The summer semester always starts in April at the University of Leipzig. And for the members of the Orchestra of Leipzig University their weekly rehearsals begin, too.

The passionate amateur musicians have voted for a demanding concert programme: The Sorcerers Apprentice by Paul Dukas, Violin Concerto in D minor by Jean Sibelius and the symphonic suite Scheherazade by Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov. And the Grand Auditorium of the Gewandhaus Leipzig, home of the renowned Gewandhausorchester, has already been reserved for the grand concert evening at the end of the semester in July.

There are only three months left for the students who are not professional musicians to get their programme going. In this film we can see how they rehearse with their musical director Juri Lebedev. They tell us about their motivation, why they had founded the orchestra at all and why it is so much fun making music with other in ones spare time. We find out about what is important with the orchestra camp and how the young musicians feel just before the concert. We accompany the students from their first rehearsal until the final concert eve.

We take a look backstage and learn more about the history of this unique student orchestra.