Bassist Chi-Chi Nwanoku was always aware that as a black musician in a classical orchestra, she was an exception. Her colleagues were almost never musicians from other ethnic backgrounds (BME - Black and Minority Ethnic). It wasn't until seeing the Kinshasa Symphony Orchestra that she discovered it could be different. ‘I suddenly realised I had to do something,’ Nwanoku tells us. She started looking for fellow BME musicians in English orchestras and conservatoires. The search did not go smoothly - Nwanoku had to expand her horizons overseas - but yielded an extraordinary result in 2015: Chineke! Orchestra was born! 

Only the music counts  

Chineke! Orchestra is made up mostly of ethnic minorities and is one of the first orchestras to reflect our contemporary diverse society on stage. “This is the 21st century. It should not be a novelty that there more than one black person on the stage playing Beethoven.” defends Nwanoku. The first projects with the orchestra were a revelation. “It was the first time that all of us only had to think about the music”, she says. By this, Nwanoku is referring to the fact that conservatoires were long focused on what a professional musician should look like. Percussionist Rosie Bergonzi adds: “A part of getting you ready to go into the profession and a part of that, for me, was speaking about ways that my hair should look.” 

Diversity on the pupiters  

The orchestra also pursues diversity in the music with which they tour worldwide. BME composers, contemporary or forgotten since centuries, are brought (back) to our attention. After having put Samuel Coleridge-Taylor, George Walker and Florence Price on a par with Antonin Dvorák at Bozar in 2022, this season Chineke! will play the world premiere of Concerto for orchestra by the young American composer Brian Raphael Nabors. Derrick Spiva Jr's 2014 work Prisms, Cycles, Leaps will be juxtaposed with Prokofiev's Third Piano Concerto in the same concert, with the talented Isata Kanneh-Mason at the piano.  

Role models for children and young people  

Thanks to their determination, entrepreneurship and musicality, the musicians of Chineke! have become role models for young BME musicians on the brink of a professional career as well as for black children taking up a musical instrument for the first time. With the youth orchestra Chineke! Youth Orchestra and the many educational activities of Chineke! Foundation, Nwanoku and her colleagues turn an amitious vision into an achievable practice.  

Chineke! Orchestra, conducted by Kevin John Edusei, will play with pianist Isata Kanneh-Mason on 15 November at the Henry Le Boeuf Hall. Book your tickets here.