IT is the joyous sound of revolution that has thrilled city audiences for more than two decades.

Now residents are again set to perform a “peasant mass” that celebrates their link with the Nicaraguan city of Leon.

Every year, the Oxford-Leon Association and Trust performs the piece, composed by Carlos Mejia Godoy and peasant workers.

It was first performed in Nicaragua at a 1975 mass as a protest against the government that was broken up by the National Guard.

Underground recordings heightened its status and the piece was performed openly after the 1979 Sandinista Liberation Front revolution.

Now two free performan-ces of the Misa Campesina de Nicaragua will take place in the centre of Oxford tonight and tomorrow.

Association chairman Jan Marshall said: “It is very much celebrating the vibrancy of Nicaragua and its popular culture.

“It is not like a normal church mass.

“It has a lot of Nicaraguan folk music which has a strong connection with Catholicism.

“It is moving and also great fun.

“It is incredibly lively and loud.”

About 30 members will perform the mass at Rose Place in St Aldate’s at 5.30pm tonight and at Blackfriars Church in St Giles at 9.30am tomorrow.

After a bring-and-share supper following the mass, the group will screen La Yuma, about a woman who dreams of escaping poverty through boxing.

Mrs Marshall said the link between the two cities was still strong despite their huge differences in wealth, culture and geography.

She said: “We try to raise awareness about Nicaragua.

“It is a very impoverished, developing country. ”

While the city’s other twinning links – with the European cities of Leiden in Holland, Bonn in Germany and Grenoble in the French Alps, and the Russian district of Perm – involve exchanges, she said the link with Leon was different.

The association raises cash for Nicaraguan aid and education projects.

Last year members donated more than £3,000 towards a project to remove arsenic from the water supply.