an interest in the Library, so when the then-Librarian went freelance, a space was made for me to continue as an intern there. From there to Assistant Librarian for a couple of years, and then, on a retirement, to Librarian proper! I’ve little desire for any more upward progression; the pace of work and freedom to listen to Radio 4 comedy while shuffling papers suits me very well. And I get to work in professional classical music while living in my home county. Couldn’t be better! My working day The job of Librarian involves making sure the music is as prepared to be played as it can be before the first
