Albany Symphony spotlights films, video games to start season
From John Williams’ blaring brass accompanying Darth Vader to Koji Kondo’s upbeat keyboard joining Mario’s adventures through Mushroom Kingdom, movie and video game scores have helped bring orchestra to new audiences.
Albany Symphony is bringing the iconic scores of Hollywood and fantastical games out of the background and making them the stars with its Film Music Festival, a first of its kind celebration of music made for media. Through the collision of popular culture and symphonic scores, the organization is leaning into its mission to make orchestral music accessible to new audiences.
“We’re forever trying to find ways to communicate to a larger audience just how varied what we do is and also to reach out to as large an audience as possible and to invite everybody in,” said David Alan Miller, music director.
Pianist Kevin Cole, renowned for his interpretations of George Gershwin, kicks off the festival with an intimate “Hollywood Cabaret” on Oct. 5. Audience members will sit onstage with Cole at Troy Savings Bank Music Hall while the pianist plays and sings through the Golden Age of Hollywood.
“I think for many people that have been to Troy Music Hall, they have no idea what it feels like to be on the stage,” Cole said. “The acoustics are so magical and wonderful. I’ve played Carnegie Hall, and I agree with the assessment — it does rival Carnegie Hall.”
The evening will include three big medleys spotlighting Irving Berlin, Jerome Kern and Howard Dietz and Arthur Schwartz, the duo behind the music of “Bandwagon” starring Fred Astaire, plus a shorter medley of comedic Gerswhin tunes. Cole will also play an original score composed for the 15-minute silent film “45 Minutes from Hollywood,” starring Stan Laurel and Oliver Hardy before they were the iconic comedy duo.
The film celebration will continue with “Soundtrack New York” on Oct. 7 at the Palace Theatre. Under Miller’s baton, Albany Symphony will play through several iconic scores connected to New York state, either through setting or composer, including “King Kong,” “West Side Story,” “Breakfast at Tiffany’s,” “Taxi Driver” and “The Lord of the Rings.”
(For those of you wondering where the entrance to Middle Earth lies in New York state, “Lord of the Rings” composer Howard Shore has been an Orange County resident since 2004).
“A lot of activity is in L.A., of course, where much of or most of the industry is, but New York has had forever a really vibrant film scene and film composition scene, and … most of those composers who ended up in Hollywood came from or through New York,” Miller said. “We wanted to celebrate New York.”
The evening will also include Cole playing Gershwin works, including “Second Rhapsody,” also known as “Rhapsody in Rivets,” and “An American in Paris.”
“He is the greatest living Gershwin interpreter in the world,” Miller said. “He plays Gershwin so stylistically perfectly. He’s channeling Gershwin himself.”
Celebrating music in new types of visual media was also important to the festival, Miller said. Enter “Video Games Live” on Oct. 8 at the Palace, a hyper-theatrical, laser studded concert that founder and award-winning video game composer Tommy Tallarico describes “as having all of the power and emotion of a symphony orchestra combined with the energy and excitement of a rock concert and a video game.” Albany Symphony, under guest conductor Emmanuel Fratianni, will perform exclusive arrangements of the biggest titles in gaming including “Final Fantasy,” “The Last of Us,” “League of Legends,” “Skyrim,” “Kingdom Hearts” and “Halo” in an immersive concert for gamers and non-gamers alike.
Tallarico first imagined “Video Games Live” in the early 2000s. Technological advances meant video game scores weren’t restricted to “bleeps and bloops,” Tallarico said, and Capitol Records had produced an album of the composer’s greatest hits. He saw an opportunity to highlight the cultural significance and artistry of the industry in a live show and help usher in a new generation of symphony-goers.
“One of my heroes is Walt Disney and 70 years ago, he created ‘Fantasia’ for that reason,” Tallarico said. “He took all the greatest symphony and orchestral music — Beethoven, Mussorgsky — and put them to animated film, he put them to cartoons … Here we are 70 years later carrying on Walt’s work, but with a different medium.”
In addition to the centerpiece concert events, Albany Symphony will host two free events geared toward the newer, younger generation of audience members.
The symposium “Scoring Work in Showbusiness” unites industry experts across different sectors of film for a panel discussion geared towards high school and college students on Oct. 7 at the University at Albany.
“Movie Music Play-In” partners Albany Symphony and Empire State Youth Orchestra for a concert featuring selections from “Pirates of the Caribbean,” “Harry Potter” and “Moana” on Oct. 9 at MVP Arena. The concert will conclude with an opportunity for audience members of all ages and abilities to dust off their instruments and join in playing “The Imperial March” from “Star Wars.”