Daniel Hammerton - Double Bass
Q. What is your instrument/ position/ job title in the Orchestra?
A. Double bass player.
Q. When did you join the Orchestra?
A. February 3rd 1980
Q. What was your earliest musical experience?
A. Aged five or so in a Methodist Chapel, watching my sister play violin in the 'Messiah' in an orchestra led by ex-principal bass Raymond Hutchinson's father Ernest, and the following week-end listening to it all again in another chapel less than a quarter of a mile away!
Q. If you could play a different instrument, which one would it be?
A. The organ, the king of instruments, and you can play the bass part with your feet!
Q. What would you most like to do if you weren’t a musician?
A. I would have liked to have been good enough to play cricket for Yorkshire or Somerset captained by Brian Close, or any team with Keith Miller in it! Two of the games great all-rounders with terrific sportsmanship. Failing that a plumber.
Q. What’s on your record/CD/MP3 Player/Spotify Playlist right now?
A. Mozart Requiem.
Q. What is your favourite Royal Liverpool Philharmonic Orchestra recording?
A. Libor's recording of the Asrael Symphony by Josef Suk, because it evokes so many happy and humourous moments we were to embark on with Libor after his first performance of a major work that I had never heard.
Q. What is your most memorable moment with the Phil so far?
A. Shepherding Alan (Sir Arthur) Stringer out the back door of Carnegie Hall under my coat after a performance of the Liverpool Oratorio to be blitzed by flash photography who thought he might be someone else!
Q. What do you like to do with your free time outside music?
A. I occasionally play golf under my handicap, which is always exciting and gives one delusions of adequacy and I enjoy quizzes, especially the music starter on 'University Challenge'.
Q. What do you like most about Liverpool?
A. I think one the most important things Liverpool offers is its humour & kind-heartedness, especially in the face of adversity. Liverpool has everything London has on a smaller scale and you are never far from the river. I only came here nearly thirty years ago for three months to keep my bank manager happy; I never managed that, but I wouldn't change anything and I have Anne and my delightful girls Olivia & Imogen to thank for that.
