Sunday, September 7, 2014

Video Games Live: hyperreal!

I went to Video Games Live yesterday! I didn't make it to SLC comic con, because I have a baby, but sitting down for some entertainment without waiting in any lines was definitely more my speed. It was pretty fun to hear some familiar game music in a concert hall. Here are some observations I had:

-It was weird to go to a concert a experience music in a way the composer specifically didn't intend. Usually when I go see a symphony I feel like I'm finally setting aside some time to TRULY enjoy this music like I'm SUPPOSED to. But with videogame music, it's more "true to the original" to listen to the music while you play the game. They played two songs from the Journey soundtrack and it actually kind of bothered me that the video clips of the game didn't match where the song occurs in the game originally: "no, you're supposed to be going through the apotheosis level now! And now the credits should roll!" (yes, I can feel your eyes rolling from here. It was just a weird feeling and I wanted to tell you about it.)

-The symphony participated in an OCRemix version of Celeste's theme, and I was weirding out about how it was an orchestra trying to sound like a remix of a digital symphony. So hyperreal!

-At first I wasn't sure why they didn't have a classical conductor, but then I realized that conducting for this concert was a completely different job. Each piece had a video that went with it, and yes, it was synced to the music, so there was some soundtrack-timing-level-preciseness with the tempo that went on (either that or their A/V guys were just really good at adapting to tempo). There was also one part where they took a volunteer from the audience to play space invaders with motion controls and they played the music live. It reminded me of how before movie theaters had speakers, they had organists who made up music to go with the silent films (I went to a recreation at BYU once and it was pretty cool). Most soundtracks these days do have some procedural elements, so it's like the improvisational aspects of performative soundtracks are built-in.

-Another way that game soundtrack music is exciting in ways that classical music used to be exciting is that most of the composer are alive and many of them know each other. So you get things like the composer conducting their own music (when/why did this tradition stop?). The soundtrack world is where our classical music is still living, in my opinion (in that it's both popular and still classical).

-There were some moments where the "founder of Video Games Live!" felt a little cheesy, but in some ways I identified with the "gamer" crowd in that I was pretty excited to hear music from games I've loved. As much as I wish I could help reclaim the "gamer" label though, I feel like it's a stupidly polarizing term, and maybe I'll just be "someone who enjoys videogames, as well as other entertainment media."