A long, long time ago…I was one of those classical music snobs who turned their nose up at the notion of symphony orchestras playing movie music. I had all of the usual arguments: it was dumbing down the music, appealing to a lower common denominator who had no interest in the great masterpieces of Beethoven or Bruckner, turning concert halls into circuses with cosplay and themed cocktails, etc.
Then, about a decade ago, I had the chance to meet the conductor David Robertson in St. Louis while he was music director of the St. Louis Symphony. I asked Robertson, a well-known advocate for new music and adventurous programming, what he thought about the orchestra’s upcoming film night. (I don’t remember what the movie was, but it wasn’t an Academy Award winner.)
“I think it’s great,” Robertson said matter of factly.
“But, don’t you think playing this music will somehow harm the musicians?”
“Actually, I think it might help them play better. Some of this music is really quite challenging.”
Not long after that, I started attending John Williams’ Film Night at Tanglewood: an annual Woodstock-like gathering which would turn the streets surrounding Lenox, MA into parking lots. Seeing Williams, now 94, conduct excerpts of his own film music with the Boston Pops (which he led from 1980-93) was like watching Yoda raise Luke’s X-wing from the swamp, a bit of sorcery he’s since replicated at some of music’s greatest temples, including the Berlin and Vienna Philharmonics. (This year’s Film Night is on Aug. 15, though Williams hasn’t conducted it himself since 2023.)
But, what really blew things open for me was the NY Phil’s Art of the Score series, which kicked off in 2013 with what’s become known in the industry as “live to film” presentations, where the orchestra performs live to an entire film with the soundtrack digitally removed. That first year, then-music director Alan Gilbert led an adventurous presentation of Stanley Kubrick’s 2001: A Space Odyssey, complete with Ligeti’s avant-garde choruses and music by various Strausses (Johann and Richard).
After the Phil performed along to Williams’ E.T. two years ago, I wrote:
“Say what you will about the aesthetic value of one of the world’s leading orchestras performing movie music: from the look of the packed hall last night, the series has been highly successful not just in terms of selling tickets, but in broadening the Phil’s audience…The music is thrilling, majestic, heartwrenching, and ultimately triumphant, punctuated by one of the most penetrating horn blasts you’ll ever hear.”
That’s when I finally got it: these aren’t concerts, and they’re not just what you’d get at your local cineplex. The visceral impact of a live orchestra – especially a top-flight one like the NY Phil or BSO – synced to the spectacular visuals of a film in real time – is it’s own thing. I’m not old enough to remember the days of grand movie palaces where silent films screened to a live pipe organ, but I imagine it’s somewhere in that ballpark. Check your kvetching at the door.
Last week, the Art of the Score returned with yet another iconic Williams score: Return of the Jedi (1983), the final installment of the original Star Wars trilogy (and sixth film overall). After seeing the Boston Pops perform The Empire Strikes Back (1980) at Tanglewood four years ago, I was excited to experience Jedi last Thursday – though I’ll admit to having second thoughts once I saw Darth Vader and some lightsaber-clutching characters posing for selfies in the Geffen Hall atrium. (Disney, which owns the Star Wars franchise, has a division called Disney Concerts that licenses its films – and promotional tools – for such performances.)
The concert (film? performance?) was led by veteran film composer David Newman, a sure-handed conductor who often leads Williams’ music at Tanglewood and elsewhere. (Coincidentally, Newman’s younger brother Thomas launched his career by helping orchestrate Return of the Jedi.) Starting with the famous opening title, much of the music was familiar from the previous two Star Wars films. But, there were numerous colorful additions: the funky jams in Jabba the Hut’s lair, the dark, terrifying brass accompanying the Emperor, the huge battery of percussion depicting the Ewoks and their forest village.
Following intermission, there was nearly an hour of brass-heavy music leading to the climactic battle scene between the rebels and the Empire, which one conductor has called “the biggest roller coaster at the amusement park.” The Phil dispatched it flawlessly, followed by seven minutes of credits set to Williams’ brilliant postlude, which everyone has finally learned to stick around for. (Well, almost everyone.)
The eruption of full-throated cheers afterwards must have put a smile on NY Phil CEO Matías Tarnopolsky’s face, whom I spotted in his usual box in the first tier of the Wu Tsai Theater. His presence, along with that of concertmaster Frank Huang and many of the Phil’s other principals speaks to how important these concerts have become, not to mention how much the musicians enjoy playing in them. According to Ben Dettelback, a 28-year-old trombonist in the Syracuse Orchestra who spoke to the NY Times last month, “Half the brass players probably in the world would credit their desire to play trumpet, trombone and French horn to the ‘Star Wars’ soundtrack. You just listen to any John Williams. That’s real music.”
Two days later, I was sitting in Pittsburgh’s Heinz Hall for another live to film screening: The Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers (2002), with Howard Shore’s score performed live by the Pittsburgh Symphony. Shore’s music for the Lord of the Rings trilogy – not to mention the three Hobbit films which followed a decade later – have been voted among the best scores ever written, with the first and third installments each winning the Oscar for Best Original Score. (The Two Towers wasn’t nominated for an Oscar due to a debate at the time over the score’s use of previously written music.) The music has become a wildly successful franchise, spawning a “Lord of the Rings Symphony”, a pair of “Lord of the Rings Suites” and various other theatrical presentations.
After my experience earlier this season seeing Manfred Honeck lead the PSO in a brilliant Bruckner 8 to a half-full audience, it was a welcome change to see the 2700 seat Heinz Hall completely full: all three performances last weekend were sold out. Indeed, the PSO has leaned heavily into it’s live to film presentations, increasing the number of soundtrack concerts to five this season. As such, these concerts are now included in the PSO’s operating budget of $42 million – a $7 million increase over last year, placing them among the dozen largest orchestras in the country.
“Movies with the PSO has become one of the PSO’s strongest audience-development programs and one that continues to see significant demand,” CEO and President Melia Tourangeau told the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette last month. “In recent years, attendance for these concerts has grown substantially, with ticket volume more than doubling since the 2022-23 season, from 11,394 tickets to this year’s 26,854.” In 2023, the Post-Gazette reported that these concerts generated as much as $250,000 per weekend, so clearly this has become a huge revenue driver for the orchestra.
Although to my ears, Shore’s music doesn’t measure up to Williams’ metric and tonal complexity, he does adopt many of the same Wagner-esque techniques, such as leitmotifs, big, brassy chorales, and propulsive percussion. Over the course of three-and-a-half hours, I heard music that could have easily been written by Shostakovich or Prokofiev, both of whom tried their hand at film music at various points in their careers.
Throughout, the PSO – particularly the brass section – demonstrated not only the superb musicianship which has become familiar to audiences at their classical concerts, but also incredible stamina, with the music seeming to grow more and more intense as the hours ticked by. (Such stamina can also be credited to the audience, contradicting the assumption that today’s listeners are only willing to digest Tik Tok-sized bites of music.) There were also quiet moments, such as a Celtic-sounding motif for amplified violin, played skillfully by Assistant Concertmatster Dylan Naroff.
Shore’s score also has a major vocal component, with the Mendelssohn Choir of Pittsburgh and the Pittsburgh Youth Chorus combining forces to deliver a overpowering rush of sound. Joining them was soprano Kaitlyn Lusk, Shore’s preferred vocalist for The Lord of the Rings, and boy soprano Hudson Schmitt, a Pittsburgh native. Swiss conductor Ludwig Wicki managed to corral the massive forces onstage with clarity and texture.
On a personal level, I was joined on Saturday by my nephew and his girlfriend, both of whom are entering their senior year at the University of Pittsburgh. For both, it was their first time experiencing a live orchestral concert, and they were each blown away by the experience – so much so that they’ve already started asking me about next season’s schedule. Forget about revenue streams: if that isn’t a win for orchestras constantly in search for new and younger audiences, I don’t know what is. Too bad they missed that Bruckner 8…
More pics on Instagram.