91Èȱ¬

This weekend 91Èȱ¬ Radio Manchester launches a new series – Manchester DNA – a project devised to explore and celebrate the positive influence different cultures have had in the city's makeup.

From Monday 12 April to Saturday 2 May, Manchester DNA will include a series of personal life stories, looking at the many different groups which make up modern Manchester.

91Èȱ¬ Radio Manchester will air 15 stories from people with varied cultural backgrounds now living in Manchester including Czech, Ethiopian, Greek-Cypriot, Polish, Spanish, German, Caribbean and Iraqi.

To celebrate the series, 91Èȱ¬ Manchester Introducing has recorded a unique track especially for the project – a song which listeners will instantly recognise as being distinctly Manchester, but with a twist.

Manchester's Beating Wing Orchestra – comprised of local people alongside immigrants, refugees and asylum seekers from all over the world – has recorded their own version of Oasis's Whatever. They also worked with the city's own acclaimed broadcasting orchestra, the 91Èȱ¬ Philharmonic, which offered three of their players to support the Beating Wing's take on the song.

Jaheda Choudhury, a Bengali singer with the Beating Wing Orchestra, said: "The track choice is amazing because it's Oasis, a Manchester band.

"We are people who have fought all sorts of oppression and adversity to get to who we are. People have come into this city and we have brought who we are and our culture, community, morals, food and music, our everything.

"Every individual has had to fight a different fight to be here today and this song and its lyrics just say it all."

Radio Manchester Introducing's producer, Chris Long, said: "When I heard the version that the Beating Wing came up with I thought it was nothing short of amazing.

"They have taken the openness and freedom of the original and run with it, pushing it into a cover which is unique and thrilling. It has to be heard to be believed and once you’ve had a listen, you won't be able to stop smiling."

The recording will first be transmitted on Radio Manchester on Sunday 11 April at around 10.50pm during 91Èȱ¬ Manchester Introducing and will be available on "Listen again" at bbc.co.uk/manchester.

At 10.00pm on Sunday 2 May, the Manchester DNA series will culminate in a special programme celebrating the local and international new music that is made in the city and will feature the Beating Wing Orchestra along with a line up of Manchester bands that have members from different parts of the world.

A film showing the making of the track will be available online from Monday 12 April at bbc.co.uk/manchester.

Notes to Editors

91Èȱ¬ Radio Manchester Introducing is the station's weekly show dedicated to new music in the Greater Manchester area. Presented by Sam Walker, it goes out on Sunday nights between 10.00pm and 1.00am.

The Beating Wing Orchestra (BWO) is a unique, musically diverse orchestra. Its main aim is to experiment, play, create and perform challenging new music that draws on a global music vocabulary.

BWO was brought together by Community Arts North West in January 2007 through its Exodus Live music project, to create and perform a new international composition commissioned by Manchester International Festival (MIF) as part of their original and new works festival.

The Grammy-nominated 91Èȱ¬ Philharmonic is one of 91Èȱ¬ Radio 3's five orchestras. It is one of the 91Èȱ¬'s busiest groups, giving over a hundred concerts a year at The Bridgewater Hall, at its base at the 91Èȱ¬ in Manchester, at the 91Èȱ¬ Proms and on numerous UK and foreign tours. With around 60,000 people enjoying its concerts per year, it also has a very active learning and community element to its work.

JC4