This weekend, the Paducah Symphony Orchestra is performing a Disney-themed concert titled 'Cinemagic' at the Carson Center—a collection of themes from the Disney film catalogue over the years, from classical pieces by Tchaikovsky to contemporary works from John Williams. Highlights of the concert include music from Sleeping Beauty, Mickey Mouse, and Raiders of the Lost Ark.
Paducah Symphony Orchestra conductor Maestro Raffaele Ponti said that Disney is a very large enterprise in the United States and, in his mind, it is one of the best parts of American culture. He said they used great artists for films and created amazing scenes, ideas, and storylines.
"They've used not only great artists for the films and for the scenery, for the ideas, the story lines, the fantasy of it all, but they have generated such great scores from it, because composers have written for those Disney films," said Ponti. "But Disney also had the idea to take great orchestral repertoire and put that to their films. For example, Sleeping Beauty. Everyone knows and loves it… there's going to be grandparents sitting in the audience, parents sitting in the audience, and their children who all have seen the same film, so it's something they can share together. Yet it's music from Tchaikovsky, which if you're not a ballet aficionado, you didn't know that Tchaikovsky wrote a ballet entitled Sleeping Beauty."
Ponti said that while audiences may not recognize the names of particular pieces of classical music, they would certainly recognize them upon hearing them and associate them with a film.
"Mussorgsky's Night on Bald Mountain is another example, and we know that from Mickey Mouse and the dancing broom. As soon as they hear that opening bassoon… everybody will see in their mind that beautiful moment when, when that dancing Bloom is starting to clean up and do its magic," said Ponti. "I think it's just wonderful. As a matter of fact, I play that at my house often hoping this vacuum cleaner would just start vacuuming by itself but it never really works."
The Maestro said that while Disney selected compositions to set the scene for their ideas, they also had composers watch completed films and create scores around what's happening on the screen. Composers such as John Williams have produced scores for many Disney productions, including the classic adventure film Raiders of the Lost Ark.
"The other side of the coin is there are going to be some things like from the movie Up, like Raiders of the Lost Art, for example, Disney films, or Disney owned films," said Ponti. "In this case, John Williams for Raiders, who actually wrote the music from the film. So it's the reverse, where he would actually be looking at a scene that they created, and then be creating the music from it, where the Disney with Tchaikovsky would have actually taken the music, listened to it, given it to the artist and the storytellers, and then said, let's create from the music. This is the reverse."
Ponti said symphony music can transport you to a place in your imagination or memory, and that its rich sound is something to be experienced in the room where it is happening. Being there and experiencing the event was something entirely different than listening to it recorded on a CD.
"Coming to the symphony is an experience. It's not just listening to an orchestra play. It's not just listening to what we call classical music, which is not always classical music. It's called symphony music, and it's about taking a dream, a journey, fantasizing of this whole thing, imagery, ideas, emotions, feelings, and forgetting the day for a moment, and just getting away from technology and just dreaming and having fun with music and sound is what it's all about," said Ponti. "You're actually sitting in the room with us. And you can feel when that symbol crashes, or that bass drum or those trumpets, and you know you can feel it... Your breath should be aligned to it. If it's a slow, calm thing, you should feel calm and relaxed. If it's Raiders of the Lost Ark, you want to jump up like Harrison Ford and just run and do something. Just don't forget your hat and your whip."
The Paducah Symphony Orchestra presents Cinemagic on Saturday, February 15th, at 7:30 p.m. at the Carson Center. Tickets and more information can be found at the PSO website here.
