Have you ever felt like the odd one out?

Probably.

Chi-Chi Nwanoku felt like that her whole career, until very recently, when she decided to do something about it.

The classical musician founded the Chineke! Orchestra in 2015 to remedy exactly that problem. “All of the orchestras I have played in, I have always been the only person of color for 35 years,” Nwanoku told The New York Times recently.

Not anymore.

Her group features a diverse collection of people of color, with musicians hailing from Iran, the Caribbean, Pakistan, India, and all over Africa.

Its name too, comes from the mother continent; “chineke” is an Igbo word. Nwanoku’s father came from the tribe; she explained, “In Chinua Achebe’s book Things Fall Apart, you see the word ‘chineke’ every now and then, with people exclaiming it when something amazing happens. It means ‘wonderful’ or ‘wow.’”

The response to the colorful orchestra has been just that so far — wonderful. Its maiden concert sold out, as did its dates last year. This year, the group is traveling everywhere from the U.K. to the Netherlands.

Simon Rattle, the Berlin Philharmonic’s artistic director, told the Times that Chineke! Orchestra shows “that classical music is for absolutely everybody.” He also noted that in a time when orchestras are increasingly reaching out to communities of color, “we need orchestras to slowly and surely start looking like the communities in which they play.”

Chineke! member Sheku Kanneh-Mason agreed, and said that while, “it has been inspiring to see lots of other young musicians like me,” he hopes that one day all orchestras will resemble Nwanoku’s.

Until then, Kanneh-Mason said, “I plan to be involved in Chineke! until Chineke! becomes unnecessary because eventually the aim will be for diversity to be the norm in classical music.”

Sphinx Symphony Orchestra

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