Wessex Youth Orchestra play backstage at the Schools Prom

11 November 2014, 22:11 | Updated: 15 December 2016, 11:50

Members of the Wessex Youth Orchestra played a number for Classic FM in our media hub in the bowels of the Royal Albert Hall.

The Wessex Youth Orchestra is now in its 44th season. Susanna Riddell has been director of the orchestra for seven years. But her involvement goes further back than that. Her father formed the orchestra in 1971, and Susanna joined at the age of 11. "I slipped into the back desk of the cello section," she told Classic FM's Tim Lihoreau, "trying not to be noticed by any of the other players." 

One of the largest youth orchestras on the south coast, the Wessex performs both nationally and on international concert tours to great acclaim. At the Schools Prom tonight they played part of the ballet suite Romeo & Juliet by Prokofiev tonight, along with Rimsky-Korsakov’s Procession of the Nobles from his opera-ballet Mlada. 

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