Chineke! Junior Orchestra

The sister ensemble to the Chineke! Orchestra, the Chineke! Junior Orchestra, is made up of majority Black and ethnically diverse musicians aged 11 – 22. Both ensembles were founded in 2015 with the aim of creating opportunities for emerging and established musicians of Black and ethnically diverse heritage.

The concert opens with a blast of energy: Dukas’ Fanfare from La Péri, which was written after the composer had completed the 1912 ballet in one act, based on a Persian folk story.

Avril Coleridge-Taylor moved to the Sussex countryside in 1939. Although the title of her tone poem Sussex Landscape suggests a pastoral idyll, the work is a moving response to the ongoing threat of World War Two.

The final work, Mussorgsky’s 1874 Pictures at an Exhibition, vividly describes ten artworks by the composer’s close friend, artist Viktor Hartmann. It was written in homage a year after the artist’s death. Ravel’s 1922 orchestration brings the images and colours to full, majestic life.