The Fires of London, first formed in 1965 as the Pierrot Players, was a British chamber music ensemble which was active from 1965 to 1987.
It was dedicated to the performance of new music. It was founded in London by Harrison Birtwistle, Alan Ray Hacker, and Stephen Pruslin.[1] From 1967 it was under the joint direction of the composers Peter Maxwell Davies and Harrison Birtwistle, and was an English chamber ensemble. The ensemble was originally created in order to play Schoenberg's Pierrot Lunaire, scored for soprano, flute, clarinet, violin, cello, and piano. A percussionist would often join the group. In 1970 Birtwistle left the group, and under the new name Davies became sole director. The group were disbanded by Davies after a 20th anniversary concert in 1987.
During their existence, The Fires of London was particularly associated with Davies' music. However it did premiere works by other composers, including the 1971 "show" Der langwierige Weg in die Wohnung der Natascha Ungeheuer by Hans Werner Henze.
The Fires of London was just one of many ensembles created to play Pierrot Lunaire, and the presence of these ensembles led to many new works being written for the same instrumentation. This in turn led to the formation of yet more groups, leading to the establishment of the "Pierrot ensemble" (flute, clarinet, violin, cello, and piano) as a standard instrumentation in contemporary music.