‘The best has to be there for all.’
John Lubbock
For me and everyone else at OSJ, the music comes first: beautiful music created by a group of outstanding musicians who bring their palpable joy at playing together to every performance. It’s wonderful that, after more than half a century, we continue to present a busy year-round programme of concerts and we continue to commission new work and to explore new musical horizons.
But that’s not all. I have always believed that it was just as important to take our music-making beyond the concert hall. An orchestra is a powerful force in the world, and this power is diluted, if not wasted, if all we do is give conventional performances in concert halls.
Music has an extraordinary power and an extraordinary reach. It can cross boundaries of comprehension, ability, race, gender, age and beyond. It can make inroads where words can’t and build bridges where none seemed possible. And we see this over and over again, particularly in the work that we do as part of our Connections programme.
A corner-stone of this programme is our Music for Autism work, which we have been doing for over twenty years. We spend more than sixty days a year playing to children and young people in special educational needs schools around Oxford and nationally. With Covid restrictions in recent months, we are delighted to have been able to continue doing this work remotely.
In the last few years, our Connections work has also taken off in exciting new directions. With fresh impetus, we have undertaken a series of bold, ambitious projects that seek to build creative musical collaborations and partnerships with diverse groups and communities.
We have worked with young people from migrant and refugee backgrounds in two different projects and with the fledgling, Kabul-based Afghan Women’s Orchestra. During the months of lockdown, we launched a new initiative to take live music, safely, to patients and staff in NHS hospitals. We have also commissioned and recorded new music as part of a collaborative project which aims to raise awareness of the environmental impact on the critical issue of water security around the world. And we continue to seek opportunities to broaden the scope of our social and community engagement work.
Classical music is often thought of as elitist, limiting access to the privileged few and putting up considerable barriers to participation, both to potential players and audience members. This has never been our way. Through our wide-ranging Connections work and through our Young Artists Scheme, we strive to break down barriers to participation by opening doors, sowing seeds and creating opportunities, often where none seemed conceivable.
Our aim is to bring orchestral music of the highest quality to a wide range of different audiences, especially to those who don’t have easy access to it. The best has to be there for all.”
John Lubbock
OSJ’s founder and Artistic Director
The Orchestra of St John’s was founded by John Lubbock while still a student at the Royal Academy of Music. It owes its name to its association with St John’s Smith Square, Westminster, which was its home for many years.
Some sixty years on, the OSJ remains a busy and vibrant orchestra and John Lubbock remains its conductor and musical director. Over the years, John has gathered around him a group of distinguished players and collaborators who are not only outstanding musicians but who also share his passion for bringing music to people of all ages and from all walks of life.
John Lubbock in conversation with Chris Gunness of Classical Music magazine
‘John Lubbock is one of our most significant musical assets – a thoughtful perfectionist and a musician of total integrity.’
Sir Simon Rattle
Support OSJ
You can support all aspects of the work of OSJ by donating to us via the Charities Aid Foundation. Please click on the DONATE button in the page footer.
To become a sponsor of our work, please contact admin@osj.org.uk.
