RPS Ensemble Award
29 November 2019
Last night at Battersea Arts Centre, we received the highly-coveted Ensemble Award from the Royal Philharmonic Society (RPS). We’re still buzzing from the announcement – feeling very honoured, grateful and quite giddy from it all.
The RPS Awards are the highest recognition for live classical music in the UK. The Ensemble Award recognises the outstanding quality and scope of the performances and work of a group of musicians in the UK; the list of previous winners of the Ensemble Award reads as a Who’s Who of internationally-acclaimed groups, including the Hallé Orchestra, Royal Liverpool Philharmonic Orchestra, Orchestra of the Age of Enlightenment and London Sinfonietta.
Itʼs particularly exciting to have been shortlisted this year alongside such stellar company in the shape of BSO Resound and the Royal Northern Sinfonia – two ensembles we hugely admire. In less than a decade, we’ve now had the privilege of winning the Ensemble Award twice – first in 2011 as a young orchestra of six years old and now eight years later in 2019. Along the way, we also won the RPS Learning & Participation prize with the Tri-Borough Music Hub in 2016.
Thank you to the RPS Awards Panel for these thoughtful words:
‘Aurora Orchestra is Midas-like in its touch, setting standards for us all, from formidable contemporary repertoire to theatrical exploration to engaging young minds. Limitless in their creativity, scope and commitment to audiences’ experience: anything can happen in an Aurora performance, it will always be the highest quality, and there’s constant anticipation as to what they will do next.’
This year has been an incredibly memorable year for us. We staged our boldest adventures in Orchestral Theatre to date, giving thousands of audience members new ways to experience live orchestral music. Highlights included our theatrical staging of Berlioz’s Symphonie fantastique at the BBC Proms and our cross-arts production Music of the Spheres at the Queen Elizabeth Hall. We continued to collaborate with exceptional artists in our Mozart’s Piano series at Kings Place and to give eclectic late-night concerts in our Lock-In series at Kings Place. We also continued to reach thousands of children – including giving many their first experience of live orchestral music – through our schools’ programme.
Thank you, thank you to all our incredible players, collaborators, supporters and audiences for being part of our special musical journey this year. This award is really for YOU.