First UK orchestra to celebrate its archive with a fully searchable online tool.

Have you ever fancied dipping your toe into the Hallé’s rich and extensive 165 year old archive? From anywhere in the world? On Sunday 21st January 2024, the Hallé is thrilled to launch its brand new, digital repertoire database that offers these very opportunities.

Over 20 years in the making, the Hallé is the only UK orchestra to have produced such a database to date. This fully searchable online tool contains over 40,000 listings of individual works, artists, soloists, concert halls and much more from 1858 to 1990, allowing everyone to become a community archivist. This database will continue to develop and grow but already allows the Hallé to share its history – from schools concerts to international tours and everything in between – far and wide.

You can access the database here: https://archive.halle.co.uk/

On the afternoon of Sunday 21 January 2024, a celebration of this extraordinary resource is being held at The Bridgewater Hall, Manchester. Before and after a matinee concert, performed jointly by the Hallé and Hallé Youth Orchestra, Hallé Archivists and other staff will be on hand to answer any questions or offer any help to discover interesting information from the past 165 years through this database. What has the orchestra played on your birthday? How many times has Elgar been performed? Find out for yourself!

The project began back in 2002 when the National Lottery Heritage Fund supported one student volunteer to manually input data for the concerts conducted by the orchestra’s innovative founder, Sir Charles Hallé. Since then, with thanks to further funding from the National Lottery Heritage Fund, a bank of skilled volunteers have been trained as part of the Ancoats: the Hallé Story project, allowing them to continue this fantastic work.

This project has been a labour of love for one dedicated volunteer in particular. He has spent 20 years working in the Hallé’s archive, devoting much of his time to methodically adding to this repertoire database. The Hallé is delighted to be able to recognise his commitment to this project on Sunday 21 January at the launch event.

Our thanks go to National Lottery players as this database has been made possible by the National Lottery Heritage Fund, supporting volunteers in the Ancoats: the Hallé Story project. They are helping to bring the Hallé’s history to life, sharing it with an increasingly wide audience, both in Manchester and further afield. Additional thanks is extended to the Garfield Weston Foundation and the Foyle Foundation for their support in helping to preserve this unique archive and its incredible stories.