article_snippet: When it was announced on Tuesday that Sir Simon Rattle will be coming home from Germany in 2017 to run the London Symphony Orchestra, whoops of delight could be heard all the way from London’s Barbican Centre, where the LSO play, to Menlove Avenue,Woolton, the middle-class suburb of Liverpool where Rattle was born 60 years ago.
article_snippet: The most remarkable English classical musician since the celebrated Beecham, Sir Simon Rattle has scaled the highest peaks.
article_snippet: Sir Simon Rattle is to join London Symphony Orchestra as music director .
article_snippet: Knowing Rattle as I do, this was no throw-away remark.
article_snippet: And Sir Simon Rattle is unquestionably a great musician.
article_snippet: Sir Simon Rattle, originally from Kent, was a businessman who taught English in his retirement.
article_snippet: The young Rattle never set foot in Liverpool’s football ground Anfield or Everton’s Goodison Park as his father might have wished but his was a regular at the city’s wonderful Philharmonic Hall where, in 1966, his life changed for ever.
article_snippet: Rattle’s days as conductor of the City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra are the stuff of legend.
article_snippet: Symphony Hall, which opened in June 1991 as a result of Rattle’s persistence and enlightened cross-party political co-operation, remains the best concert hall in Britain.
article_snippet: So when people talk about the cultural development of Birmingham, and Rattle’s substantial part in it, people are not fibbing.
article_snippet: There is a clear will to build a concert hall worthy of London’s unrivalled reputation as a city of culture and Rattle knows, for he is no fool, that he appointment can only assist the process.
article_snippet: Everybody understands that, with Rattle at the helm of such a fine orchestra, the LSO could become world-beaters not only in public performances but also in the world of music education.
article_snippet: That is Rattle’s talent too
article_snippet: This is what helps make Simon Rattle one of the world’s greatest, says Simon biographer Sir Nicholas Kenyon:
highlights_snippet: Sir Simon Rattle to join the London Symphony Orchestra as music director .
  