London Gay Symphony Orchestra

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London Gay Symphony Orchestra

The LGSO is the UK's oldest LGBT Orchestra and one of only a handful in the world. We welcome players of all abilities, and all genders and sexualities.

Founded in 1996, the LGSO has given concerts four times (or more) every year for the past sixteen years at venues throughout the UK including the Royal Festival Hall; we’ve toured internationally to Paris, Cologne and Zagreb; performed with Jimmy Somerville, Simon Callow, Rosalind Plowright and Sue Perkins; recorded a score to the cult film Pervirella; commissioned new work from upcoming composers

; raised thousands of pounds for charities including Amnesty International, The Food Chain, Crusaid and The Albert Kennedy Trust and were recently semi-finalists in the BBC's 'All Together Now: The Great Orchestra Challenge'. To enquire about playing with us please contact: [email protected]

To join our mailing list and hear about our upcoming events please just click the 'mailing list' button at the top of the page and sign up.

08/05/2026

Hello our Wonderful Audience!!

Our 30th Season Finale is upon us and we are going out with a bang! This programme is a celebration of orchestral power and is chock full of energy, movement, and driving rhythms.

From the explosive opening of Dmitri Shostakovich’s Festive Overture to the driving, Mexico City nightlife-inspired rhythms of Gabriela Ortiz’s Antropolis (complete with pounding timpani cadenza) this programme never sits still.

John Adams’ The Chairman Dances adds a surreal, slightly whimsical twist; a dreamlike foxtrot full of hypnotic pulse and motion from his opera Nixon in China, before we close with the sheer scale and power of Sergei Prokofiev’s Symphony No. 5 set against the backdrop of WW2 Russia, and a yearning for freedom.

Join us on Sunday 21st June for a finale to remember!! Doors are at 6:30pm, baton down at 7pm sharp!

🎟 Tickets via the link in bio 🔗

19/03/2026

Mozart's Sinfonia Concertante sounding fabulous at Sunday's rehearsal!

Join us on the 19th April at 7pm to hear this and more wonderful, quintessentially springtime, classical music 🌱🌼

Oboe: Nathan Evans
Clarinet: Gary Clarke
Bassoon: Lucy Keyes
Horn: Iain Clarke

06/03/2026

Birdsong, Mozart, and a forgotten symphony!🌿

Our penultimate concert celebrates the arrival of spring (finally!), from Mozart’s sparkling Marriage of Figaro overture to birdsong and riverlight from Delius.

We’re also shining a spotlight on four of our own fantastic wind players, who step forward as soloists in Mozart’s mysterious and beautiful Sinfonia Concertante.

The evening culminates in the genius of Louise Farrenc’s powerful and thrilling Symphony No. 3; a Romantic masterpiece that is finally getting the recognition it deserves!

Set to be a joyful evening of colour, energy, and discovery; we’d love to see you there!

Get your tickets at the link in bio 🔗

Concert is on Sunday the 19th April, doors are at 6:30pm, baton down at 7pm sharp!

08/02/2026

ONLY 1 WEEK TO GO!! 💂‍♂️

That's right, we are only one week away from our London themed Winter Concert, featuring 3 brilliant 20th Century composers: we have the pomp of Elgar, the whimsy of Tippet and the lyrical depth of Vaughan Williams, a fabulous trifecta of composers to celebrate this equally multifaceted city!

Have a read through above to capital-ise (not sorry) on learning a little more about next week's concert.

Doors at 6:30pm, baton down at 7pm sharp!

Get your tickets at the link in bio! 🔗

06/02/2026

Hello our wonderful audience!

We'd like to share an exciting achievement from one of our members of our fabulous orchestra: Nathan Evans and his 3rd poetry collection, Homography.

This collection is about q***r ancestry, q***r family—and ofc q***r boys!

Published by to mark the start of LGBTQ+ History month, Homography explores q***r heritage through q***r relationships expressed through a range of imagery, from the natural world to the underworld of fe**sh, in forms as diverse as the LGBTQ+ community, all with humour, hope and honesty.

There are musical references throughout, but especially in the poem ‘I Hear a Queerphony’ which uses playing in an orchestra (that's us!) as a metaphor for q***r experience.

If you'd like to bag yourself a copy, there are signed copies available at G**s the Word or if purchasing online head to bookshop.org (not the Besos store!). Nathan will also be performing some of his poetry with music at the common press bookshop on Sunday 22nd, so pop along if you fancy a free evening of poetic entertainment!

Congratulations Nathan!!

***rpoetry

09/01/2026

Hello and Happy New Year our wonderful audience!!

We hope you enjoyed our Christmas Concert as much as we enjoyed performing, it was a blast! have a swipe through to check out some clips including incredible soloist: Basil Alter . Now that we've set the bar, let's see what's coming up next...

London Calling: our 30th season's Winter Concert explores and celebrates the nations capital through the lens of 3 of Britain's best 20th century composers. Elgar opens with a swaggering snapshot of Edwardian city life, a bustling, colourful and loudly confident tour of the early century capital, before Tippett leads us into a more ritualistic world, hinting at older traditions beneath the modern city. The evening culminates in Vaughan Williams' expansive London Symphony, a sweeping and deeply personal vision of the capital, from a quiet dawn to crowded rush hour hustle and bustle before closing with some grand vistas of the Thames, a perfect portrayal of the breadth of London life.

Get your tickets and learn more about the pieces in the programme now at the link in bio!

Concert is on Sunday the 15th February, doors will open at 6:30pm, baton down at 7pm sharp.

See you there!

10/12/2025

Only 4 days to go!! introducing the second piece in our Christmas programme: Tchaikovsky's Violin Concerto played by the fantastic .

An absolute tour de force, this concerto is widely revered as amongst the most difficult to play and was turned down by no less than than two soloists prior to it's premiere! However, having heard him play it first-hand in rehearsals, I can say that Basil absolutely takes the reins of this fantastic concerto with a performance that is not to be missed!!

See you this Sunday, doors at 6:30, baton down at 7pm sharp!

Get your tickets at the link in bio before they sell out 🔗

03/12/2025

Introducing the first piece in our glorious Christmas concert programme: Schumann's fantastic Genoveva Overture.

Written to introduce Schumann's only Opera, Genevova, which tells the tale of romantic deciet that befell Genoveva, the overture manages to capture the full emotional arc from desperation and longing, to deceit and entrapment through to glorious rescue, all in under ten minutes, and apparently without Schumann having a scooby that this was what the opera would be about!!

swipe through to learn more, and follow the link in bio to get your tickets now for the concert next week, Sunday 14th at 7pm sharp!

05/11/2025

"Have yourself an LGSO Christmas..." 🎵🎄☃️
that's definitely how the lyrics went right?

Our 30th season Christmas concert tickets are now live, get yours now to join us on Sunday 14th of December for a Romantic evening of festivities!

This formidable programme or 19th century Romantic era brilliance, starts out the gate with Schumann's dramatic Genoveva Overture, leading into the emotionally and physically demanding (and very well loved!) Tchaikovsky Violin Concerto, which will be played by our incredible soloist, Basil Alter. The Programme closes out with a very fitting tour through the seasonal calendar, but not with Vivaldi: Glazunov's The Seasons, is a magnetic ballet with each movement painting different seasonal depictions in your mind!

Bonus: Swipe to hear a couple of clips of us from our last concert or check out the previous post from to hear highlights from her beautiful performance of Vaughan Williams' The Lark Ascending!!

Get your tickets at the link in bio! 🔗

pride

17/10/2025

It's Concert week and only 2 days till our 30th season debut!!

Our Final piece on the programme needs no introduction: Dvorak's utterly brilliant "New World" Symphony no.9!

This tour de force is considered to be Dvorak's Masterpiece, and has inspired some of the most iconic film scores of modern times!

Haven't got your ticket yet to hear this incredible programme live?? get your tickets now at the link in bio! 🔗

Concert is this Sunday 19th, doors are at 6:30pm, baton down at 7pm sharp!

Address

St Giles Cripplegate, Fore St Avenue
London
EC2Y8DA

Website

http://www.lgso.org.uk/

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