Sir Colin Davis, British Conductor, Dies at 85

Matthew Murphy for The New York Times Sir Colin Davis conducted the London Symphony Orchestra at Avery Fisher Hall in New York City in 2011.

Sir Colin Davis, the magisterial conductor whose career with the London Symphony Orchestra spanned over half a century and included 11 years as its principal conductor, died on Sunday.

The London Symphony Orchestra said in a statement that Sir Colin, who served as the orchestra’s president since 2007, died of an unnamed illness on Sunday evening. He was 85.

“Sir Colin’s role in British musical life was immense,” the orchestra said in its statement. “He was internationally renowned for his interpretations of Mozart, Sibelius and Berlioz, and music lovers across the world have been inspired by his performances and recordings.”

Colin Rex Davis was born in Surrey, England, on Sept. 25, 1927.

Though he had always dreamed of being a conductor, his rise in the profession was not swift. His skill on the piano was wanting, as was, he admitted, his desire to play it. He was appointed as assistant conductor of the BBC Scottish Symphony in 1957 after three attempts for the job.

By his own admission, he was hot-headed and short-tempered in his younger years, and his relationships with musicians and musical organizations early in his career were often tempestuous. Though he made his debut with the London Symphony in 1959, it would be decades before he truly made his mark. In 1965, the London Symphony turned him down as chief conductor.

For the next several years, first as chief conductor of the BBC Symphony, then as music director for the Royal Opera House, his career advanced slowly.

It was not until 1992, with his masterful interpretation of the Sibelius cycle with the London Symphony, that his authority became apparent and his fame began to spread. Three years later, he was made principal conductor of the London Symphony, a position he held until 2006, when Valery Gergiev took his place.

His mark on the institution was indelible. He championed Sibelius and Berlioz, whose major works he conducted in full with the London Symphony in 1999 and 2000. He also revived Mozart as a symphonic mainstay after a long absence. In 1997, he took the London Symphony to New York to conduct its first residency at Lincoln Center. He was principal guest conductor of the New York Philharmonic from 1998 to 2003.

He received two Grammy awards for his recording of Berlioz’s Les Troyens with the London Symphony Orchestra in 2002, and another in 2006 for Verdi’s Falstaff.

Though age had slowed his pace in recent years, at the podium he radiated a vigor and passion for his craft to the end.

Anthony Tommasini, the New York Times classical music critic, wrote that when Sir Colin took the podium to conduct the Berlioz Requiem in London’s St. Paul’s Cathedral last June, he “looked a little frail.”

“But once he settled into his tall, swiveling conductor’s chair, he exuded authority and stamina and drew a radiant, angelic and at times terrifying account of this challenging score from the orchestra and chorus.”

There was no immediate word on survivors. Sir Colin’s wife, Shamsi, died in 2010 after nearly half a century of marriage. The couple had five children, and he had two children with his first wife, April Cantelo, the BBC reported.

Toward the end of his life, Sir Colin had become something of a sage in the world of classical music, wont to puff on his pipe and knit in quiet introspection.

”Conductors,” he once said in an interview with The New York Times, ”are paid to think, and that’s what the job should be about: sitting at home thinking, what is this piece How can I set it up to sound its best and live on, because there’s nothing to replace it with just yet This is what absorbs the mind. Especially in old age.”