Music Upbeat: Worlds apart

STRANGE, isn't it, how you always remember when you see a black face in an orchestra. Radio 4's Kaleidoscope is investigating why some of the longest- established minorities in Britain, and for that matter America, have made such little headway in the profession. Interviewees have not minced words. 'The two areas of music, that is classical and pop,' says Ian Hall, 'are very subject to apartheid, you know, white and black.'

Hall, a well-established organist and composer, the first black music graduate from Oxford University, is the nephew of the late conductor Rudolph Dunbar. The BBC once responded to an enquiry from Italy about booking Dunbar that 'we are not prepared to accept him as a conductor. . . it's possible that interest has been aroused in him as a Negro who is attempting to become a serious musician'. The broadcast is due next Friday and Saturday.