I have an embarrassing admission. This weekend while I was watching the television, I saw an interesting commercial with a completely gorgeous song in it. I could have sworn up and down that the song was the theme from Alan Menken’s score for Beauty and the Beast.

Well, I was wrong.  It wasn’t Disney but Camille Saint-Saëns’ the Aquarium movement from Carnival of the Animals.  Talk about feeling sheepish.

So in addition to this little incident and the Oscar nominations on Tuesday, I was thinking about film scores and classical music, and how the two inform each other. 

How many times have you heard music at the movies and couldn’t help but think it was Holst and not Horner who’d written the score?  And how frequently have you seen outstanding orchestras and performers lending their talents to film scores?

And the Winner Is...

Sometimes it’s really fun to be the Executive Director of the Chicago Sinfonietta.  Aside from the day-to-day challenges of selling tickets and subscriptions, raising enough money to keep the orchestra afloat, and the six thousand other things that are bound to wake me up every night,  it’s a wonderful privilege to work in our field and for this particular orchestra.  Last week I had a truly amazing experience that I have to share with you.

Ok. It happened. My one week free trial of the Metropolitan Opera's MetPlayer expired and I got sucked into buying a month's subscription. Currently, I am in the process of making my way through the Ring Cycle (on Die Walkure from 1989 with none other than James Levine at the podium and Jessye Norman as an incredible Sieglinde plus plenty of other ringers). The newer productions are in HD with intermission interviews, shots of stage changes and even more from productions as recent as last April! Of course the Met isn't the only classical organization developing an online comsumer group. Similarly, the Berlin Philharmonic has a Digital Concert Hall where viewers can access concert archives, documentaries, view live streaming concerts and watch discussions with soloists, conductors etc. Both of these organizations give their online audience a better view and more acoustic balance / clarity than one can get from almost any seat in the house of a live performance.

For those of you who watched the Super Bowl this past year, this commercial is nothing new. It has over 3 million YouTube hits - for a commercial, I say that is pretty impressive. I just encountered it a few days ago and can't shake the ridiculousness from my mind.

When Verdi composed his Requiem (a funeral mass) in the late 1860's, he was inspired to set the feelings of loss, sorrow and anguish. The Dies Irae (Latin for "day of wrath") movement brings out some of the most intense portrayal of raw emotion I have ever heard. The orchestration is incredible and extremely powerful - watch out for that bass drum, I blew my speakers out listening to it a few years back.

Latest news is that Michael Jackson may have had some classical compositions in process.  

Not the only pop star turned composer, Paul McCartney quickly comes to my mind as another whos strictly classical creations including Liverpool Oratorio, and Ecce Cir Meum have been introduced to audiences. 

I'm always looking for something new, but not sure if songwriters writing pop songs - turned orchestral is all that.  

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