Philharmonic orchestra shares stage with speakers

Audio Pro, Norrlandsoperan

Speakers from Swedish speaker designer Audio Pro are being used in a cross-border music project in Umeå, Sweden. A project that involves the philharmonic orchestra, Norrlandsoperan, accompanied by schoolchildren who play music on speakers through their mobile phones.

Tradition meets innovation when the finale of a three-year long project, MAXAT, takes place at Norrlandsoperan in Umeå, Sweden. It is the so-called Mobile Phone Orchestra – an orchestra consisting of teenagers who play on speakers via their mobile phones – that takes the stage together with the Philharmonic Orchestra, Norrlandsoperan, for an evening of musical compositions by Lind, Pärt and Ravel. Each mobile phone is connected to an individual speaker from Audio Pro. “We were contacted by Norrlandsoperan who were looking for speakers that could function as a musical instrument in an orchestra, a request you don’t hear very often. Initially we had a hard time even imagining how this would work, but now that we have seen the result, it suddenly makes a lot of sense,” says Nils Ankarcrona, CEO of Audio Pro.

The music, which is specially composed to be played via mobile phones, by young people without any previous musical experience, who are instructed via color coding on how to play their special part. Each mobile phone is connected to an Audio Pro speaker that amplifies each player's individual music. The sound from the speakers is thus combined with the philharmonic orchestra's special piece and becomes a joint musical piece that is performed in the concert hall as one unified music experience.

Andreas Nilsson, music producer at Norrlandsoperan, says that they tried several different speakers for this specific project, and finally decided to choose Audio Pro's T3+ speaker, as it was perceived as having by far the best sound of them all. “The reliability, battery life and sound quality of the speakers have exceeded our expectations in this project. We have now used the speakers for a whole year and toured all over the country with them, including abroad in a concert with the Klaipeda Chamber Orchestra in Lithuania. All this transportation and handling of the speakers put quite a strain on them, and we are surprised at how much the Audio Pro speakers can withstand without breaking. A few units have stopped working after too much rough treatment, but all the others work just fine, even with this tough treatment.”

The MAXAT project has been carried out by Norrlandsoperan in close collaboration with Anders Lind and his mobile phone orchestra concept, with support from the Swedish Arts Council and in collaboration with Umeå University. Norrlandsoperan’s concert with the philharmonic orchestra accompanied by schoolchildren with speakers from Audio was scheduled to take place on May 28, but has since been postponed until next year. The date will be announced later.