As part of celebrations to mark the 20th anniversary of the Final Fantasy video game franchise’s first release, the Taipei Symphony Orchestra and Chorus will present a concert of music by composer Nobuo Uematsu tonight and tomorrow at Sun Yat-sen Memorial Hall.
The program for the Taipei leg of Distant Worlds: Music From Final Fantasy (太空戰士交響音樂會) world tour comprises works that Uematsu penned for the series of video games between 1986 and 2004, when he resigned as Final Fantasy’s chief composer.
The Final Fantasy series is known for its revolutionary gameplay, groundbreaking graphics and epic storytelling, and also for its musical score. The concert, which premiered in 2007, two decades after the first Final Fantasy role-playing game came out in Japan, features Uematsu’s compositions performed by a full orchestra under Grammy Award-winning conductor Arnie Roth and accompanied by high-resolution video from the series.
During the collaborative process of arranging the music for live performance, Uematsu and Roth asked themselves what “fans heard in the past and what can we bring that’s new,” the latter said at a press conference held at Sun Yat-sen Memorial Hall yesterday.
Roth said the concert sticks very closely to what came out of the studio, maintaining the link between Uematsu’s scores and Final Fantasy’s cinematic sequences.
“There are no prerecorded tracks, no safety nets,” said Roth, also speaking at the press conference. Because of the works’ different styles, “it is a demanding concert. It takes a lot of work on the part of the orchestra.”
The music is wide-ranging enough to appeal to a broad range of tastes.
Liberi Fatali, the show’s opening number, exudes a sense of impending darkness through subtle violin and cello interludes, while the piano intro for To Zanarkand and the sorrowful Aerith’s Theme are intended to convey feelings of unfulfilled love and homelessness, respectively.
Local audiences may recognize Eyes on Me, a track sung by Mando-pop icon Faye Wang (王菲) that was used as part of the sound track for Final Fantasy VIII.
Other highlights from the set list include the Spanish guitar razzle-dazzler Vamo ‘alla Flamenco, the jazzy, drum-heavy Swing de Chocobo and Memoro de la Stono, which is partly sung in Esperanto, the language created in the late 19th century for the purpose of facilitating global communication.
The concert’s “blend of art forms is a distinguishing feature that has captivated audiences in other cities,” said Shih Chieh-yung (史擷詠), a music professor at National Taiwan Normal University (國立台灣師範大學) who works for Smartcard (聲碼數位藝術), the organization that brought Distant Worlds to Taiwan.
“Except for comic book and game conventions, gaming fans rarely get the chance to come together like this,” Shih said.
PERFORMANCE NOTES:
WHAT: Distant Worlds: Music From Final Fantasy (太空戰士交響音樂會)
WHEN: Today and tomorrow at 7:30pm
WHERE: Sun Yat-sen Memorial Hall
(國父紀念館), 505, Renai Rd Sec 4, Taipei City
(台北市仁愛路四段505號)
ADMISSION: NT$800 to NT$3,200,
available online at artsticket.com.tw
or by calling (02) 3393-9882
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