I think the physicality of conducting and playing was the Symphony's answer to Metallica's 'full on amplification' challenge. A bit like experiencing all nine of Beethoven's symphonies and 'The Rite of Spring in one evening! I remember during the intermission hearing string players saying how they should have brought a dry change of clothes, and -it's Mitchum deodorant time- from a perspiring horn player. Well I would call it a Wagnerian Orgasm! It was a full-on musical experience with all players playing hard and soaking through their tuxes and black formals from the exercise. we can still find different ways of getting the band will match the 100-piece ensemble with full-on amplification. The massiveness of it all was fantastic! I keep returning to Metallica's 'Rolling Stone' quote:. 'After two evenings of sturm and drang - I suppose the thing that sticks most in my mind was the sheer balance in power between electric and natural instruments. Every player in the orchestra working as hard as Metallica does, committed to the music. Adding an orchestra was like writing a film score to that story.
instead, the symphony actually became the 'fifth Beatle' - a member of Metallica.Įxample: 'Call of Ktulu' is a symphonic piece even without the orchestra. We were not simply supporting and certainly not 'sweetening'. The band wandered around the stage and into the sections of the orchestra orchestra players leapt to their feet, excited to be making music on the edge of their seats. a Brave New World! As the evening unfolded there was a breaking down of barriers - not only between audience and players, but players and players. They play concertos accompanying solo piano or violin at almost every concert. The beauty of nearly one hundred musicians - each of whom has dedicated their entire life to perfecting their ability to speak and express themselves through the music and their instrument and playing together - reacting to each other and the music is why the orchestra was originally formed. To feel the audience give a standing ovation to me and the orchestra even before one note had been played was both reassuring and friendly, but I also got the feeling that the audience was applauding its own daring in being there. That kind of approval is inspiring! 'The event was in a 'formalized' setting with orchestra members in ties and tails, ushers in uniforms, and band members and audience in stage and street wear. The crowd's reaction was like adrenaline on stage, and we all thrived on it. The first contact with the audience was a frightening roar which terrified the orchestra, more accustomed as they usually are to polite applause. When the busses loaded with the symphony members arrived the first day of the show, they were met with cheering hordes of Metallica fans that had been camped out in the park across from the hall - not the usual greeting for a Symphony Orchestra! Something different was going on. They will read 'fly specks' on paper if necessary, and add their own expressive skill to each note making it come alive. Orchestras rely on a composer and a conductor to tell them exactly when and how and what to play. Rock bands invent their own parts to play.
giving every player something to say and above all making it feel and sound like it had always been there. I reacted to the songs, inventing melodies and counter-melodies that wove themselves around the tunes and adding orchestral color and texture to songs that were already complete! Sometimes we supported the chords or the riffs, sometimes we commented on the lyric or on a solo line, adding our yokes to the song, playing the right parts on the wrong instruments. listening to the orchestra in my head and writing down what I heard. began by listening to and absorbing Metallica tunes and really believing that I was a symphony orchestra playing along. Conducting a conversation between two different worlds that share the language of music.Ĭreating a dialogue between two worlds that celebrate the power of music. Combining one of Americas' most powerful orchestras, the San Francisco Symphony with the world's most powerful rock band, Metallica, was really about imagining musk on top and alongside of their songs.