Liverpool's Royal Philharmonic Orchestra is the country's longest surviving
professional orchestra and can trace its origins back to 1840. It operates under
the auspices of The Royal Liverpool Philharmonic Society, an organisation
founded by the great and the good of Liverpool's upper classes who started the
orchestra with the objective of promoting "the science and practice of music"
for the "pleasure of the moneyed merchant class in the town". A concert hall was
duly built which opened its doors in 1849. The fortunes of the orchestra varied
throughout the remaining half of the ...