Guildford Philharmonic Orchestra

There's the 1983 recording of the Bax Symphonic Variations featuring Joyce Hatto (possibly). I have it as a Concert Artist/Fidelio tape but I believe it has been available, on and off, on cd.

To the best of my knowledge by far the majority of the Guildford Orch's recordings appeared on the Concert Artist, Fidelio & Revolution LP labels of Barrington Coupe but I don't know if there's a complete listing of them anywhere. I know there was a Bax Sym 4 & a Bax Pine Trees. The symphony & the genuine Hatto Bax have appeared on Concert Artist CDs but I don't know anything of their current availability. Following DSM's comment one might have thought this was now an opporunity for BC to cash in!

According to Lewis Foreman's Bax biography The symphony was played live & subsequently recorded in 1964. He says Handley & the Orch played the Symphonic Vars in 1970 but he doesn't state the pianist. I assume it was Hatto & the recording (to which Foreman gives positive comments) was made subsequent to the concert.

The only Guildford recording I have is on one of the Sergio Fiorentino CDs put out by APR with Liszt's second concerto & Chopin's Polish Airs Variations. The date is given as 1966. The sound is very dry; a characteristic of Guildford Civic Hall? According to Brian Crimp's notes the Polish Airs are transferred from the mastertape but the Liszt concerto & most solo items are taken from LPs as the masters are lost or damaged. The sound in the Liszt is utterly "dead", not helped by excessive processing to remove the LP surface noise.  

At the risk of duplication of some of the above comments, I'll post this:

Revolution Records of 490A Old Kent Road, London, issued in 1970 (through RCA) three Guildford Philharmonic - Vernon Handley LPs. RCF.001 featured Joyce Hatto (real) performing the Bax Symphonic Variations for Piano & Orchestra; RCF.002 was the Bax 4th Symphony; and RCF.003 Bax's Tale The Pine Trees Knew and E.J. Moeran's Serenade. The latter was not the complete version as recently issued (I forget by whom). All three LPs have extensive notes by Burnett James. The sound on RCF.001 is quite acceptable, not so much the others (could be wrong there with the Symphony but I'm too lazy to put it on to find out).

Handley became Musical Director of the GPO in 1962. He and the GPO & Choir (the town supposedly had three choirs and Handley was responsible for them all) are to be found on a Lyrita recording of music by Hadley and Finzi (as another poster already mentioned).