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Composer Dobrinka Tabakova talks to Tom Service about her artist residency at The Hallé in Manchester. She discusses her love of melody, the thrill of writing for youth orchestra, the importance of understanding the character of the musicians she writes for, and how meeting composer Iannis Xenakis when she was 14 shaped her musical path.

Tom visits the site of the new Shireland City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra Academy in West Bromwich, which opens in September 2023. As the first state school in the country to be established in collaboration with an orchestra, the academy is built around a central performance space which will also be open as a venue in evenings and throughout the year for the wider Sandwell community and beyond. Tom takes a tour of the site with CBSO Chief Executive Stephen Maddock, Principal Designate David Green and architect Claire Mantle to find out more.

Emily MacGregor joins Tom to talk about her new book ‘Interwar Symphonies and the Imagination: Politics, Identity and the Sound of 1933’ which explores how symphonies in Europe and America reflect and shape the politics of their time, and how they resonate with us today. The book looks at symphonies by composers such as Kurt Weill, Hans Pfitzner, Roy Harris and Florence Price which were written or premiered in 1933 – a year in which Hitler came to power in Germany and the Great Depression reached its peak in the United States.

We explore the past, present and future of immersive performances with David Owen Norris who takes us on a whistle-stop tour of how composers and musicians have played with sound and space throughout the centuries. Tom also visits the d&b Audiotechnik demo facility in Stroud to find out about the latest technology being used to create immersive audio performances in halls, theatres and opera houses across the world.