GCSE Musicians enjoy Chineke! Orchestra at the Southbank Centre

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On Wednesday evening, Year 9 and 10 GCSE Music students ventured to the Southbank Centre for a spectacular celebration of music by black female composers performed by Chineke! Orchestra.  
 
Chineke! Orchestra was founded in 2015 by Chi-Chi Nwanoku to give Black and ethnically diverse classical musicians a platform on which to excel. Chineke! Orchestra is part of a wider foundation, which included Chineke! Junior Orchestra (with whom one of our A Level Music students and department prefect Michael performs) and Chineke! Voices. As part of Black History Month, this evening's concert featured compositions by Avril Coleridge-Taylor, the daughter of Samuel, a composer who lived just down the road from school in Waddon for much of his life, and Florence Price, music by whom our very own Sinfonietta is rehearsing currently. Alongside these early twentieth century composers, the orchestra performed virtuosic pieces by two contemporary composers, Eleanor Alberga and Valerie Coleman, whose piece Phenomenal Women: Concerto for Woodwind Quintet soli and Chamber Orchestra featured female soloists from the Chineke! Orchestra.  
 
The atmosphere in the Queen Elizabeth Hall, Southbank Centre throughout the concert was one of jubilation. Our students were dazzled in particular by the soloists in Phenomenal Women. Dr Burton and Mrs Straw were delighted that students' imaginations were sparked by the unusual sounds of flutter tonguing and the buzz mute, and impressed by the orchestral vastness of the late Romantic works by Coleridge-Taylor and Price. Thank you to everyone involved in organising the trip—the students and staff had an inspiring evening and we’re looking forward already to the next one!