Musical Storyland: Story, Cast and Series Facts

Story and premise

CBeebies and BBC Education have commissioned Musical Storyland, a major new ten-part series featuring the BBC Philharmonic that brings famous stories from around the world to life using the power of music.

The series follows the success of the BBC Philharmonic's film The Musical Story of the Gingerbread Man and is the first time an orchestra has ever been commissioned to make a series of films for network television.

The stories are narrated by a host of stars and the series features a number of internationally renowned guest musicians, all accompanied by brand new teaching resources on the BBC Teach website available for schools to utilise.

Using live action and animation alongside original compositions, stories featured in the series include The Baobab Tree, Jack and the Beanstalk, Ananse and the Monkeys and The Hare and the Tortoise.

Series details

• Title: Musical Storyland
• Format: Scripted
• Language: English
• Genres: Children, Music
• Premiere date: 2023-11-27
• Final broadcast date listed: 2024-03-25
• Status in TVmaze: Ended
• Web channel listed by TVmaze: BBC iPlayer
• Network country: United Kingdom
• Typical episode runtime: 10 minutes
• TVMaze ID: 72441
• IMDb ID: tt31860756
• TVDB ID: 442772

Cast and credited roles

• Jess Schafer — Cello
• Nihal Arthanayake — Narrated By
• Nihal Arthanayake — Presenter
• Jan Blake — Narrated By
• Jan Blake — Presenter
• Nathan Knight — Double Bass
• Jenny Hutchinson — Piccolo
• Rebecca Levis — Horn
• Elliott Gresty — Clarinet
• Simon Gilks — Violin
• Sidiki Dembélé — Djembe
• Sidiki Dembélé — Calabash

Seasons in the TVmaze catalogue

• Season 1: premiered 2023-11-27; final listed air date 2023-11-27; episode order: 5.
• Season 2: premiered 2024-03-25; final listed air date 2024-03-25; episode order: 5.

Source and licence

Adapted from Musical Storyland on TVmaze. The synopsis is reproduced as plain text; catalogue facts, cast and season records are selected and reformatted. This adapted text is available under CC BY-SA 4.0, following the TVmaze API licence. Network and web-channel credits identify the service listed in this source; they do not establish current streaming availability.