Editing London Symphony Orchestra (section)

===First World War and 1920s===
Shortly after the beginning of the war the board of the orchestra received a petition from rank and file players protesting about Borsdorf's continued membership of the LSO. Although he had done as much as anyone to found the orchestra, had lived in Britain for 30 years and was married to an Englishwoman, Borsdorf was regarded by some colleagues as an [[enemy alien]] and was forced out of the orchestra.<ref>Morrison, p. 21</ref>

[[File:Beecham-1910-crop.jpg|thumb|right|upright|Sir Thomas Beecham]]
During the war the musical life of Britain was drastically curtailed. The LSO was helped to survive by large donations from [[Thomas Beecham|Sir Thomas Beecham]], who also subsidised the Hallé and the Royal Philharmonic Society. For a year he took the role, though not the title, of chief conductor of the LSO. In 1916 his millionaire father died and Beecham's financial affairs became too complicated for any further musical philanthropy on his part.<ref>Lucas, pp. 45–147</ref> In 1917 the LSO's directors agreed unanimously that they would promote no more concerts until the end of the war.<ref>Morrison, p. 54</ref> The orchestra played for other managements, and managed to survive, although the hitherto remunerative work for regional choral societies dwindled to almost nothing.<ref>Morrison, p. 55</ref>

When peace resumed many of the former players were unavailable. A third of the orchestra's pre-war members were in the armed forces, and rebuilding was urgently needed.<ref name=m56>Morrison, p. 56</ref> The orchestra was willing to allow the ambitious conductor [[Albert Coates (musician)|Albert Coates]] to put himself forward as chief conductor. Coates had three attractions for the orchestra: he was a pupil of Nikisch, he had rich and influential contacts, and he was willing to conduct without fee.<ref name=m56/> He and the orchestra got off to a disastrous start. Their first concert featured the premiere of Elgar's [[Cello Concerto (Elgar)|Cello Concerto]]. Apart from the concerto, which the composer conducted, the rest of the programme was conducted by Coates, who overran his rehearsal time at the expense of Elgar's. Lady Elgar wrote, "that brutal selfish ill-mannered bounder&nbsp;... that brute Coates went on rehearsing."<ref name=webber>Lloyd-Webber, Julian, [https://www.telegraph.co.uk/culture/music/3665153/How-I-fell-in-love-with-E-Es-darling.html "How I fell in love with E E's darling"], ''[[The Daily Telegraph]]'', 17 May 2007; and Anderson, Keith, Liner notes to Naxos CD 8.550503, Dvořák and Elgar Cello Concertos (1992), p. 4</ref> In ''[[The Observer]]'' Newman wrote, "There have been rumours about during the week of inadequate rehearsal. Whatever the explanation, the sad fact remains that never, in all probability, has so great an orchestra made so lamentable an exhibition of itself."<ref>Newman, Ernest, "Music of the Week", ''The Observer'', 2 November 1919, p. 11</ref> Coates remained as chief conductor for two seasons, and after the initial debacle is credited by Morrison with "breathing life and energy into the orchestra".<ref name=m57>Morrison, p. 57</ref>

After Coates left, the orchestra reverted to its preferred practice of engaging numerous guest conductors rather than a single principal conductor.<ref name=m57/> Among the guests were Elgar, Beecham, [[Otto Klemperer]], [[Bruno Walter]], [[Wilhelm Furtwängler]] and [[Serge Koussevitzky]]; soloists in the 1920s included [[Sergei Rachmaninoff]], [[Artur Schnabel]] and the young [[Yehudi Menuhin]]. Revenues were substantial, and the orchestra seemed to many to be entering into a golden age. In fact, for lack of any serious competition in the 1920s, the LSO allowed its standards of playing to slip. In 1927 the Berlin Philharmonic, under Furtwängler, gave two concerts at the Queen's Hall. These, and later concerts by the same orchestra in 1928 and 1929, made obvious the poor standards then prevailing in London.<ref>Kennedy, p. 138</ref> Both the [[BBC]] and Beecham had ambitions to bring London's orchestral standards up to those of Berlin. After an early attempt at co-operation between the BBC and Beecham, they went their separate ways. In 1929 the BBC began recruiting for the new [[BBC Symphony Orchestra]] under [[Adrian Boult]]. The prospect of joining a permanent, salaried orchestra was attractive enough to induce some LSO players to defect.<ref>Morrison, pp. 72–74</ref> The new orchestra immediately received enthusiastic reviews that contrasted starkly with the severe press criticisms of the LSO's playing.<ref>Morrison, pp. 73–74</ref> According to the critic [[Walter J. Turner|W J Turner]] the LSO's problem was not that its playing had deteriorated, but that it had failed to keep up with the considerable improvements in playing achieved over the past two decades by the best European and American orchestras.<ref>Morrison, p. 64</ref>