This pioneering music program has Western Sydney primary school students playing alongside world-class musicians

In the Australian Chamber Orchestra's Neilson auditorium in Sydney's Walsh Bay, a flock of primary school children is chittering excitedly in the wings.

As the doors open, a hush falls over the chamber and the students, aged between 6 and 12, file in reverently.

Laid out before them are about 50 child-sized string instruments, from violins to cellos, that endearingly look like toy instruments (but they're not). One by one the kids pick them up and prepare to play, heads held high, bows in hand.