John Wallace obit

Sad passing of top trumpet, 76

 

He was not on the list.

News just arrived that the great Scottish trumpet player John Wallace died early today.

John was principal trumpet for two years each with the Royal Philharmonic and the LSO, then for 19 years with the Philharmonia Orchestra. At the royal wedding of Charles and Diana he played to trumpet solo in Kiri te Kanawa’s aria, watched by millions worldwide. His second most famous solo was in the credits for the TV adaptation of John Le Carre’s Tinker, Tailor, Soldier Spy.

In 2002 John became principal of the Royal Scottish Academy of Music and Drama, retiring in 2014.

Wallace was born in Methil, Fife, Scotland on 14 April 1949. His father Christopher Wallace worked as a joiner at the Tullis Russell Paper Mill in Glenrothes and played in the Tullis Russell Mills Band for 65 years. At the age of seven, John was given a cornet and taught to play, initially by his father. He soon joined the junior band and later progressed to the senior band, being the fourth generation of his family to play in a brass band. In 1964, he was selected to play in the National Youth Orchestra of Great Britain.

Wallace attended Buckhaven High School before going on to study Music at King's College, Cambridge, where his Director of Studies was David Willcocks. He then went on to study composition, with trumpet as a second study, at the Royal Academy of Music and York University.

Finding that composition didn’t pay, Wallace joined the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra as co-principal trumpet in 1974. This was swiftly followed by two years with the London Symphony Orchestra as joint principal trumpet. Then in 1976 he began a nineteen-year stint as principal trumpet of the Philharmonia Orchestra.

Alongside his orchestral duties Wallace developed an extensive solo career, of which the most prominent public high spot was playing a widely televised trumpet solo alongside Kiri Te Kanawa at the wedding of Charles, Prince of Wales to Lady Diana Spencer in July 1981.

In 1986, following a period with the Philip Jones Brass Ensemble, he founded the Wallace Collection Ensemble, a flexible brass interest group.