Since its founding in 2011, the Freie Jugendorchesterschule Berlin, which introduces even the youngest children to orchestral playing, has been a regular guest at Klangwerkstatt Berlin. This year, it once again presents a captivating and adventurous programme. In large orchestral forces and in smaller formations, sometimes playful and sometimes wistful, sometimes joyful and sometimes melancholic – this year's concert of the Freie Jugendorchesterschule Berlin revolves around the musical exploration of sea voyages. The programme features works by Andreas Frey, Jobst Liebrecht, George Dreyfus, Bruno Coulais and young composers.

Bruno Coulais: Three songs from the film Die Kinder des Monsieur Mathieu (2004)
Since its founding in May 2024, the small choir of the youngest singers (from age 6) has been rehearsing, and – together with the recorder ensemble, so that the delicate voices are not drowned out by the accompaniment – has most recently taken on these songs. One of the rehearsals was used to watch the songs on video. First results were already presented at the orchestra weekend at the end of April.

Andreas Frey: Auf hoher See (2018)
After the children of our youth orchestra grew so wonderfully through his piece Abenteuer last year, Andreas Frey has provided us with another work whose enticing movement subtitles alone make you want to play along and are able to involve all ages and skill levels. The participants of our composition workshop have added musical commentaries to the piece, which are woven into the overall sequence and will receive their world premiere – performed by professional musicians – in the scorings “string quartet” and “duo flute and piano”. They relate to the most perilous part of the sea voyage and drew inspiration from one of the oldest Greek myths. Accordingly, the pieces bear titles such as Sirens of the Sea, Riesen, Riesen über Kopf, Scylla und Charybdis and similar. A team of young authors has devised a short story to frame the whole.

Jobst Liebrecht: Dindy's tune (2021, Version 2025)
What was originally conceived as a birthday treat for an old friend is well worth the considerable effort of this new version, arranged for recorder solo and recorder ensemble. The piece is short but tricky.

George Dreyfus: Die Abenteuer von Sebastian, dem Fuchs (1963)
These delightful miniatures, which George Dreyfus himself arranged in this form for recorder quartet, originate from the film music for the puppet animation series The Adventures of Sebastian the Fox, which enjoyed great popularity among children in Australia in the 1960s. Sebastian, a small marionette, experiences his adventures in “real-life settings” alongside actors, causing all manner of cheerful confusion. The short films in black and white, which seem positively antique to us today, derive much of their charm from precisely this quality – a charm that the music appears never to have lost. It was one of the first television series for children produced in Australia, and distinguished itself from other shows by being conceived and accompanied by a puppeteer with his puppet. George Dreyfus wrote music for it that continues to delight our children today, because it comes across as young, fresh and lively in the most varied scorings, right up to youth symphony orchestra. The composer, owing to his Jewish heritage, was forced to leave Germany in 1939 and went on to become one of Australia's leading composers, based in Melbourne.
To bring our joyful and instructive engagement with these enchanting miniatures to a close, we have now also turned to the last five musical adventures of the cheeky little fox. This time he pesters the potter and the baker, rides along on the cart, sleeps in a four-poster bed and is hunted.

Jobst Liebrecht: from: raindrops (2020/Version 2024)
Arguably the most experimental piece – the first three movements of which we had the pleasure of premiering last year – already generates the greatest fun during rehearsals. The often playful but sometimes genuinely serious original texts (born of the pandemic period), combined with minimalist musical interjections and underscoring, leave just as much room for the imagination as for precise ensemble playing. A decidedly rehearsal-intensive piece that once again gently draws all the young and not-so-young musicians into the action.

Arthur Gabriel Wagner Henderson: Concertino (2025)
Arthur has been receiving composition lessons at our music school since May 2024, having already developed an interest in composition through the composition course at the Staatsoper and having also participated in the “Jugend musiziert” competition.