My father, Stephen Lawrence, who has died aged 90, was an important figure in the musical life of Cumbria. He was a peripatetic cello teacher, a member of the Cumbria Quartet, ran the Cumbria Youth Orchestra and co-founded the Cumbria Philharmonia. He also played horn in the Westmorland Orchestra.
He was the grand-nephew of William Haslam Mills, the chief reporter of the Manchester Guardian in the early 1900s; Stephen could be found reading the print edition of the Guardian every day until he died.
Born in Widnes, he was the second of three sons of Eva Park, one of the first female students at Manchester University, and Samuel Lawrence, a chemistry lecturer and later HM inspector of technical colleges; he was also a leading member of the Conservation Society, one of the first environmental organisations in the UK.
Stephen went to Stockport grammar school, where he took up the cello. In 1952 he won a scholarship to Trinity College, Oxford, to read chemistry. He played lacrosse for the university (and trialled for England) and met Gillian Rushton, whom he married in 1959, in the cello section of the university orchestra.
After his national service as an RAF navigator in Canada, Stephen got a job with British Cellophane in Barrow-in-Furness, Cumbria, but quite soon tired of industrial management and took a large cut in salary to become a local authority cello teacher.
Eventually, the job included a day a week playing in the Cumbria Quartet. They played in schools and put on their own concert series, performing Beethoven and Bartók, and even commissioned new pieces, while the Cumbria Philharmonia, a large orchestra, played the works of Mahler and Richard Strauss.
After his retirement, Stephen and Gillian moved to Hutton Roof, near Kirkby Lonsdale, and converted a barn to contain a large music room, where Stephen played string quartets every week until he was 90. He also enjoyed walking on Hutton Crags, was an avid bridge player and had a provocative sense of humour.
Gillian died in 2021. Stephen is survived by his sons, Peter and me, and his grandchildren, David, Jeremy, Stan and Nona.
