ABSTRACT
Louis Boyd Neel started his medical career as a house physician at St George’s Hospital, London, and later worked at King Edward VII’s Hospital for Officers near Harley Street. His career would soon take him out of hospital medicine when he became a general practitioner in Elephant and Castle, Southwark. As well as absorbing the local culture and tending to his patients by day and night, Neel continued to devote himself to music and in his spare time studied theory, singing and orchestration at the Guildhall School of Music. Pieces suitable for such a scale were rarely performed prior to this and Neel uncovered and rediscovered baroque and classical works worthy of his orchestra and commissioned, championed and popularised new works. The orchestra’s noted releases from this time included the first recording of Vaughan Williams’ Fantasia on a Theme by Thomas Tallis and Benjamin Britten’s Simple Symphony.
