Play! A video game symphony V (526586156)

PLAY! A Video Game Symphony was a concert series that featured music from video games performed by a live orchestra. The concerts from 2006 to 2010 were conducted by Arnie Roth. From 2010,

Andy Brick Andy Brick is an American composer, conductor and symphonist. A native of suburban Chicago, Brick studied composition under Leslie Bassett at the University of Michigan. He then completed graduate studies in composition at the Mannes School o ...

took the position of principal conductor and music director. Play! was replaced by the Replay: Symphony of Heroes concert series.

History

In 2004, Jason Michael Paul was approached by

Square Enix is a Japanese multinational holding company, production enterprise and entertainment conglomerate, best known for its ''Final Fantasy'', ''Dragon Quest'', ''Star Ocean'' and ''Kingdom Hearts'' role-playing video game franchises, among numerous ...

to organize a concert for music from its ''

Final Fantasy is a Japanese science fantasy anthology media franchise created by Hironobu Sakaguchi and developed and owned by Square Enix (formerly Square). The franchise centers on a series of fantasy and science fantasy role-playing video games. The ...

'' series. After the concert sold out in a few days, Paul decided to turn video game music concerts into a series. Arnie Roth, who had previously conducted the '' Dear Friends - Music from Final Fantasy'' and ''More Friends: Music from Final Fantasy'' concerts, was selected to conduct the concerts.

, who had previously conducted the Symphonic Game Music Concerts, was chosen as the associate conductor. The concerts are performed by local symphony players and choirs. Play! premiered on May 27, 2006 at the

Rosemont Theater The Rosemont Theatre is a concert hall in Rosemont, Illinois, a suburb of Chicago. The venue, which has seats for 4,400 people, opened in 1995 and hosts many different musical artists and shows. It is located near O'Hare International Airport, Fa ...

in Rosemont,

Illinois Illinois ( ) is a state in the Midwestern United States. Its largest metropolitan areas include the Chicago metropolitan area, and the Metro East section, of Greater St. Louis. Other smaller metropolitan areas include, Peoria and Rock ...

. The premiere show featured performances by

Koji Kondo is a Japanese music composer, pianist, and music director who works for the video game company Nintendo. He is best known for his numerous contributions to the ''Super Mario'' and ''The Legend of Zelda'' series of video games, among others pr ...

Angela Aki known professionally as , is a pop singer, songwriter and pianist. Biography Early life Aki was born in the small town of Itano in Tokushima Prefecture, in the mostly rural island of Shikoku. Her mother is Italian American and her father is ...

, and Akira Yamaoka, and composers

Nobuo Uematsu is a Japanese composer and keyboardist best known for his contributions to the '' Final Fantasy'' video game series by Square Enix. A self-taught musician, he began playing the piano at the age of twelve, with English singer-songwriter Elton ...

, Yasunori Mitsuda,

Yuzo Koshiro is a Japanese composer and sound programmer. He is often regarded as one of the most influential innovators in chiptune and video game music, producing music in a number of genres including rock, jazz, symphonic, and various electronic genre ...

and Jeremy Soule were in attendance.

Concerts

Each concert features segments of

video game music Video game music (or VGM) is the soundtrack that accompanies video games. Early video game music was once limited to sounds of early sound chips, such as programmable sound generators (PSG) or FM synthesis chips. These limitations have led t ...

performed by a live orchestra and choir, with video footage from the games shown on three screens. An opening fanfare, written by Nobuo Uematsu, is performed at each show. Music from all video game eras is performed at the shows. According to Paul, the show is a "straightforward music program," designed "to keep the arts alive in a way that is classy."

Performed music

Music from the following games has been performed at Play!: *'' ActRaiser'' *''

Apidya ''Apidya'' (titled in Japanese characters below the title) is a horizontally scrolling shoot 'em up video game developed by German studio Kaiko and released by Play Byte in 1992 for the Amiga. It was Kaiko's second game developed. Despite being ...

'' *'' Battlefield'' *''

Black Black is a color which results from the absence or complete absorption of visible light. It is an achromatic color, without hue, like white and grey. It is often used symbolically or figuratively to represent darkness. Black and white ha ...

'' *'' Blue Dragon'' *''

Castlevania ''Castlevania'' (), known in Japan as is a gothic horror action-adventure video game series and media franchise about Dracula, created and developed by Konami. It has been released on various platforms, from early systems to modern consoles, ...

'' *''

Chrono Cross is a 1999 role-playing video game developed and published by Square for the PlayStation video game console. It is set in the same world as ''Chrono Trigger'', which was released in 1995 for the Super Nintendo Entertainment System. ''Chrono Cros ...

'' *'' Chrono Trigger'' *''

Commodore 64 The Commodore 64, also known as the C64, is an 8-bit home computer introduced in January 1982 by Commodore International (first shown at the Consumer Electronics Show, January 7–10, 1982, in Las Vegas). It has been listed in the Guinness W ...

-Medley'' *'' Commodore Amiga-Medley'' *''

Daytona USA is an arcade racing video game developed by Sega AM2 in 1993 and released by Sega in 1994. Players race stock cars on one of three courses. The first game released on the Sega Model 2 three-dimensional arcade system board, a prototype debute ...

'' *'' Dragon Age: Origins'' *'' Dreamfall'' *''

'' *'' Guild Wars'' *'' Halo'' *''

Kingdom Hearts is a series of action role-playing games developed and published by Square Enix (originally by Square). It is a collaboration between Square Enix and The Walt Disney Company and is under the leadership of Tetsuya Nomura, a longtime Square ...

'' *'' Lost Odyssey'' *'' Metal Gear Solid'' *''

Prey Predation is a biological interaction where one organism, the predator, kills and eats another organism, its prey. It is one of a family of common feeding behaviours that includes parasitism and micropredation (which usually do not kill ...

'' *''

Shadow of the Colossus ''Shadow of the Colossus'' is a 2005 action-adventure game developed by Japan Studio and Team Ico, and published by Sony Computer Entertainment for the PlayStation 2. It takes place in a fantasy setting and follows Wander, a young man who ent ...

'' *''

Shenmue is an action-adventure game series created, produced and directed by Yu Suzuki. '' Shenmue'' (1999) and ''Shenmue II'' (2001) were developed by Sega AM2 and published by Sega for Dreamcast. '' Shenmue III,'' developed by Suzuki's company ...

'' *'' Silent Hill'' *''

Sonic the Hedgehog is a Japanese video game series and media franchise created by Sega. The franchise follows Sonic, an anthropomorphic blue hedgehog who battles the evil Doctor Eggman, a mad scientist. The main ''Sonic the Hedgehog'' games are platformers m ...

'' *'' Stella Deus'' *'' Super Mario Bros.'' *'' Super Mario World'' *'' The Chronicles of Riddick: Escape from Butcher Bay'' *'' The Darkness'' *'' The Elder Scrolls III: Morrowind'' *'' The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion'' *''

The Legend of Zelda ''The Legend of Zelda'' is an action-adventure game franchise created by the Japanese game designers Shigeru Miyamoto and Takashi Tezuka. It is primarily developed and published by Nintendo, although some portable installments and re-relea ...

'' *'' The Revenge of Shinobi'' *'' Ys'' *''

World of Warcraft ''World of Warcraft'' (''WoW'') is a massively multiplayer online role-playing game (MMORPG) released in 2004 by Blizzard Entertainment. Set in the '' Warcraft'' fantasy universe, ''World of Warcraft'' takes place within the world of Azer ...

Album

On January 9, 2009, a live album CD and DVD of the concert was released. It was recorded in

Prague Prague ( ; cs, Praha ; german: Prag, ; la, Praga) is the capital and largest city in the Czech Republic, and the historical capital of Bohemia. On the Vltava river, Prague is home to about 1.3 million people. The city has a temperate ...

and was performed by the Czech Philharmonic Chamber Orchestra.

Reception and legacy

The concerts have been well received. Audiences regularly give standing ovations after each song. Jeremy Soule, composer of the music for ''The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion'', said that he "consider 'Play' to be the ultimate video-game surround system." According to Paul, Play! helps to promote the work of composers, as well as "lend credibility to the genre of video-game music." Roth stated that the concerts help to also push the classical industry forward and to "draw new audiences." According to Soule, video game concerts can help to educate old generations "that game music isn't just a bunch of bleeps and bloops." One associate conductor stated that the performance crosses the generational gap, bringing together older and younger generations.

References

External links

*{{webarchive , url=https://web.archive.org/web/20130423194132/http://www.play-symphony.com/ , date=April 23, 2013 , title=Official website Video game concert tours 2006 in video gaming 2007 in video gaming 2010 in music 2010 in video gaming 2008 in video gaming 2009 in video gaming 2006 in music 2007 in music 2008 in music 2009 in music

History

Concerts

Performed music

Album

Reception and legacy

See also

References

External links