The Music Room is the place to find all of the activities designed by the Basque National Orchestra's Education Department. These activities include the now firmly entrenched Family Concerts, hosted in Vitoria-Gasteiz and Donostia-San Sebastián, and all of the events that fall under the category of School Activities. This season's School Activities include Concerts for Schools, Visits to the Orchestra Headquarters, School Workshops and Open Rehearsals. The BNO will also present a second season of Sinfokids.

All of these events will add up to over 30 musical encounters this season, with the Basque National Orchestra at the core. We should point out that last season more than 7500 boys and girls took part in the various events. Over the course of its 30-year history, the Basque National Orchestra's education activities have reached an audience of more than 146,000 people.

Family Concerts. The objective set for the new season of Family Concerts is to spotlight human values and cheer. The season kicked off this past December in Donostia-San Sebastián with "La viola no está sola" (The viola is not alone) and continues this Saturday, February 4, with "Historia de un soldado" (The Soldier's Tale). In Vitoria-Gasteiz the season will get under way this Sunday, February 5, at the Teatro Principal with "The Soldier's Tale". The show is a re-creation of Stravinsky's classic "The Soldier's Tale" (L'histoire du soldat), featuring puppets and shadows created and directed by Santi Arnal, and performed by the company Per Poc and a group of instrumentalists from the BNO. In March the percussion group Stick Dance Quartet will present "Una Caja de sorpresas" (A box of surprises), showing us how just about any object can be turned into a musical instrument. This concept is aimed at audiences of all ages, but the Vitoria-Gasteiz performance will be specially designed for tots. In May, the sound of the full Orchestra will ring out in all its glory in "Sheherazade y otras voces" (Scheherazade and other voices), with perfomances in Donostia-San Sebastián only. And in June the series will be back in full swing with "40 urteko algara", celebrating Txirri, Mirri eta Txiribiton, the clowns that have put smiles on Basque faces for 40 years, bringing audiences moments of joy and laughter with their fun-loving antics. Before all of the concerts, except for "Una caja de sorpresas" in Vitoria, there will be a Music Appreciation Workshop, designed to promote active listening. Again ths season, the Family Concerts series is a co-production between the BNO, the Vitoria-Gasteiz City Council and the Kursaal Foundation.

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