• One of Britain’s most highly respected concert-music composers;
• Major commissions include 3 large-scale orchestral works for the BBC Proms, the most recent of which, VISIONS AND JOURNEYS, premiered by Sir Andrew Davis and the BBC Symphony Orchestra in 2002, won the BBC Listeners Award, as part of the new British Composer Awards inaugurated by the British Academy of Composers and Songwriters.
• USA debut at the ISCM World Music Days, Boston 1976 , with Concerto for Orchestra.
• Choral and chamber works performed worldwide.
• Extensive discography.
• Recent commissions include works for the London Sinfonietta, Cheltenham Festival and the BBC Philharmonic Orchestra.
• Recent highlights include the successful premieres of THE PERIOD OF COSMOGRAPHIE, in the BBC Philharmonic’s Mahler series, and the Second String Quartet, commissioned by the Allegri Quartet, who continue to perform it regularly throughout the UK.

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Recording and cover artwork © NMC Recordings Ltd., 1998

Internationally celebrated for his completion of ELGAR'S THIRD SYMPHONY, commissioned by the Elgar Trust and premiered at the Royal Festival Hall on Sunday 15th February 1998 by the BBC Symphony Orchestra conducted by Sir Andrew Davis. Its first recording for NMC instantly topped the Classical music charts.

There have now been more than 200 known performances of the Symphony, by orchestras including Chicago Symphony, Philadelphia Orchestra ( US premiere), St. Louis Symphony, Dallas Symphony,Cincinnati Symphony, National Symphony of Washington, ( including New York debut at Carnegie Hall) , Sapporo Symphony Orchestra, Hong Kong Philharmonic, Toronto Symphony, New Zealand and West Australian Symphony Orchestras, St.Petersburg Philharmonic, Czech Philarmonic, Danish Radio Orchestra, Royal Stockholm Philharmonic, LSO, Halle, Royal Liverpool Philharmonic, CBSO, and all the BBC Orchestras, of which the BBC Symphony have toured it internationally and performed it twice at the Proms, including a televised relay. In addition it is now in the repertoire of many amateur and youth orchestras here and abroad.

Awards that Anthony Payne has received for his work on the 3rd Symphony include: The South Bank Award for Classical Music The Evening Standard Award for Outstanding Artistic Achievement. Classical Music Magazine's Special Award, and The New York Radio Critics' Award. Also several TV documentaries have featured him and his work on the Symphony.

"Payne's deep knowledge and love of the Elgar style .. have enabled him to 'elaborate' the sketches with a skill and a fidelity to the original that take the breath away...The result is convincingly ambivalent, utterly Elgarian and deeply moving...Payne's labour of love was ... a triumph for all concerned, and a landmark in the history of British music" The Times (Barry Millington)

"..it is that English Romantic way of thinking about melodic line, expressive harmony and instrumental colour- and above all, creating haunting musical atmosphere, which shines through"
Stephen Johnson - The Gramophone