Ah, how far we’ve come being recognized, haven’t we?
If anyone out there is a Final Fantasy fan, know that one of the major announcements date-wise for the Distant Worlds concert series, which I enjoyed thoroughly these past two years, is that August 1, 2010, they’ll be playing at the Ravinia musical festival. The Chicago Symphony Orchestra will be performing the pieces, which means that two of the best music-related entities in the city will be playing pieces about epic battles, gut-wrenching emotion, and curiously feminine-looking male characters. I can’t wait.
It’s interesting that music from a video game has gone so far as to be played at a festival that pre-dates even the earliest pixels made manifest into a curious phenomenon called Pong. As I’ve said before in previous entries, music in video games has made great strides in plucking at the heart strings. The evolution of square wave noises and MIDI tracks into orchestral studio pieces for games has been a huge part of making people who play them feel the weight of events, something of paramount importance in RPGs.
Considering it’s in Downtown Chicago, there’s no way I’m missing something like this. Hopefully, if you’re in the area or something, be sure to hit me up so we can hear Final Fantasy songs the way they were intended to be played – to an audience that hopefully will learn to appreciate them.