Have you ever seen an Orchestra formed from people that all met on the London Underground?

Local musician Shaun Buswell from Swindon (Wiltshire) is doing a really amazing musical challenge to raise money for charity.

He is creating an Underground Orchestra whereby the whole orchestra (30-100 piece) has to be made up by musicians he meets on the London Underground - they have to be complete strangers and not people he has met before or already knows.

The orchestra must then perform at one of twelve top London venues on 12.12.12. There is even interest from TV Production companies to air a documentary about the challenge.

Talented musician Shaun Buswell, who you might remember from the band Buswell or from his alter-ego Jurgen Milkwolff, likes to perform musical challenges for charity.

His most recent challenge was to write music for a full symphony orchestra (without reading a note of music), find an orchestra willing to perform with him without ever having heard the music and perform it live within six months. The challenge was completed in February 2011 and a snippet of this performance can be viewed here.

As part of this latest 2012 challenge there are strict rules that must be adhered to, so far these are:

1. Shaun has to meet the musicians for the first time on the London Underground (and must be actively inside the gates of an Underground station).

2. The musician Shaun meets must be carrying their instrument (or part of it) when he meets them for the first time.

3. Shaun must not know the musicians personally nor have met or communicated with them directly in person before (i.e they must be complete strangers to him).

4. Shaun is, however, allowed to pick one musician he works with per instrument as the lead for that group (i.e one cellist, one trumpeter, etc. of his choice to run that group).

5. The venue to be played at has to be from a list of 12 top venues agreed prior to the challenge.

6. Shaun must write all the music himself again (he still can't read a note of music).

Other challenges

If this was not enough, Shaun is also attempting 12 personal mini-challenges, which are anything from stopping smoking to performing on The London Eye. These can be viewed here http://121212challenge.blogspot.co.uk/2011/12/mini-challenges.html

TFL have reviewed the branding and are supporting of the challenge (see http://www.121212.org.uk).

A documentary is also being made about the challenge.

Shaun still doesn’t really know what an oboe looks like…..

The aim is to raise funds and awareness for various charities, the main ones being Kick4Life (http://www.kick4life.org) and Music Alive (http://www.music-alive.org.uk)

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