Bromley Symphony Orchestra is a large and successful amateur orchestra based in south London with a reputation for interesting concerts of almost professional standard. We give four concerts a year at Langley Park Centre for the Performing Arts and occasionally a summer workshop.

The orchestra was formed in 1917 by Miss Beatrice Fowle and Miss Gwynne Kimpton, teachers at Bromley High School for Girls, the latter of whom became its first and very successful conductor. The earliest concerts were given under the title “Bromley Patriotic Orchestral Concerts” with the double object of raising public morale as well as helping to raise funds for war charities. The early concerts given by the Orchestra would have seemed unusual to our modern ears, used to the typical overture-concerto-symphony structure or similar. The oldest programme we have seen, for example, 17 November 1923, included not only Beethoven’s Fourth Symphony and the Tchaikovsky Violin Concerto (with Jelly d’Arányi) but also various songs for voice and piano (John Voss and Phyllis Norman-Parker) and Quilter’s Children’s Overture. 

The orchestra rehearses on Mondays from 19:30 to 22:00 at Bishop Justus CE School, Magpie Hall Lane, Bromley BR2 8HZ. Please bring a music stand to rehearsals. Bowed string parts are available after the first rehearsal and string players mark up their own parts. Tea, coffee and biscuits are normally available for 50p (but currently still suspended due to COVID restrictions).

We welcome applications from prospective members and ask new members to complete a registration form and Gift Aid declaration after their first rehearsal. We collect an annual subscription from members who attend rehearsals (with a 50% discount for students). Seating positions are rotated where possible and there are opportunities to perform solo parts.

Playing members commit to the full rehearsal series for each concert they play in. If an absence is unavoidable please contact your section leader immediately, and if you were due to rehearse a solo part, please find a deputy. Members are also expected to put in the necessary time outside rehearsals to learn and practise the pieces they perform, and to promote ticket sales for all the orchestra’s concerts.

There is a Facebook members group ‘BSO Tutti‘, an official Facebook page to like and follow, a twitter feed @BromleySymphony and an Instagram account bromleysymphony. Some members socialise at The Two Doves in Oakley Road after rehearsals and The Railway in West Wickham after concerts.

Visit our website to find out more about Membership