The Royal Philharmonic Orchestra’s (RPO) recent 14-concert tour began in Santa Barbara, California, on Jan. 11 and ended at New York’s Carnegie Hall on Jan. 31, under the baton of its new music director, Vasily Petrenko. I once had the very good fortune to film the RPO on a previous U.S. tour as part of a documentary I made to celebrate its 50th anniversary and then added to it to mark its 60th anniversary. Titled “Batons, Bows and Bruises,” it enjoyed a six-year run on the Sky Arts Channel in the UK. The orchestra’s grand title gives the impression that it is a pillar of the British music establishment, but it exists today more in spite of than because of those institutions. Back in 1963, its fate depended entirely on the efforts of one extraordinary American, the “superagent,” Ronald Wilford (1927–2015 ). Superagent Wilford ran Columbia Artist Management Inc. (CAMI) for …