(Beethoven's "Symphony No. 5")
- [Narrator] Over the past 18 months,
The Virtual Orchestra has been resident
in each of the Philharmonia's town-based residencies;
Bedford, Leicester, Canterbury, and Basingstoke.
Thanks to support from Esmée Fairbairn,
Paul Hamlyn and John Ellerman Foundations,
we've been able to use the Philharmonia's
award-winning digital experiences as the catalyst
for immersive outreach and audience development work.
(Beethoven's "Symphony No. 5")
That has meant working with a steering group
of local organisations.
We've run school, family and community workshops,
and supported a creative fringe programme,
and crucially, we've brought the full orchestra
to perform informal shows as we did here in Basingstoke.
So what has been the effect of The Virtual Orchestra so far?
To date, we've recorded over 64,000 interactions
with the project and initiated partnerships
with over 40 organisations.
Representation of our three
priority audience segments rose by 78%,
and 100% of steering group respondents felt
that The Virtual Orchestra had a positive impact
on their community.
(Beethoven's "Symphony No. 5")
Holly Mathieson: We've been working as part
of the Virtual Orchestra exhibition,
playing free concerts for 45 minutes
for anyone to come and stand all around us,
sing with us, dance with us.
Orchestras can be fun, we can be silly,
we can dance, we can floss really, really badly.
Soong Choo: My favourite thing was meeting the public,
interacting with the audience and people
who've never been to a concert,
children who were maybe thinking about playing the violin
but I was actually able to give them a demonstration,
and so many people saying,
"Oh, it's changed my viewpoint of classical music,
"viewpoint of an orchestra".
Katherine Bryer: With The Virtual Orchestra
it feels very much like everyone's together
and it's like you are part of the orchestra.
Whenever I've done education work before,
it's never been as immersive as this.
Karen Stephenson: So I sit in the cello section all the time
and I know what it sounds like to sit where I sit.
But I don't know what it sounds like
to sit in the brass section or in the woodwind section
or even to have a go on the percussion instruments
or something like that.
So even for me, as a seasoned old pro,
it had something new for me as well.
Hopefully as a result of The Virtual Orchestra,
we'll get even more people coming to concerts
and come to the concert hall, that'd be great.
Holly Mathieson: I think the coolest experience today
was when off the cuff, Tim Steiner,
our presenter, got this lovely chap called Ashok up
to conduct the orchestra.
We hadn't planned it or anything.
- Oh, it was very energetic and when they asked me
to become a conductor, I was like,
"Wow, what is this happening to me?"
So it was a nice experience, yeah.
When they were playing, I was just thinking one
of my two daughters should go with them
and it will make me proud (laughing).
(Beethoven's "Symphony No. 5")
- It was an incredible experience to be so close
to the orchestra, 'cause normally,
you're obviously sat a little further back.
(Beethoven's "Symphony No. 5")
- [Narrator] For the Philharmonia,
this is just the beginning.
We're tracking the effects of The Virtual Orchestra
in our residencies and we're changing our programme
to reflect what we've learned.
That all starts with new families concerts
and relaxed chamber concerts that are in development
and would not be happening without The Virtual Orchestra.
(Beethoven's "Symphony No. 5")
(audience clapping)