Robert Irving III founded Sonic Portraits Orchestra in 2009 as the vehicle for his commissioned suited Sketches of Brazil. This premiered on Thursday August 13, 2009 at Chicago’s Millennium Park before a then record crowd of 12,500 fans. Irving conducted the 34-member ensemble that featured Wallace Roney on trumpet and Fareed Haque on classical guitar.  Irving composed the piece in homage to his mentors, Miles Davis and Gil Evans on the 50th anniversary of their seminal recording “Sketches Of Spain.

Since that time, Irving’s Sonic Portraits Orchestra has remained intact in various forms for recording projects and more recently for subsequent commissioned performances of “Sound Pictures of a Century the Living Legacy of Timuel D. Black” first premiered on December 8, 2018 on the 100th birthday of the centenarian who mentored Barack Obama and Chicago’s first Black Mayor, Harold Washington.  Irving celebrated his birthday on October 27, 2019 with remounting of this suite as the inaugural performance of the Sonic Portraits Orchestra Youth Division at Schultz Auditorium on the campus of Illinois Institute of Technology. The ensemble consisted of youth from the jazz and classical communities ranging from age 14 to 26. The vocal ensemble Young Diva Young Divo, curated by Senabella Gill were featured with the orchestra. This electrifying collaboration was scheduled for a three night run at the historic ETA Performing Arts Center Theater beginning March 29, 2020. Circumstances leading up to the pandemic shutdown precluded this highly anticipated expansion of the piece into a larger musical theater format.