iPads make fantastic digital musical instruments, and we use them a lot in OrchLab sessions thanks to their adaptability and accessibility. In this guide we’ll show you ThumbJam, one of the music apps that we use. There is another guide available for Garageband which you can explore. ThumbJam is available to download from the Apple
As part of OrchLab Festival Day 2020, we screened a performance of a new arrangement of ‘Promenade’ from Modest Mussorgsky’s Pictures at an Exhibition. Mussorgsky (1839–1881) was a prominent Russian composer who was very interested in creating music that had a uniquely ‘Russian’ sound. He had a friend called Viktor Hartmann who was an artist,
As part of OrchLab Festival Day 2020, we screened a performance of ‘Troika’ from Sergei Prokofiev’s Lieutenant Kijé Orchestral Suite. In this special arrangement by John Webb you will see musicians from the London Philharmonic Orchestra perform this well-known wintry piece. The piece is a musical depiction of a fast winter’s journey on a troika,
In Autumn 2020, OrchLab worked with groups from Bramley Hill Centre (Garwood Foundation) and St Cecilia’s (Leonard Cheshire) on a project inspired by Pictures at an Exhibition, an piece of music by Modest Mussorgsky. Mussorgsky (1839–1881) was a prominent Russian composer who was very interested in creating music that had a uniquely ‘Russian’ sound. He
I see trees of green, red roses too,I see them bloom for me and you.And I think to myself, what a wonderful world! These are the opening lines of the famous song, which we sang and explored at OrchLab sessions in Autumn 2020. This is a great song to sing along to, but it can
In Autumn 2020, our OrchLab project focused on Modest Mussorgsky’s Pictures at an Exhibition, a colourful orchestral work describing a visit to an art gallery and depicting the paintings there in music. In this activity, we invite you to play along with the last movement of this work, ‘The Great Gate of Kyiv’, which describes
‘Mama Don’t Allow’ has become a firm favourite in our live OrchLab sessions, so we’ve created a resource led by Dav Shiel from Drake Music, featuring LPO trombonist David Whitehouse, so you can play and sing along whenever you like! Watch the video titled ‘About this activity’ first, then when you know how to join
‘Uranus: The Magician’ is the sixth movement of The Planets Suite by Gustav Holst. You can read all about The Planets in our Listening Guide. ‘Uranus: The Magician’ ‘Uranus: The Magician’ starts off with a dramatic statement of four notes (G, Eb, A and B), which represent Holst’s name. Holst converted some of the letters of his name into that four-note
Gustav Holst: The Planets Suite English composer Gustav Holst (1874–1934) wrote one of the most famous and popular orchestral pieces ever – The Planets Suite. It has been performed by professional orchestras all over the world since Holst finished it in 1916. It has hugely influenced music written for film by modern day composers. For instance, John Williams’s