Information about pieces and composers, and the OrchMap, an interactive map of the orchestra with LPO players introducing their instruments.
Ludwig van Beethoven (1770–1827) Beethoven is one of the best-known classical composers and his music has been played by orchestras all over the world for more than 200 years! He was famous in his lifetime, despite being often difficult, stubborn, and bad-tempered. He was completely deaf for the last 10 years of his life, but
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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,
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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,
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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
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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
Posted in Create & Compose, Listen & Discover, Resources, Staff guidance & training
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 Kiev’, which describes
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In a recent OrchLab project, we used a famous suite of music called The Planets, by Gustav Holst, as our inspiration music. You can find out more about it in our Planets Listening Guide. In this activity we’re going to create our own graphic musical score, which we can then use to create our own
Posted in Listen & Discover, Resources, Staff guidance & training
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
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‘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
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