Venezuelan Refugee Orchestra Back Together After Argentine Lockdown

Buenos Aires, Aug 3 (UrduPoint / Pakistan Point News - 3rd Aug, 2021 ) :After a year and a half of silence due to the coronavirus pandemic, the sounds of the Latin Vox Machine orchestra have returned to a house in Buenos Aires.

The group -- made up of Venezuelans who fled their country's economic crisis to Argentina -- is preparing for a performance of the Symphonic Little Prince, a symphony they created during the lockdown, and that they released on disc at the end of July.

The violas are rehearsing in the living room, while the violins are in the kitchen. Later, the keyboards and choir will take their places to practice.

They hope to play their symphony in public for the first time in November.

The orchestra's director Enmanuel Gonzalez can hardly wait.

"The Little Prince is a beautiful project.

It was a labor of quarantine and was also an escape, it was all that we thought about," he said.

"I'm really looking forward to it and cannot wait to present it." Inspired by the novella "The Little Prince" by French author Antoine de Saint-Exupery, the Symphonic Little Prince is an original composition created by the 120-strong Venezuelan orchestra, whose members arrived in Argentina four to five years ago.

They were among the millions of people who fled the crippling economic and political crises in their home country.

Most of the Latin Vox Machine orchestra were trained in Venezuela's prestigious El Sistema program, where Gustavo Dudamel, the new director of the Paris Opera, also began his training.

Yet after arriving in Argentina, many earned a living busking in the Buenos Aires metro.