Jeunesses Musicales World Orchestra

The Jeunesses Musicales World Orchestra is a program of Jeunesses Musicales International. It was founded in 1949 by Igor Markevitch but its permanent structure dates back to 1970, when Gilles Lefebvre consolidated the world’s first youth orchestra. During this period the orchestra had the residence in Canada, from 1988 to 2004 it moved to Berlin and actually its headquarters is in Spain with the support of Valencian region.

The Jeunesses Musicales World Orchestra has had its headquarters in Valencia, Spain since 2005, when maestro Josep Vicent became its Artistic Director and Principal Conductor. It is composed of 100 musicians from 40 countries and it has toured in China, The Netherlands, Spain, Austria, Cyprus and Germany. In Summer 2008 it travelled to Canada where maestro Franz Paul Decker conducted.

The World Orchestra started this new period in Valencia showing its artistic project to China to mark the 60th anniversary of the signing of peace between China and Japan. The Netherlands and Austria were next. The orchestra came back in the Winter of 2007 to the Kurhaus (Scheveningen), the place where The World Orchestra was born. It has played in Cyprus and Germany (its previous administrative home) in the Winter of 2007 to perform in the Berlin Philharmonie.

The World Orchestra has made performances in Spain. Apart from symphonic concerts in numerous concert halls as El Palau de les Arts Reina Sofía in Valencia, Palau de la Música of Valencia, Teatro Monumental of Madrid or GREC Festival of Barcelona, the orchestra ran a Chamber Music festival, with concerts for String Quartet, Brass ensemble and Percussion Group. JMWO was also the resident orchestra of Nits de la Mediterrània Music festival and also was in charge of the music of the Opera ‘Puss in Boots’ (a co-production with Teatro Real of Madrid and Teatre Liceu of Barcelona). Some of JMWO musicians took part in the filming of new movie on Valencian composer Martin y Soler. One concert was for the finals of the 32nd America’s Cup Competition. The World Orchestra joined forces with Orquesta de Valencia with almost 150 musicians on stage.

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Wikipedia