The large symphonic concert was set up in the courtyard of the old hospital, and it was quite a venue. We were held off in a side room for a while as the attendees settled in, and then we were brought out to sit up front. I was right by the percussion and strings (orchestra left) so that was going to be a slightly uneven listening experience. John Debney started out with his suite from the new PS3 computer game Lair, and then followed it up with a suite from Cutthroat Island. Disappointingly, there was no choir in the suite! Oh well. That was followed by Javier Navarrete’s Pan’s Labyrinth, and then music by two Spanish composers (Marc Vaillo and Pascal Gaigne), and then Roque Baños played two pieces of music, including a suite from his very cool score to Alatriste.
After a 30-minute intermission (wow they really like to run things late and long here!), the second half of the concert started up. David Arnold conducted two pieces from Casino Royale, which was pretty cool: “City of Lovers” and “The James Bond Theme”. Unfortunately the guitarist playing the classic theme was a little… slow. And so he was a little off tempo, which was too bad, because otherwise it sounded pretty good. Just to show you what kind of sense of humor David has, he conducted with a breadstick – which he then ate when he finished. The new Stargate suite was preformed quite nicely. It had a few rough patches, but about 3/4ths of it sounded really good. (David later told me that if he had 30 more minutes of rehearsal time, they would have been able to iron out the issues.)
Next up was John Powell, and unfortunately he wasn’t happy with the performance problems on the Bourne Ultimatum suite, so he nixed it from the program. However we still got very nice suites from P.S., I Love You, which isn’t out yet, and X-Men: The Last Stand. He ended with “Building the Crate” from Chicken Run, which was a blast and the choir even used kazoos to everyone’s delight.
Finally up was Bruce Broughton, who conducted suites from Young Sherlock Holmes and Silverado, which was a great way to end the show. It was also announced that Bruce would be the honorary President of the conference next year, replacing John Debney who was this year’s president.
By the time the concert ended, it was 2:30am. Yes, somehow this concert that had been estimated to run 2-2.5 hours had run for over 4 hours. Ah, Spain. But now, there was a party to attend!