Cinematic

QSO’s Cinematic just gets bigger and better each year – no wonder the events are quickly sold out. This year’s tribute to composers who write for the silver screen featured a rich choice of truly moving and emotional pieces. As usual, the fun started in the foyer with characters from ‘Pirates of the Caribbean’, ‘Mary Poppins’, ‘Lord of the Rings’ and others greeting the audience. Inside the Concert Hall, the orchestra took to the stage and readied to tune up, dressed in an array of costumes from ‘Up’, Disney and other franchise feature films. Double Bass player, Justin Bullock, somehow found time to fashion his own take on Pixar’s ‘Up’ with house-and-balloon-combo head attire!

Conductor, Nicholas Buc (also an award-winning composer himself) took to the stage dressed as Jack Skellington from Tim Burton’s ‘The Nightmare Before Christmas’. The opening piece was a rousing version of ‘Also sprach Zarathustra’ best remembered for its use by Stanley Kubrick in ‘2001: A Space Odyssey’.

The soundtrack is the most outstanding feature of the two ‘Star Wars’ franchisees that followed: Ludwig Göransson’s fabulous main theme from ‘The Mandalorian’ and John Williams’s ‘Duel of the fates’ from ‘The Phantom Menace’. An uplifting piece by Australian composer Nigel Westlake from ‘Paper Planes’ segued to a series of love themes: Michael Giacchino’s ‘Married life sequence’ from Pixar’s ‘Up’, Craig Armstrong’s work from Richard Curtis’s ‘Love Actually’, pieces by Danny Elfman for ‘Edward Scissorhands’, James Horner’s suite excerpts from ‘Titanic’ and the emotional ‘Tale as old as time’ by Alan Menken from ‘Beauty and the Beast’. The lighting was brighter and the sound was richer than last year – enhanced by the addition of 70-piece community choir, the Voices of Birralee.

The choir was a brilliant added layer to the cinematic experience and I hope this talented group are included in future productions. The generous second half of the programme featured Hans Zimmer’s theme from ‘Inception’, and John Williams again, this time with ‘Hymn to the fallen’ from ‘Saving Private Ryan’. Nicholas Buc always includes some interesting work from the worlds of gaming and animation. This year he featured pieces by two Japanese composers – themes from the video game ‘Kingdom of Hearts’ by Hikaru Utada and Joe Hisaishi’s work on the animated feature ‘Howl’s Moving Castle’ – and the audience was very much appreciative. The fantasy element continued with James Horner’s music from ‘Avatar’, John Williams’s iconic and all-enhancing audio motifs from ‘Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone’, Howard Shore’s ‘Two Towers Symphonic Suite’ from ‘Lord of the Rings’ and a final stirring medley from Klaus Badelt’s work on ‘Pirates of the Caribbean: the Curse of the Black Pearl’. The audience simply did not want to leave, and so a special encore, featuring haunting work by the Voices of Birralee was the gothic ‘O Fortuna/ Carmina Burana’, as featured in Richard Donner’s ‘The Omen’ and John Boorman’s ‘Excalibur’.  Cinematic was an uplifting programme, enjoyed by a capacity audience from all age groups. A wonderful way to experience orchestral music by some of our modern-day (and classical) composers.

Beth Keehn

Photographer: Sarah Marshall