In 1958, shortly after returning to Britain from studying in Paris, the flautist William Bennett received a phone call: “Get to the Festival Hall as quick as you can. Sir Thomas Beecham is doing Richard Strauss’s Ein Heldenleben and is a player short. The rehearsal has already started.” This was soon followed by another call telling him to present himself in Manchester for an audition with the BBC Northern Symphony Orchestra, now the BBC Philharmonic.
Five days later Bennett, who has died aged 86 of motor neurone disease, was a member of that orchestra, and embarking on a career as one of the leading players of his generation. Both through influencing the development and design of the flute and making more than 100 recordings as a soloist, many of them on his own Beep Records label, he sought to give his instrument “the depth, dignity and grandeur of the voice or a string instrument”.
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