How Britain’s Chineke! is changing classical music
Chi-chi Nwanoku pauses before she ascends the stairs to the performance hall of the New England Conservatory.
It is spring, and she wants to let the “spine-tingling” moment sink in. Eight years have led to this moment for the founder and artistic director of Chineke!, Europe’s first majority-Black and ethnically diverse orchestra. She is bringing African American composer Florence Price home.
Price had been one of few Black students at the conservatory during the height of the Jim Crow era. It’s only recently that her work – a stunning array of more than 300 classical pieces – has been rediscovered and featured by symphony orchestras, thanks in part to the efforts of Chineke!
“To think that this woman, regardless of how skilled or talented she was, she was never going to have a good
