Simon Wills – Composer of Truffaldino

Simon Wills was a trombone player in the HSO from 1969 – 75.  He had no plans for a career in music, but an audition taken for a bet led to his joining the Teatro Massimo in Palermo as first trombone when he was 21.  He later moved to the London Symphony Orchestra and during his years there was also principal in the Chamber Orchestra of Europe.  He worked on every continent, made over 600 commercial recordings and had many solo pieces written for him, including one, Judas Mercator, by Peter Maxwell Davies. 

He now composes full-time and has a fast-growing reputation in Germany, Austria and Switzerland.  Popular works include a terrorism opera The Secret Agent, a setting of Fontane’s Die Brück am Tay and Moro Lasso – a song for an unseen singer.  His Prelude and Fugue upon Quem Pastores Laudavere is a Christmas favourite (last year it was played by the Berlin Philharmonic) and the orchestral arrangements that he made at Claudio Abbado’s request for the Emmy-winning Spitting Image Prokofiev Fantasy have been produced as a ballet at Deutsche Oper am Rhein. 

In July 2009, Tonhalleorchester Zurich premiered his symphonic poem The Island; the same year the Munich Philharmonic commissioned a Dante symphony, subtitled Malebolge.  They toured the work and it has been broadcast worldwide.  2012 sees the production of two new operas.  The Stolen Smells is an opera buffa which the composer will conduct in Luzern in January/March, after which it transfers to Hamburg for recording by Norddeutsche Rundfunk.  Du Bist Da, Du Bist Fort, an opera for children, will open in Düsseldorf in October and tour Germany for the rest of the year.