There is an undeniable coolness to Oliver Zeffman, as he confidently reels off orders at a top table in Tomos Parry’s Soho restaurant Mountain. “Tomos is a good friend,” he says. We meet for lunch at the peak of the May heatwave, and Zeffman’s tight T-shirt, which reads “Boy University”, hugs a gym-trained physique.
This is perhaps not the scene you would imagine when you think of a classical conductor, and yet the staff here refer to him as “Maestro”. Indeed, the 33-year-old is London’s hottest conductor, here to discuss the project he has become best known for since graduating from the Royal Academy of Music in 2016: Classical Pride.
“Lots of the most important composers, past and present, are or were LGBTQ+,” he says. “Bernstein, Britten, Barber, Tchaikovsky, Handel — it’s a very long list. But for some reason no one had ever done a Pride concert before outside of the US.”
The concept was inaugurated in 2023 at the Barbican, with Zeffman leading the City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra. Some will recall The White Lotus soundtrack, recreated by the musicians, choir and opera singer, and complete with Zeffman’s excitable gestures on the podium, going viral shortly afterwards.
The event has expanded each year and 2026 comprises a four-day run. It will culminate with the London Symphony Orchestra at the Barbican, following a particularly exciting Baroque Ball, which will take over Banqueting House in Whitehall tonight.
“Apart from Bach, three of the big four baroque composers were gay. Handel, Lully and Corelli,” he says. “Music wasn’t really written for concert halls. A lot of it was the court entertainment of the day, and so the idea is kind of to recreate the baroque music which was written to be party music.”
Guests are encouraged to come in period costume for the “gay (re)imagining of the baroque balls of the courts of James I and Louis XIV”. The classical performance will be followed by a “debauched after-party vibe” courtesy of DJ Jodie Harsh.
Zeffman, who began playing the violin aged three before pivoting to conducting at 16 (“because I wanted to be at the front, half joking,” he quips), learnt his craft by setting up a makeshift orchestra of school friends, performing at churches in Highgate, before studying History and Russian at Durham, and relocating to St Petersburg for a year, where he studied at the St Petersburg Conservatory, which is renowned for its conducting school.
A gifted entrepreneur, it is commendable how Zeffman brings his ideas to life. “It started with my parents lending me £300 to rent a space. I’ve learned to raise the money, find the players and put on events you want to be a part of.”
So if you happen upon hundreds of people in Jacobean garb spilling onto the streets of Westminster this evening, know Zeffman is behind it. It is just the type of eccentricity that makes this city thrive.