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Chineke! Orchestra with Angel Blue

BBC Proms 2026

Live at the BBC Proms: Chineke! Orchestra conducted by Jonathon Heyward, with soprano Angel Blue in a programme including Barber and Dvorak.

Live at the BBC Proms: Chineke! Orchestra conducted by Jonathon Heyward with soprano Angel Blue in a programme including Barber and Dvorak

Presented by Katie Derham, live from the Royal Albert Hall, London.

Edmund Thornton Jenkins: Dance Suite (reconstr. & arr. Tuffus Zimbabwe; world premiere)
Samuel Barber: Knoxville: Summer of 1915
George Gershwin, arr. Anthony Parnther ‘Our love is here to stay’
Harold Arlen, arr. Anthony Parnther ‘That Old Black Magic’
Richard Rogers, arr. Anthony Parnther ‘My Funny Valentine’
Irving Berlin, arr. Anthony Parnther ‘Puttin’ on the ritz’

c.8.00pm
Interval: Alisha Jones talks to Katie Derham about the enduring power of the Great American Songbook: influential songs written between the 1920s and 1960s for Broadway musicals, Hollywood films, and Tin Pan Alley, the heart of New York City’s songwriting industry. And she looks ahead to Dvorak's optimistic 8th Symphony, which draws on Bohemian folk music.

c.8.20pm
Antonín Dvořák: Symphony No. 8 in G major

Angel Blue (soprano)
Chineke! Orchestra
Jonathon Heyward (conductor)

Europe’s first majority-Black and ethnically diverse orchestra Chineke! is back. It opens with the premiere of a suite drawn from music for a ballet left incomplete by the South Carolina-born Edmund Thornton Jenkins, who died aged only 32. American soprano Angel Blue sings Samuel Barber’s Knoxville: Summer of 1915 – a child’s all-encompassing vision of life in a teeming urban centre – as well as new arrangements of songs by some of 20th-century America’s greatest tunesmiths. After the interval we swap cities for forests and fields in the ecstatic nature hymn that is Dvořák’s Symphony No. 8.

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2 hours, 14 minutes

Last on

Last Saturday 19:30
BBC Radio 3

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Music Played

  • Edmund Thornton Jenkins

    Dance Suite

    Orchestra: Chineke! Orchestra. Conductor: Jonathon Heyward.

  • Samuel Barber

    Knoxvillle, Summer of 1915

    Lyricist: James Agee. Performer: Angel Blue. Performer: Angel Blue. Performer: Angel Blue. Orchestra: Chineke! Orchestra. Orchestra: Chineke! Orchestra. Orchestra: Chineke! Orchestra. Orchestra: Chineke! Orchestra. Conductor: Jonathon Heyward. Conductor: Jonathon Heyward. Conductor: Jonathon Heyward.

  • George Gershwin

    Our love is here to stay

    Music Arranger: Anthony Parnther. Performer: Angel Blue. Orchestra: Chineke! Orchestra. Conductor: Jonathon Heyward.

  • Harold Arlen

    That Old Black Magic

    Performer: Angel Blue. Orchestra: Chineke! Orchestra. Conductor: Jonathon Heyward.

  • Richard Rodgers

    My Funny Valentine (from Babes in Arms)

    Lyricist: Lorenz Hart. Performer: Angel Blue. Orchestra: Chineke! Orchestra. Conductor: Jonathon Heyward.

  • Irving Berlin

    Putting on the Ritz

    Performer: Angel Blue. Orchestra: Chineke! Orchestra. Conductor: Jonathon Heyward.

  • Antonín Dvořák

    Symphony No. 8 in G major

    Orchestra: Chineke! Orchestra. Conductor: Jonathon Heyward.

  • Caroline Shaw

    Plan and Elevation: I. The Ellipse

    Ensemble: Attacca Quartet.
    • Nonesuch.

  • Caroline Shaw

    Plan & Elevation: II. The Cutting Garden

    Ensemble: Attacca Quartet.
    • Caroline Shaw: Orange.
    • New Amsterdam/Nonesuch.
    • 4.

Broadcast

  • Last Saturday 19:30
    BBC Radio 3