Music Worcester To Present REFUGEE ORCHESTRA PROJECT At Mechanics Hall

Music Worcester will present the Refugee Orchestra Project in concert at Mechanics Hall in Worcester, Massachusetts. The performance will take place Sunday, March 1 at 5:00 p.m. at the historic venue, located at 321 Main Street.

Led by founder, conductor, and music director Lidiya Yankovskaya, the program will feature music by composers who were refugees during their lifetimes. The repertoire will include Exilios by Gabriela Ortiz, La Création du Monde by Darius Milhaud, Béla Bartók’s Romanian Folk Dances, Maria’s City by Zoltan Almashi, and “Papers, papers” from Gian Carlo Menotti’s The Consul.

The concert will also include the world premiere of Humanity, a new work by composer Milad Yousufi. Yousufi, the Refugee Orchestra Project’s Artist in Residence, was commissioned jointly by the Refugee Orchestra Project, Music Worcester, and the Oregon Bach Festival to create the piece.

“Since seeing Lidiya Yankovskaya lead the Refugee Orchestra Project in a concert several years ago, it has been a goal of mine to bring the ensemble and everything they represent to Music Worcester's series,” said Adrien Finlay, Music Worcester’s Executive Director. “The opportunity to bring such musicians together in a program that will also feature a new work by Milad Yousufi, a composer we connected with for the first time back in 2018 through his former piano professor, Simone Dinnerstein, will generate an utterly unique concert experience from which we all can draw inspiration.”

Founded in 2016, the Refugee Orchestra Project brings together refugee musicians to highlight the contributions of displaced artists to cultural life and to raise awareness of refugee experiences. The ensemble has presented performances internationally, including collaborations in London and Washington, D.C.

Yankovskaya is also Music Director of Chicago Opera Theater and has conducted more than 40 world premieres. Her experience as a refugee informed the founding of the Refugee Orchestra Project and its mission-driven programming.

Music Worcester, founded in 1858, presents concerts across classical, jazz, global music, and dance, alongside education and outreach initiatives throughout Central Massachusetts.

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