Special event allows Londoners to 'create a concert of their own' at the Southbank Centre
Crowds of young Londoners are flocking to the Southbank Centre for a classical music concert like no other – where they can mix the evening’s music themselves and build their own live classical mixtape.
Part of the Southbank Centre’s 75th anniversary, the event on 5 February 2025, called Classical Mixtape, sees over 200 musicians from six orchestras assemble across the venue for a medley of classical music’s greatest hits.
From £12, audiences can hear everything from Beethoven’s iconic Fifth Symphony to the music of Stars Wars and The Lord of the Rings, choosing the order of the music to build a concert experience of their own.
In an unprecedented first, all of the Southbank Centre’s Resident Orchestras – Aurora Orchestra, Chineke! Orchestra, the London Philharmonic Orchestra, the London Sinfonietta, the Orchestra of the Age of Enlightenment, and the Philharmonia Orchestra – will perform across a single night at the multi-arts centre in its for the first-of-its-kind event curated for Under 30s audiences.
The venue's Head of Classical Music, Toks Dada, said: "Sharing classical music with the widest possible audience sits at the core of what we do and we are proud to offer a range of experiences that speak to different people. Classical Mixtape continues this spirit by inviting audiences to encounter world-class music across our site in ways that feel open, social, and entirely their own.”
The evening opens with the London Philharmonic Orchestra performing iconic works ranging from Beethoven’s Fifth Symphony to Howard Shore’s original score for The Lord of the Rings. Following this grand opening, the event transitions into a unique, immersive format where audiences can rotate through 20-minute looping sets across various venues.
The London Sinfonietta brings Steve Reich’s minimalism to the industrial Undercroft, Chineke! Orchestra surrounds listeners with Margaret Bonds’ Montgomery Variations in the Clore Ballroom, the Orchestra of the Age of Enlightenment hosts a Bavarian-inspired brass set in a reconstructed alehouse, and Aurora Orchestra explores the Alpine landscapes of the Mahlers in the Purcell Room.
The night reaches a cinematic crescendo back at the Royal Festival Hall as Marin Alsop conducts the 111-piece Philharmonia Orchestra through the celestial sounds of Holst’s The Planets and John Williams’ Star Wars Suite.
Further information can be found at www.southbankcentre.co.uk/whats-on/classical-mixtape-a-live-takeover