Not Just Naked Girls

"It is so mad, so utterly wild a scheme that we can't resist!" So saying, the management of the London Symphony canceled 20 recording sessions, five concerts, refused an invitation to the Athens Festival and, with the abandon of undergrads leaving for spring vacation, bundled the orchestra off to that big sandbox in the sun, Daytona Beach, Fla. They are the attraction at the first Florida International Music Festival, by far the most culturally ambitious festival in the Southeast.

Scheduled for a month-long stay, the London Symphony is the first European orchestra to settle in a U.S. city for such an extended engagement. When they arrived two weeks ago--96 musicians, 43 wives and 36 children--they were met by a caravan of 40 cars and treated to a wee-hour spin across Daytona's famed beach. In the days since, it has been one continuous round of sun and surf--and great music.

Counterattack. The first of the orchestra's 16 concerts in Peabody Auditorium attracted a glittering audience in formal dress, with a scattering of flowered sports shirts, slacks and sandals. Colin Davis, the brilliant 39-year-old British conductor, led off the all-British program with a rousing performance of Britten's Young Person's Guide to the Orchestra, a kind of teaser course for the uninitiated, moved on to headier stuff by Vaughan Williams, Frederick Delius and William Walton. The orchestra more than lived up to its reputation as one of the world's finest ensembles. Bolstered by such first-rank performers as Composer-Conductor Aaron Copland, Cellist Janos Starker, Violinist Jaime Laredo and Pianist John Ogdon, the festival was off to an impressive start.

Artistically speaking, that is. Attendance for the first half-dozen performances in the 2,600-seat auditorium ranged from a high of 2,100 to a disappointing low of 800, owing partly to the stiff price of tickets (from $3.50 to $10). But no one was discouraged. The festival, financed with $170,000 raised by the community, was conceived as a "cultural counterattack" on the "sex, suds and sand reputation" of Daytona, and such things take time. Says Festival Director Tippen Davidson: "Something was needed to round out our tourist image--not just naked girls being bounced on a beach blanket."

Pralines & Pompano. The young orchestra (average age: 33), when not involved in its programs or teaching 80 students at the festival's music school, is having a jolly good bash. Festival patrons have showered the musicians with champagne parties, shrimp boils at the yacht club, and enough pralines, hush puppies and fried pompano to fuel Her Majesty's navy. Last week, for those musicians who could tear themselves away from golf, water-skiing and deep-sea fishing, there was a lavish beach party with barbecued chicken, baked beans and 60 gallons of sangria, a bubbly mixture of wine, orange juice and club soda, which was ladled out of a plastic garbage can.

If it survives, the London Symphony could become a permanent summer fixture in Daytona. Says General Secretary Ernest Fleischmann: "It's ridiculous that we had to come to Daytona Beach to do this. It should have happened in England long ago--to teach, play, to benefit the community. This is where we should be eleven months of the year."

* Brian Gaulton, 2nd violin; Peter Benson, 1st violin.

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