Music and Conversation for World Environment Day

To mark World Environment Day, we take to the skies for a fascinating event where contemporary music meets the wonders of the natural world. Join us at National Museum Cardiff to explore a series of captivating performances, thought-provoking talks and interactive workshops that celebrate our planet and the creatures that call it home. The day is inspired by birdsong and incredible journeys of migratory birds.

All the performances and activities are free. Come for the whole day or dip in and out – the choice is yours.

Full Event Programme

1:00pm and 6:00pm – Sinfonia Cymru concert performance

Programme includes:

Mark David Boden – Chasing Sunlight (World Premiere)
Claire Victoria Roberts – Trade Off (World Premiere)
Joy Becker & Darren Gallacher – Hope Is The Thing With Feathers
Claire Victoria Roberts – Out Of Time (in partnership with Music Theatre Wales)

Violin – Fenella Humphreys
Film creation – Ratio Studios

This hour-long concert features a special piece of music chosen by the PRS Foundation for their New Music Biennial, which showcases artists who are pushing the boundaries of new music in the UK: Mark David Boden’s Chasing Sunlight is an ‘audio-visual concerto’, meaning our orchestra and violinist Fenella Humphreys perform on stage in front of video projections. The films were captured by our friends at Oasis One World Choir and Bradford Refugee Action’s BRAVE project and reflect the Arctic tern’s 40,000-mile migration. This beautiful combination of music and imagery is a poignant reflection on displacement and endurance.

We’re also celebrating the music of Welsh composer Claire Victoria Roberts, with the World Premiere of her brand-new Septet as well as her psychedelic ‘street art opera’ Out of Time, which you can experience through video projections and headphones.

Returning to our birdy theme, Joy Becker and Darren Gallacher’s Hope Is The Thing With Feathers is a collection of pieces inspired by birdsong and declining bird populations across the UK. Featuring music by Caroline Shaw, Meredith Monk and Pauline Oliveros.

Each piece combines music and visual projections for an evocative journey through music and nature.

2:15pm & 3:30pm (45 mins) – Behind the Scenes Guided Tour – by Museum Curators, Showcasing Bird collections 
The museum collections encompass millions of specimens, many more than those that are displayed in the galleries. On this tour, the museum’s Vertebrate Curator will introduce the bird collections held at the museum, including many rare, endangered and extinct species. A golden opportunity to see behind the scenes of the National Museum and get close to a dodo!

4:30pm (1 hour) – Composers workshop

If you’ve ever wondered how a musical piece comes together, here’s an opportunity to see the composition process in action. Composer Mark David Boden works with students at RWCMD. Several of his cohort have written pieces for clarinet, horn and recordings of sounds from the natural world. Hear them being performed before Mark gives constructive feedback in this rare open workshop.

12:15pm and 3:00pm – Oasis One World Choir performances

Oasis One World Choir brings together singers from 25 different nations, including people who have been displaced from their birth countries and volunteers from the Cardiff community. Their performances promote healing and celebrate cultural diversity, with therapeutic benefits for both singers and audiences. They’ll be performing joyful songs, including a brand-new song they have written with Sinfonia Cymru musicians Joy Becker and Darren Gallacher specially for World Environment Day.

Please scroll down for a full timetable.

Many thanks to National Museum Cardiff for hosting this event. We are very grateful or funding from PRS Foundation, Vale of Glamorgan Festival Legacy Fund, Ty Cerdd, Hinrichsen Foundation, and Vaughan Williams Foundation, which has enabled us to commission the world premieres we will present at this event. Special thanks to our friends at BRAVE (through Bradford Refugee Action), Oasis One World Choir, Ratio Studios and Music Theatre Wales for their artistic collaboration on this project, and to Mark David Boden, Fenella Humphreys, Joy Becker, Darren Gallacher and Claire Victoria Roberts for their inspiration and music.