Gervase de Peyer

Gervase de Peyer was born in London in April 1926 and studied clarinet at the Royal College of Music with Frederick Thurston after wartime service in the Coldstream Guards. He made his concert début in 1948 and was appointed Principal Clarinet of the London Symphony Orchestra in 1955 — a position he held for nearly twenty years, until 1973.

He was the leading British clarinettist of the post-war international recital and chamber music scene. His central repertoire encompassed the Mozart and Brahms concertos (the latter recorded definitively with the LSO under various conductors), the Weber concertos, and the substantial body of British chamber music for clarinet written for him by Britten, Maxwell Davies, Maw, Bennett, Goehr and the wider mid-century school. He was a founding member of the Melos Ensemble in 1950 — the chamber ensemble that gave the world premiere of Britten’s *War Requiem* chamber accompaniment in 1962 and the world premiere of Bartók’s *Contrasts*. His extensive solo recital and concerto recordings with the Melos, the LSO, the English Chamber Orchestra and (after his move to the United States in 1969) the Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center became reference performances. He taught at the Royal Academy of Music and the Curtis Institute, with Emma Johnson and many others among his pupils.

De Peyer was appointed CBE in 1980. He died in Norfolk in February 2017. Music Preserved’s archive includes a range of his recital, concerto and chamber music work.