Portrait of the Royal Liverpool Philharmonic – Britain’s oldest and ballsiest orchestra

Liverpool’s last ocean liner lies half a mile inland, on the crest of a hill. The Philharmonic Hall, home of the Royal Liverpool Philharmonic Orchestra, sits between two cathedrals on Hope Street, its towers jutting over the city like twin prows. It’s an unavoidable metaphor: when you enter the Hall on a concert night, the first thing you see is a bronze memorial to the musicians of the Titanic. Everything about the Hall — the grand staircase; the long curving corridors; the art deco auditorium that looks like something from Alexander Korda’s Things to Come — suggests that you’re about to steam off on some fantastic voyage. I’ve heard concerts all over the world, but when I dream about music, it’s always at the Liverpool Phil.

So the news that the RLPO has appointed a new chief conductor feels personal. How could it not? The RLPO was the first orchestra I ever heard — at that point, in the 1980s, reinventing itself under the dapper Czech Libor Pesek. Even then, the conductor of the RLPO was a public figure on Merseyside, whether he liked it or not (a regional TV presenter asked Pesek what he did on his days off. ‘I think.’ ‘What about?’ ‘Death’). Since 2006 Vasily Petrenko has been repeating the trick, cheerfully brandishing football anecdotes while hoovering up international awards for his recordings of Shostakovich and Tchaikovsky. Now Petrenko’s successor has been announced: Domingo Hindoyan, an energetic Venezuelan who — like many newcomers — seems astonished by the reality of the city and its orchestra.

‘Before I ever went to Liverpool, of course I knew the Beatles, Liverpool Football Club and the Titanic,’ says Hindoyan. ‘Even in Caracas, you get that information. But I’ve already conducted the orchestra in Beethoven, Strauss and Stravinsky, as well as new music, and they are brilliant, with a fantastic sound: flexible and disciplined.