Vivienne Price, who has died aged 83, was the founder of the National Children’s Orchestra (NCO) and a music teacher who influenced the lives of thousands of children.
Well-known alumni of the orchestra include the cellist Guy Johnston, the violinists Nicola Benedetti and Matthew Denton, and the conductors Daniel Harding and Robin Ticciati. There were also countless musicians who went on to work as orchestral professionals, joined the National Youth Orchestra, entered the BBC Young Musician of the Year, started their own teaching practices, or headed departments in leading schools and colleges.
Vivienne was dedicated to music education and her charges adored her, yet she did not achieve as much public recognition as she deserved.
The first home of the NCO, which is for children aged between seven and 13, was Fitznells Manor, in Ewell, Surrey, the house Vivienne bought with her husband, Tony Carter, in 1978. After they divorced in the mid-1980s, the operation moved to Ashtead, where the NCO had its office above her bungalow. The pattern of courses was established, with a week at Easter, another in the summer, and a weekend at Christmas. The Queen Elizabeth Hall, on the South Bank in London, was the main concert venue. A training orchestra was started to cope with increasing demand and insufficient places.
Today there are five national and six regional orchestras, and other satellite groups to complement the core orchestral training. Children need to audition annually, even if already members of the NCO. Bursaries are available, so that Vivienne’s ethos of music for all young people can be maintained.
She was an old-school violin teacher: she minded about foundation, technique, posture and presentation, and felt deep disappointment if a child came her way who had been badly taught and was not able to maximise any potential.
Her expectations of children were high, and she stretched them. Debbie Wright, a former student who now runs her own teaching practice, recalled at the age of 11 being faced with Tchaikovsky’s Capriccio Italien and thinking she would never get to the end of its seven pages.
Born in Leigh-on-Sea, Essex, Vivienne was raised in Epsom by her mother, after her father, Eric, died when she was a baby. She attended Rosebery school and won an exhibition to the Royal College of Music aged 16, where she learned the violin from Herbert Kinsey. Even as a student, she ran groups at home, from toddler percussion to young orchestras. Later she ran a Saturday morning school for children aged up to 12. All instruments were taught, with the help of visiting teachers, and many participants went on to junior colleges of music. Vivienne trained the junior orchestra at the Guildhall School of Music and Drama, qualifying as a teacher in 1952.
After her diagnosis with leukaemia in 1998, and breast cancer a year later, she handed the NCO baton to Roger Clarkson, though they continued to work together.
This year, the NCO survived a fight over its future, in which the mainly non-musician trustees were seen as being at odds with the core founding principles of the organisation. Vivienne was quoted in the Guardian as saying: “The musicians, staff, volunteers, parents who have made us what we are have been ignored, criticised and bullied. I have been excluded from board decisions. Extraordinary spending decisions have been made behind closed doors.” Eventually matters were resolved, and one of the main points of disagreement – a mooted move to Birmingham from Weston-super-Mare – was shelved.
Vivienne was presented with a lifetime achievement award at the Music Teacher awards for excellence 2014. She was made MBE in 1997.
She is survived by two sons, Julian and Eric.
• Vivienne Price, music teacher and founder of the National Children’s Orchestra, born 9 January 1931; died 6 November 2014
