Sarah Willis and Ursula Jones receive RPS Honorary Memberships

The Royal Philharmonic Society (RPS) has awarded Honorary Memberships to horn player Sarah Willis and music industry supporter  Ursula Jones in recognition of their ‘outstanding services to music’. Membership certificates were awarded to Willis and Jones at a special event held yesterday at London’s Royal College of Music (RCM) and presented by the RCM brass faculty.

Since 1826, RPS Honorary Membership has been presented ‘in recognition of those who devote their lives to music and uplifting others with it’. Willis and Jones join a long line of recipients including Mendelssohn, Berlioz, Liszt, Wagner, Verdi, Dvorák, Clara Schumann, Tchaikovsky, Rachmaninov, Ravel and Stravinsky as well as more recent recipients Dame Evelyn Glennie, Sir George Benjamin, Marin Alsop, Stephen Sondheim and Dame Sarah Connolly.

Awarding the Willis’ certificate, RPS chief James Murphy said: ‘Classical music is a boundless, tireless force. Some of the greatest musicians are those who somehow match its colossal energy with extraordinary spirit of their own. Sarah Willis is one such luminary… She’s been such a role model in how she’s used that position to radiate classical music’s wonders, forever making time amidst the most intensive orchestral schedule to present television programmes, lead educational ventures and masterclasses, and harness digital technology to further music’s aura.’

Jones’ late husband, trumpeter Philip Jones was himself a recipient of RPS Honorary Membership in 1999 making the couple the first in history to both receive the honour.

Giving Jones her award, Murphy added: ‘Miraculously matching Sarah’s energy whilst in her nineties, Ursula Jones is nothing short of a musical icon. What an extraordinary life in music she has led. She co-founded the English Chamber Orchestra in the 1950s and brought together multiple other orchestras for notable occasions, including for Leonard Bernstein, for the first West End production of West Side Story. Today, she invests such care and generosity in supporting so many young musicians in the UK and in her native Switzerland.’

Honorary Membership recipients are nominated by RPS members and colleagues across the music profession, with the final choice decided upon by the RPS Board of Trustees and advisory Council.