Video game soundtracks get orchestra treatment




You’ve heard of video games being described as classics. Now it’s time to hear them as classical.
The London Philharmonic Orchestra is tonight performing a concert featuring 22 tracks from video games with the full running order being:
  • Advent Rising
  • Halo
  • Bioshock
  • Dead Space
  • Mass Effect
  • Battlefield
  • Call of Duty
  • Splinter Cell
  • Elder Scrolls
  • Final Fantasy
  • Legend of Zelda
  • Myst
  • World of Warcraft
  • Uncharted: Drakes Fortune
  • Angry Birds
  • Tetris
  • Super Mario Bros
  • Enemy Zero
  • 007: Blood Stone
  • Little Big Planet
  • Grand Theft Auto
  • Metal Gear Solid
The score for the concert was composed and arranged by Andrew Skeet, who’s previously produced soundtracks for movies, TV dramas and documentaries as well as working with pop musicians. He told the BBC he’d tried to select a mix of games to provide nostalgia but also select the best music. While some of the tracks from more elaborate games have been little changed from the original composition, those for games such as Tetris and Angry Birds have received a complete classical revamp.
Skeet has blogged about the progress of the project and says of the music from games of his youth that “when you hear it again years later there is some weird Pavlovian response to it and your right thumb starts to itch, your pulse races and your eyes start to ache!”
Tickets for the concert at London’s Royal Festival Hall range from £16 to £39 (US$26-$63), but the orchestra has already recorded a studio performance and will release an album, “Video Game Heroes” in the next few months.
(Picture credit: London Philharmonic Orchestra)
Via Video game soundtracks get orchestra treatment
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