World Record at the Klassik Open Air

Conducting and presenting Europe’s largest open-air classical concert for the third year running, Alexander Shelley on Saturday also lead the 60,000 strong crowd in the World’s largest ever sung canon. Having performed Stravinsky’s Firebird Suite, Tchaikovsky’s Violin concerto (with soloist Erik Schumann) and Rachmaninov’s mammoth 2^nd Symphony with the Nuremberg Symphony Orchestra, Shelley ran 100 metres into the thick of the audience, climbed a 9metre tower and proceeded to divide the audience into four groups, rehearse them separately and then direct them through the canon using airport light sticks as a baton. The record attempt was the culmination of this year’s “Klassik Open Air” which has grown over the last decade into one of the major summer cultural events in Bavaria. Reviews and images from the concert can be found here.