Leopold Stokowski was born in London of Polish/Irish ancestry in 1882 and showed such an early aptitude for music that he was able to enter the RoyalCollege of Music at the tender age of 13, the youngest student at that time to do so. His first foreign tour took place in the spring of 1951 when, at the invitation of Sir Thomas Beecham, he took the Royal Philharmonic on a tour of England to coincide with the 'Festival of Britain' that year. It was during this tour that he also made his first appearance with the BBC Symphony Orchestra in a Royal Festival Hall concert that included Beethoven's 7th Symphony and Stravinsky's Rite of Spring.