Musicians will meet sporting “soloists” when the Orchestra plays Andy Akiho’s Ricochet: Ping Pong Concerto next month.

It’s a case of rackets at the ready at the Hong Kong Philharmonic Orchestra, where music and table tennis are soon to intersect at one of their concerts. The Orchestra, who recently performed in Melbourne and Sydney on their first ever tour to Australia, are to play Andy Akiho’s “jaw-dropping” Ricochet: Ping Pong Concerto as part of a family concert at the Hong Kong Cultural Centre Concert Hall next month.

The composition by American composer Andy Akiho, which features ping pong balls as ‘soloists’, was commissioned by the Beijing Music Festival and the Music in the Summer Air (MISA) Festival in Shanghai, where it had its world premiere in 2015.

Born in Columbia, South Carolina in 1979, Akiho is based in New York City. An eclectic composer and performer of contemporary classical music, he is a graduate of the University of South Carolina, the Manhattan School of Music and the Yale School of Music, and is currently pursuing a Doctorate in composition at Princeton University.

Ricochet is a triple concerto for ping pong, percussion, violin and orchestra. CAMI Music described it at the time of its premiere as “a playful concerto which perfectly combines the rhythm of sport and music, and juxtaposed an intricate polyrhythmic score for violin and percussion with the comparably random sounds of an actual Ping-Pong match. Two Ping-Pong players volleyed along in an approximate tempo, first with paddles, then tambourines and glasses, and – as a cadenza – against a bass drum and a gong.”

In an enthusiastic review, The Financial Times quipped: “So riveting was the piece as visual theatre that no one seemed to keep score”.

According to the Orchestra’s website “the high intensity tour de force for violin, percussion, and ping pong ‘virtuosos’” promises to be a lot of fun. There is a caveat, though: “Don’t get hit by the Ping Pong balls across the hall!”