Musicians from the London Philharmonic Orchestra illustrate The Power Of Listening at Vinegar Yard, London (Credit – Will Ireland)
LONDON, Monday, 21 September 2026.
The London Philharmonic Orchestra’s answer to a distracted, divided
age: stop half-listening, start deep listening
As the London Philharmonic Orchestra opens its new season – the first full season under Artistic
Director Jesús Herrera – the Orchestra announces ‘The Power of Listening’, a bold new vision.
The season launches with a creative partnership with the Royal College of Art and Neville
Brody, exploring how listening inspires creativity.
Jesús Herrera, Artistic Director of the London Philharmonic Orchestra:
“We’re living through something close to a listening crisis. Public life feels polarised and atomised –
people talk past each other, tuned out from positions they haven’t taken the time to understand. I
believe proper, active listening can help bridge such divides. Music reminds us that listening is
more than simply hearing another person: it can be an act of introspection, a way of opening
ourselves to other perspectives, and of paying attention to what the world can teach us. Starting
with this season, I want the London Philharmonic Orchestra to show what deep listening can do.”
‘The Power of Listening’, the Orchestra’s new long-term vision is an invitation to be part of
something new – for audiences who already know the Orchestra and those who don’t yet. As
Herrera opens his first full season of programming on Saturday 26 September, each piece has
been chosen for its social or historical significance, inviting audiences to connect more deeply with
the music and consider how it makes them feel.
The vision launches with a creative partnership with the Royal College of Art and Neville Brody,
exploring how listening can inspire creativity. Working with creative agency Ace of Hearts, the
London Philharmonic Orchestra invited eight Royal College of Art postgraduate artists, mentored
by Brody, to each listen to a different piece of music and create an artwork in response –
capturing the emotions, thoughts and memories the music sparked in them.
From Monday 21 September, a sound gallery – a specially built installation of the original
artworks, each paired with a set of headphones – invites passers-by at Vinegar Yard, London SE1,
to listen to the very piece of music that inspired each artwork, experiencing the power of
orchestral music and its ability to inspire creativity and emotion. The artworks will also be
displayed on billboards around London.
Art you can see by listening
Each piece of art responds to music the Orchestra will perform live this season. The result is a
series of artworks that make the invisible impact of music visible, from getting the heart racing to
helping the day melt away – and a direct invitation: if a few minutes with headphones on a
London street can move you this much, a live orchestra in a concert hall can do far more.
The installation is designed to reach people who may never have considered an orchestral
experience “for them” – and invite them to experience the music live.
Wider research is beginning to reveal how our brains respond differently to live music. A 2024
study published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences found that live music
elicited stronger and more consistent activity in brain regions involved in processing emotions
than recorded music, with listeners’ brain activity responding dynamically as the performance
unfolded.
Jesús Herrera, Artistic Director of the London Philharmonic Orchestra:
“Listening is often thought of as something we do passively, but music can have a profound effect
on how we feel and what we imagine. By bringing together the London Philharmonic Orchestra
and the Royal College of Art, we wanted to make that invisible experience visible – and show
people that you don’t need to be an expert in classical music to have a powerful response to it.”
David Burke, Chief Executive of the London Philharmonic Orchestra:
“The Power of Listening is a statement about the kind of Orchestra we want to be: open,
connected to the culture around us and relevant both to those who already know us and those
who might never have set foot in a concert hall. It’s a long-term commitment to opening up what
orchestral music can offer and who it can be for. If our music moves you on a London street, we
hope you’ll come and hear it played live.”
Neville Brody OBE, Professor of Communication Art & Design at the Royal College of Art and
best known for his era-defining work as art director of The Face magazine in the 1980s:
“Translating a symphony into a still image is a near-impossible task. In a moment when images
can be generated in seconds by a machine, there’s something urgent about asking a person to sit,
listen and really feel something before they make a mark. Through this partnership with the
London Philharmonic Orchestra and the Royal College of Art, eight artists were asked to do
exactly that: listen deeply to orchestral music and turn what they heard and felt into something
visual.”
See the music for yourself
The artworks will be on free public display for one week at Vinegar Yard, with headphones
attached to each piece so visitors can listen to the music that inspired it while viewing the art.
The artworks will be on free public display for one week at Vinegar Yard, with headphones
attached to each piece so visitors can listen to the music that inspired it while viewing the art. The
artworks will also appear on billboards across London.