July 2, 2005 - Dear Friends Forth Worth
Hadriel and Ybrik Metaknight, a Compendium theorist and admin respectively, recently attended the Dear Friends concert in Fort Worth. Let's hear what transpired, eh?
Hadriel's Account
So I went to the concert. And here's the story.
So this was my first time alone in downtown Fort Worth. Not counting the fact that the map I used from the Bass Hall website said that an exit from the Carter-Burgess parking garage was an entrance. So in order to avoid having to go all the way out of downtown Fort Worth, I had to drive up a one-way, luckily avoiding a collision. I ended up parking in a parking lot across from the Barnes & Noble and walked in kind of heart-attack-y. Another guy I knew from previously was with the group, as well. Had a problem pronouncing Ybrik...ouch. Parked illegally, had to go get some cash out of an ATM to pay the damn parking machine because it wouldn't take a debit card, which is the only thing I ever carry. So I hung out in Starbucks for a while and then walked over to the Bass Hall. Everyone else already had their tickets -- I had to go buy mine right there. Liquidated another $65 for floor seats -- the very front row right in front of a bunch of violins. I think they just installed those, the reason being that when I got in there, I sat in front of four Asian kids in the very front row -- there were a crapton of Asians there, which isn't really all that surprising. Never met an Asian I didn't like. One of them said he called on Tuesday and they were sold out, but then he called back and there were a bunch of seats left. But anyway, anytime someone walked on the path near the seats, they rocked back and forth like bumper cars. We had a name for stuff like that at Bell: EXTREME SITTING.
Watched the first half of the concert -- the Squall/Rinoa dance is still totally ROFL. Then, in the intermission, I found three of my friends from Bell there. I talked with them for a while, and they jokingly questioned why I came in a band shirt and a Hawaiian tourist piece instead of a suit. We all talked about wanting to hear One-Winged Angel, but the lazy bastard choir already left. The second half was good as well, but nothing compared to the end. We all clapped incessantly, so the orchestra kept on having to stand up and sit down. Finally, the conductor asked if it was time to go home. Everyone yelled "NO!" I was probably not alone in thinking:
You are not leaving without playing One-Winged Angel. I will not LET you leave without playing One-Winged Angel. I will restrain every single one of you until you play One-Winged Angel. So play One-Winged Angel or Baby Jesus will cry.
Then the conductor started taking requests, and as if on cue a bunch of us screamed "SEPHIROTH!" Wham. The choir came back in, and it was glorious. Hearing that live was...liekzomgwoah. Of course, we didn't let them leave without playing it again. Then I was like "ok, fine, you can go home now." The trip back was pretty easy, aside from the claustrophobia outside the main auditorium.
Moral of the story: Never reserve anything in advance, ATMs are your friend, and One-Winged Angel is the shiznit.
The Ybrik Yarn
Ybrik wrote this in his LiveJournal.
Good weekend All right, time for a big update. And for once, it's not complaining.
This was a pretty damned good weekend. It all started Friday (as most weekends do).
What was so good about Friday, you ask? Many things. I got paid. I drove to TCU to check my mail, and lo and behold, "The OneUps Vol. 1" (the newest CD from OneUp Studios) had finally come in (I'd only been checking my mail every day this week for it). And it is awesome. Full review of the CD is coming soon, to be posted here as well as on the OUS message board. But the best part of Friday was still to come: The "Dear Friends: The Music of Final Fantasy" concert, played by the Fort Worth Symphony Orchestra at the Bass Hall. I also met up with some friends from the OUS message board. If you don't care to know anything more about the concert or the before-and-after meetings, just skip this LJ cut.
I went to the concert with Ryan, one of my best friends since eighth grade. We had great seats, at the very back of the right side of the orchestra level. We had two seats that were in a row all their own, which was nice. Before the concert, we met up with [info]hillarygayle, [info]bryancreech, [info]the_af, [info]benphillips and [info]arf, among many others. These people are all Internet friends of mine, through the OUS message boards. I had met all those named before, but it was cool to see them all again. I had dinner with hillarygayle, bryancreech, the_af and benphillips after the concert at Sardine's, a great Italian restaurant on University Drive where they play live jazz music. Again, great fun to hang out with these folks.
Sooooo much to say about this concert. First of all, I am a big fan of all of the following: Symphonic music (been to Fort Worth Symphony concerts more times than I can count, and own more classical music CDs than I can count), video game music (see: OneUp Studios, OverClocked ReMix and VGMix, I'm Ybrik Metaknight on all three), the Bass Hall in general (been there even more times than I've been to see the Symphony, even counting all the times I've seen that orchestra at Concerts in the Gardens in the FW Botanical Gardens), and, of course, the Final Fantasy games. So this was a huge geek-out time for me.
Everything was performed excellently. The only song that had any screw-ups that were noticeable to me (and mind you, I have a pretty well-educated and well-trained musical ear thanks to all the years of band and other music stuff) was Love Grows, an otherwise beautiful piano-and-orchestra arrangement of the song Eyes On Me from FFVIII. The piano player seemed to botch two or three notes, and it didn't really take much away from that piece. Other than that, everything was great. I'd already heard most of the arrangements thanks to having them on CD: Love Grows, Liberi Fatali (FFVIII), Aeris's Theme (FFVII), Terra's Theme (FFVI...though the recording I have is much slower than the FWSO played it), Theme of Love (FFIV), Dear Friends (FFV), Final Fantasy (almost all the games have had this theme, as you might expect), Vamo' Alla Flamenco (FFIX) and the FFI~III medley (more on that one shortly). But it was great hearing them performed live for the first time.
The only pieces that were new (arrangements) to me were: To Zanarkand (FFX), You're Not Alone (FFIX), Ronfaure (FFXI) and Cloud Smiles (new melody from the still-unreleased sequel movie, "FFVII Advent Children"). The FFX piece is an all-time favorite theme of mine. It's usually heard in a solo piano arrangement, and naturally this arrangement was very heavy on the piano (like Love Grows and Aeris's Theme). The orchestra added the kind of color I always wanted for the piece. It reminded me of the rendition heard in the ending of that game. You're Not Alone is a very popular FF piece. It's not one of my favorites, but I like it. This arrangement was also not one of my favorites, but it was pretty damned cool. Ronfaure is not one I'm really familiar with, since — due to various computer problems, the worst of which is caused by TCU's network — I've not played FFXI much. But this piece was pretty cool. I've heard the original tune a couple times, so it was vaguely familiar. And this arrangement was awesome. Nice march feel to it. Cloud Smiles, as I said, is from FFVII: Advent Children, a straight-to-DVD movie that will be coming out in September and is a sequel to Final Fantasy VII, one of the most popular (and many say best; I disagree) games in the series. I was able to hear bits of Aeris's Theme and the FFVII main theme in there. Good little piece.
My favorite was by far the FFI~III medley. This arrangement is one of my all-time favorite pieces of arranged VGM — it's probably gone on more CDs than any other single arrangement. It's a medley of FFI Main/Overworld Theme, Matoya's Cave (FFI), Elia the Water Maiden (FFIII), the Chocobo Theme (every game since FFII has had some version of the Chocobo theme), and, finally, Theme of the Rebel Army (FFII). Even though I have a recording of that from the 20020220 Concert in Japan, this performance was just incredible. The massive crowd geek-out during the Chocobo theme was cool, the two FFI tunes are always enjoyable...but Theme of the Rebel Army was amazing. First of all, when it breaks into the first statement of the theme (after a brief transition from Chocobo's Theme), it's played by the trombone section. I play trombone, and so always love parts of pieces that are heavy on trombone. And the FWSO trombone section (which includes a guy who teaches at TCU, not that I've ever taken lessons from him) played it incredibly well, much more full and holydamnloud than in the recording I have. That short section of that piece was probably my favorite moment in the entire concert. Also, there were a couple of parts where the French horns were really loud. I credit this to Mark Houghton, the principal horn player. Houghton went to my high school, and graduated four years before I did. He then went on to the Eastman School of Music in New York, one of the most prestigious music schools in the world, I believe on a full ride. And now, in his mid-twenties, he's the principal player in a fairly major orchestra. Anyway, he's easily the most gifted horn player (and possibly the most gifted classical musician) I've ever met. I'm not sure I've ever talked to anyone who has met him that doesn't agree.
Finally, there were two encores, or rather, a single piece played as an encore — twice, the second time a good deal faster than the first. One-Winged Angel, from FFVII, is easily one of the most popular pieces of VGM ever. It plays during the final battle of that game, and features a choir singing in Latin (Liberi Fatali also features a choir singing in Latin). It's not quite my favorite from the series, but the orchestral arrangement (yes, another that I've heard and have a recording of) is damn cool. And hearing it live was, once more, awesome, especially with the whole crowd geek-out thing again. The FW Symphony Chorus (don't know the real name, but that sounds right) did an awesome job on it.
It was a hell of a concert, and a hell of a good day.
As for the rest of the weekend: Three-day weekends are always nice. Saturday was really relaxing. I was supposed to go to Six Flags with [info]hillarygayle, [info]bryancreech, [info]the_af and maybe [info]benphillips, but they decided not to go. So I went home to Keller after running a couple errands in Arlington (I was already there when I found out Six Flags was a no-go, which was fine by me). Then I got a call from the_af saying that they were going to be at Grapevine Mills, but at that point I was getting free food at home. Damn my parents for tempting me with stuff like that. I ended up just going back out to the lakehouse where I'm living for the summer and chilling there. On Sunday, I went back to Keller for a dad's-side-of-the-family thing at my aunt's house. I swam, visited with my very close cousin Allyson — who flew in for the weekend from Long Beach, Calif., where she is interning for the summer at some petroleum company — and won $5+ at poker with my dad and some of my cousins. Then I went and spent the night at home (still in Keller). Today (Monday, of course), I went to my aunt's house on my mom's side of the family, in North Richland Hills. I swam again, visited with another close cousin, and won $3+ at poker with my dad, my aunt, my cousin and other assorted family.
All in all, a good weekend.
But now I'm back, and have basically Tuesday to work on two stories for this next week's paper. Damnation.
From: The Bend of Time
