YouTube Symphony Orchestra debut to be live-streamed on 20 March

The 101 members of the YouTube Symphony Orchestra 2011 have arrived in Sydney this week for a gala performance Sunday, March 20, that will light up the sails of Sydney Opera House and be live-streamed to YouTube’s global audience at 11:00 am South African time.

Musicians from more than 30 countries — selected through an online audition that garnered millions of views on the YouTube Symphony channel — will join together for a week of rehearsals and concerts around Sydney which build up to the finale event.

The March 20 performance will be conducted by award-winning conductor, Michael Tilson Thomas. The repertoire includes Britten’s Young Person’s Guide to the Orchestra and Stravinsky’s spectacular Firebird, and Mothership.

Throughout the evening, the YouTube Symphony Orchestra 2011 performance will be opened up to audiences beyond the concert hall via live streams and exterior projections. The sails of Sydney Opera House will become a backdrop for a light show by Obscura Digital, creating a multimedia experience of the performance using artwork, effects and real-time concert video to play in synchronisation with the orchestra for the enjoyment of the public at live sites around Sydney Harbour.

The performance will be live-streamed to a worldwide audience on the YouTube Symphony channel, and on mobile devices via the YouTube Symphony apps, which can be downloaded from the Android Market or the Apple App Store.

This finale will be the culmination of a week of performances, rehearsals and masterclasses in which the musicians will participate in venues around Sydney. Every day, highlights from the concerts and behind the scenes footage of the musicians’ experience will be posted to the YouTube Symphony channel and on the YouTube Symphony apps.

“After the truly outstanding applications for this year’s YouTube Symphony Orchestra and the great reaction from the online community who expressed their opinions, I look forward to getting together with everybody this week in Sydney to create a fine orchestra of people from all over the world,” says Michael Tilson Thomas, Conductor and Artistic Advisor.