This past Sunday, the Distant Worlds: Music from Final Fantasy concert series presented back-to-back concerts at the world-renowned Symphony Center, home to the Chicago Symphony Orchestra. I was able to sit down with conductor Arnie Roth two days prior to talk about a number topics related to the production.

Head past the break to read about how Distant Worlds got started, a couple of a the soloists from this weekend’s double concert, the future of the tour (specifically a Mexico stop), and more!

Christian Ponte: We’ll get started. Thank you very much for taking the time to talk with us. You’ve got a very special concert coming up, and for many it’s their first Distant Worlds concert, maybe even their first AND second. For those people, could you briefly just talk about how you got involved with this concert series?

Arnie Roth: Yeah, probably the very first time was in 2005. It’s also when I met Nobuo Uematsu. Prior to 2004, there hadn’t been any video game music concerts in the United States. My colleague in Germany, Thomas Böcker, had started doing some concerts: the Leipzig Games [Convention], things like that. Thomas and I have continued working together for many years now, but [back then] he was the only one outside of Japan that had done some video game music concerts. Of course, you’re aware that Dear Friends performed in L.A. in 2004, but it was during E3 and was kind of a trade situation in terms of attendance. At that time, I was researching video game music concerts. I’m the music director and conductor of the Chicagoland Pops Orchestra here, and I tour around the country and the world conducting various orchestras, so I’m always looking at different possibilities for concerts, both multimedia and traditional concerts. In researching this, it was very interesting that no symphony orchestras or presenters in North America believed that you could do a concert of video game music as a separate, public-sold ticket; in other words, as an individually-sold ticket not connected with a convention or a trade thing of some sort, because they looked at that E3 concert and said, “Well, E3 was going on, it doesn’t really count.”

We were the first commercial presenter to take a chance on doing any concert, and it happened to be Dear Friends: Music from Final Fantasy, and that was in February of 2005. That was the first commercially presented concert, and it sold out completely. It was here at the Rosemont Theater in the Chicago area, and after that — and that’s when I first met Nobuo Uematsu at the same time — then I was asked to continue Dear Friends, and finish the Dear Friends tour. It was very short, maybe five concerts or something like that. I conducted the rest of those with the Atlanta Symphony, the Detroit Symphony… I’m trying to remember the others, there [were] maybe three or four others. It was a lot of fun, it was terrific, but that was my first exposure to video game music concerts, per se.

Out of that grew a very wonderful relationship with not only Nobuo Uematsu, but also Square Enix as a parent company. They asked me to do More Friends in L.A. — that was another concert — and I actually was asked by Square Enix to (besides conduct the concert) produce the live record for the CD, a Japan-only release of More Friends. Then the year after that, they asked me to fly to Japan and do the Voices concert. I was the only non-Japanese performer there; it was all the various solo singers from the games that had sung, plus choir and orchestra. I was honored to be asked on that.

Following that, it kind of evolved to where they came to us and said, “We really want to do a proper, global tour.” The difference there with Distant Worlds was that they wanted it to really have more of a global reach — not just North America, not just Asia, but Europe, Central and South America, other markets in Asia, Australia… That’s been the goal for Distant Worlds. My company has the exclusive license with Square Enix to present Distant Worlds. We’re now in our fourth year, and we have renewed the license with Square Enix. They’re thrilled and so are we, and we’re going to keep going and expanding Distant Worlds, and with the goal, again, being new markets — places we haven’t been to before — and adding more and more repertoire, which we do on almost every concert. [Adding repertoire] is a lot of fun, except the problem is that I run out of time. The concert has to be a finite number of minutes, and if I’m only doing one [concert], I can’t do everything. (laughs) I try.

Here in Chicago this weekend, we have this unusual marathon where I’m doing two almost completely different concerts between the afternoon and the evening, and so you’ll hear everything from Distant Worlds I & II, and you’ll hear a lot of things from our DVD from Japan (from the concerts we just did in November). We have Benyamin Nuss from Germany, a wonderful — I think he’s 22 — wonderful pianist who’s done several concerts with me. I just did the music of Nintendo with the Royal Stockholm [Philharmonic Orchestra] a couple weeks ago — June 1st — and that was with Thomas Böcker, and Benyamin played on that as well.

So yes, that’s my whole involvement with video games. Obviously I was involved with Play! as well for the first few years of getting Play! going, writing a lot of the arrangements for Play! and working with an awful lot of composers, different composers around the world with that, and that was a lot of fun as well. So I guess, yeah, I’ve done a lot of video game music. I guess I have.

CP: And we appreciate it!

AR: And I like it! I not just like it, I mean… the passion that the Final Fantasy fans have for the music of Final Fantasy is what is most exciting to me. They are different, I think in my humble opinion, from other audiences I conduct. I don’t mean traditional orchestra concerts necessarily, but comparing it more to even other video game music concerts. Great enthusiasm in all them, but it’s the question with how strongly they want to hear the music performed live or whether they’re simply into the action of the game. They’re coming because they like the game, but are they really into the music?

That is truly the case with Final Fantasy fans. They know these scores really well! (laughs) I’m constantly kind of getting little comments about, “Oh wow, you took that really fast,” or “You really took a big pause here between these movements,” and “What were you thinking there?” and this kind of thing. They question, they listen very intensely, and so it’s a very educated, intense, listening audience. I appreciate that. I think all the musicians appreciate that.

CP: …you actually covered about four of my questions already.

AR: I covered all I can!

CP: We’ll jump ahead! You’ve got a fabulous soloist in Susan Calloway. The fans love her, and it’s not just the fact that she’s singing Final Fantasy songs. What do you think it is about her talent that sets her apart, and makes her and integral part of this program?

AR: One of the concepts that I operate on is you must get the correct or the absolute best musician for the particular piece or performance that you’re trying to do. The very best musician for a Beethoven symphony is not necessarily the very best musician for an opera performance, a ballet performance, an orchestrated rock concert, or a video game music concert. Some of them are very flexible and can do all these different genres, but more often than not, you want a particular kind of vocalist. They’re quite individual. [Sometimes] you want maybe a very ethereal, esoteric kind of voice, and then other times you want a full-blooded, operatic soloist. We find that it’s important to kind of differentiate these.

Susan Calloway does something very interesting. She comes at this from studio background. She’s one of the most well-known voiceover talents for TV and radio commercials in North America. She’s constantly flying to New York, Chicago, L.A. from, she lives in the Detroit area, specifically to sing on national recordings — mostly jingles, mostly television and radio jingles. She’s very, very flexible — style-wise — for that reason. You’re constantly doing different kinds of styles of these things, and she has not only a wonderful pop voice, but she is very savvy in terms of when I ask her to change some phrasing or when I ask her to try a different style. She doesn’t naturally know all the music of Final Fantasy, so it was kind of a joint venture of teaching her the style that we wanted to go on on a particular piece. She has such good ear and vocal ability — it’s at a such a high range that she’s able to adapt to these styles very quickly.

I think she’s one of these artists that when you talk about a “Kiss Me Good-Bye,” for instance, [it's] a perfect fit for her voice. “Suteki da ne” may be a little bit more of a stretch for her to get to that very etherial kind of place, to tell the story as this kind of extended poem, and to ease back the intensity of her voice (which is a quite focused, intense, pop voice). She’s grown into that as we’ve done that more often. “Melodies of Life” is an easier thing for her, I think.

Now, the best one (and we’re doing that this Sunday) is “Answers,” which is an unbelievable piece of music — and you can tell Nobuo I said so. He knows it. Out of all the things in [Final Fantasy] XIV, I enjoy that one so much, and it’s a wonderful pairing between the chorus, the soloist, and the orchestra. So we get to do that here in Chicago, which is great, and I know [Nobuo Uematsu is] excited about that too. He feels that some of the Final Fantasy XIV pieces –most of which I really like a lot — we should probably not play so much of them, because so many of the fans haven’t had the opportunity to really get to know the music yet. But whenever we have Susan, a chorus, and orchestra, we must do “Answers.” That’s one of my favorites.

CP: You’re a Chicagoan, so you know as well as I do that we’re actually a bit spoiled having one of the world’s best in our own backyard: The Chicago Symphony Orchestra.

AR: Of course, yeah. And we’re playing in their home!

CP: Your concert with the CSO at last year’s Ravinia Festival fell through, but — like you said — you are performing at their home venue this weekend. I don’t know that you’re in a position to actually announce anything, but do you still see a performance with the CSO in Distant Worlds‘ future?

AR: I would like to think there is one. I want to emphasize, as I did when the whole situation with Ravinia happened, that that was literally a contractual issue between the Chicago Symphony and Ravinia Festival. [It] had nothing to do with Distant Worlds; we happened to get caught in the middle of it. While that is the only date that was canceled/postponed/whatever, we used this one as the postponement date because we quickly tried to arrange this date and in the Chicago Symphony home. The orchestra, as it turns out, wasn’t available, but we still were performing in the Symphony Center, so we felt that was important, and frankly it’s a beautiful venue for us for this kind of a concert.

I just want to stress the fact that I could see us going back to Ravinia when they’ve resolved their contract issues, which had nothing to do with Distant Worlds — it really was something having to do with the number of classical versus non-classical services that the Chicago Symphony does at Ravinia, and an error was made by someone in the process after we had already been contracted and released we were doing the concert, and so we had to postpone it for that reason. It really was one of those situations that I hated, but I tried to rectify it as quickly as we could find a date in Chicago where it was related in some way.

At least at Symphony Center, we would be able to do something better than what we could have done at Ravinia. At Ravinia it would have been one concert with very little rehearsal time with the Chicago Symphony. Yes, Chicago Symphony would be fantastic, but one long rehearsal with them — that’s it. Now, I’m doing two full programs and giving so much more repertoire in these two programs than I could have done [with the CSO]. Their performance length is shorter at Ravinia, so there’s a lot of other things that would have been impacted to doing that one concert. So I’m very happy that we did this.

I also take note that Symphony Center is delighted at the two sold out shows, and they are taking note of that. It would be a surprise, frankly, if they didn’t come back to us and say, “Okay,” a year, two years from now, because frankly what I’m searching for — and you can ask all of your readers or listeners — I’m researching what to do about the 25th Anniversary of Final Fantasy, which is coming up in December of next year. We’re already playing Royal Albert Hall in London this year. What do we do? (laughs) We’re adding more and more pieces, and of course we know how to do that. So we’re thinking. Everyone’s thinking, and so if anyone has any suggestions, I look at all of them. I can’t respond to them all the time, but we read everything that goes into our Facebook site –you know we have something like 33,000 or 34,000 registered — and I read everything. So, if anyone has any ideas, I’m listening.

CP: You’ve got the Returning Home DVD of the recent Tokyo concert. Do you see other DVDs or Blu-rays in Distant Worlds’ future, or do you think one is enough for this particular concert series?

AR: Well, I was kind of thrilled that we had the opportunity to get that one out. People had been asking us for the whole first three years. I was delighted that we had done two records with the Royal Stockholm Philharmonic, and I consider those really wonderful recordings. I mean, these are ones that were recorded at a much higher bit rate/sample rate than conventional. 48-bit versus 24-bit. The resolution on those is astounding, and the orchestra’s playing, I think, is just absolutely without peer.

I think with those two records and the DVD of Returning Home – which showcased a lot of repertoire from [Final Fantasy] XIII and XIV, as well as all the hits, as well as new arrangements of “Clash on the Big Bridge” and actually other new solo piano things. We did “Those Who Fight,” which Benyamin Nuss is going to play this weekend. We’re kind of recapping what he did in Japan with us, so he’ll be the piano soloist on “Love Grows,” on “Saber’s Edge” from Final Fantasy XIII which has a solo piano part, he’ll also play the a cappella Final Fantasy XIII piece by [Masashi] Hamauzu, “March of the Dreadnoughts,” and he will play solo piano from the Piano Collections of “Those Who Fight.” So yeah, I’m thrilled he’s here, and so we’re recapping those four on the Chicago concerts, split between the two of them.

So, should we have more? I don’t know, you tell me! Do you think we should? I think we’re okay for right now. I think we’ll give it a little time.

I’m looking at Distant Worlds III though, in terms of the next record, because we now have assembled so much new repertoire that we literally have enough for a whole ‘nother record — easily — and there are some big, important pieces that we’re adding in Chicago for the first time that could get onto that; things like “You’re Not Alone” — we’re now performing that again this weekend — and we’re doing a new piece that I just finished the arrangement of that we’re premiering during Chicago which is from Final Fantasy VI, “Dark World,” and not because we had to do “Dark World,” but because I’d been searching for a piece to get Nobuo Uematsu to play live as a soloist on stage with us, and he kept resisting. He says, “No, I’m too nervous!” that he didn’t want to do it. I finally found the right piece for him to do, and I went to him, I said, “This is the piece we’re going to do, and I’ll do it with you!” So I’m going to play solo violin, he’s going to play solo keyboards, [we'll have] full orchestration, and we’re going to play that live. I’m very excited about it. We haven’t rehearsed or anything yet, but we’d been going back and forth on the Internet about, “I’m going to do this,” and showing him what the demos sound like, that kind of thing, so… we’re ready! (laughs)

CP: Looking forward to it!

AR: Oh, it’ll be fun! Yeah!

CP: “Melodies of Life” is a personal favorite of mine, and I absolutely loved hearing the English premiere of “Suteki da ne” the last time you were here. What pieces from the program do you in particular enjoy the most?

AR: I would say out of all the songs, if we’re talking about [those]… I mean, you’re probably looking at everything, but out of all the songs, I like “Suteki da ne.” I find it a little more unique. I find as far the more typical pop style that Uematsu has adopted occasionally, I find “Kiss Me Good-Bye” is a really good example of that. Also, Susan does a really good job on that one, and it lays well for her in terms of her own voice. So, I like that. “Memoro de la Stono” — beautiful, both that combination of the opening and the actual song itself, “Distant Worlds.”

You know, the business of trying to decide what’s my favorite, Uematsu and I always kind of laugh about this. We come off the stage, the last thing that we play is, let’s say, “One-Winged Angel,” and we’re all like, “We can’t get it out of our heads!” the next two hours while we’re having an after-dinner or after-show bite to eat or something like that. It will not get out of our head!

“Liberi Fatali” is one of those that a is very compelling piece. Just as importantly, pieces like “Aerith’s Theme” — a very intimate, personal kind of statement and beautifully crafted — I find just as powerful as those. I enjoy doing “Dancing Mad” as well! It’s much more sectionalized in different sections, and so the flow of the piece is a little different than some of the other ones, but there’s so much wonderful power and epic qualities to it that it’s a fun compelling piece for us to do, which we’re doing in this weekend as well.

CP: Well, that almost wraps it up for me. Are there any closing comments from you specifically for our Final Fantasy fans and music fans?

AR: Really the reason we’re here is because of the fans, for no other reason the fact that they have supported this tour. The biggest thing I can do is thank all the fans, and it’s literally when I say that it’s the reason that we’re able to continue — not just one year’s worth of concerts or a couple of years, but four years, five years, six years — we can continue because… what, are we playing Chicago for the fifth time, maybe? Fourth time? Fifth time? Of just Final Fantasy concerts? It’s amazing, frankly, and we’re sold out for both of these performances. It’s that kind of support that allows us to keep going.

If there was an obvious erosion of fan interest, then it would be a very simple matter for Square Enix to say, “You know, that was wonderful, I think we’ll take a break.” But right now, both Square Enix and my own company, AWR Music, and Nobuo Uematsu, we all feel there’s so much more to give, and there are so many places we haven’t played. We just played Australia for the first time — sold out there. Royal Albert Hall sold out in two weeks, and that’s not happening until November. There are a lot of other markets in Europe and Asia and elsewhere; we want to get to Mexico City, and they should stay tuned because that’s very close to being announced now. There are some dates in South America also that we’re working on.

I think the idea of getting out into some of the other areas and trying to spread it that way, and then how do we evolve the tour, long term? Besides adding more and more repertoire, do we branch off and have a second tour that maybe features perhaps not just Final Fantasy, but other games as well on that? Not so much a Play! or something like that because we’re not attempting to be that. We really are aligned right now with Square Enix, but possibly there are a lot of other games that Square Enix has: Kingdom Hearts, Legend of Mana, Chrono Cross, Chrono Trigger… I heard that Dragon Quest is opening in the United States sometime soon, and it’s tremendously popular in Japan, so that could also be something interesting. I think there’s many possibilities to move forward, and we’re looking at that all the time, so thank you to the fans for allowing us to move forward.

CP: Arnie Roth, thank you very much for your time. It’s been a pleasure!

A big thanks to Chris Szuberla for arranging the interview. You can check out the Distant Worlds: Music from Final Fantasy official website and Facebook Page for tour dates and information. You can also purchase their albums digitally from their online store in qualities as high as 24/88.2 FLAC!

Be sure to check back soon for more from this past weekend!

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The Chicago Symphony Orchestra is arguably the top orchestra in the United States at the moment and is consistently considered one of the best in the world. Known for its signature brass sound, the CSO has performed at the Ravinia Festival, its summer home, annually since 1936. It came as a pleasant shock to game music enthusiasts when it was revealed last fall that the Chicago Symphony Orchestra would perform the music of Nobuo Uematsu at this year’s Ravinia Festival, under the baton of Chicagoan Arnie Roth.

Unfortunately, it was too good to be true.

The Distant Worlds: music of FINAL FANTASY concert for August 1st has been canceled due to a venue conflict, according to the Ravinia page for the event. If you, like me, had purchased tickets hoping to see one of the world’s greatest ensembles perform some of the greatest music in gaming, you may soon find yourself contacting the Ravinia box office soon for a refund or exchange instead. The official Distant Worlds site has yet to confirm the cancellation as of this writing.

Ravinia Festival

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Final Fantasy fans, get ready for more orchestral recordings of your favorite soundtracks! The Distant Worlds concert series has sent out word that the Distant Worlds II: more music from Final Fantasy album is now available for download. All 13 tracks are available for just $9.99, and features the Royal Stockholm Philharmonic Orchestra under the baton of Arnie Roth, with solo performances by vocalist Susan Calloway, harpist Laura Stephenson, guitarist Per Skareng, guitarist Oskar Ekburg, and of course Nobuo Uematsu on organ with his Earthbound Papas band.

The best part for audiophiles like me? You’re able to choose your preferred download format! You can get the album in 320kbps mp3s, Ogg Vorbis, or lossless formats such as FLAC and ALAC! I’ll probably opt for FLAC myself, but I still intend to purchase the actual CD when it goes on sale starting June 1st. I’m just that thorough.

Distant Worlds Store

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PLAY! A Video Game Symphony is one of the few video game orchestras out there, and a staple of the program since its inception has been Arnie Roth on the conductor’s podium. It looks like that will no longer be the case, as the organization’s official site now lists Andy Brick as the production’s principal conductor and music director.

Brick, a native of the Chicago suburbs (yay!), previously served as the principal conductor for the  Symphonic Game Music Concerts series (where he was coincidentally succeed by Roth). He has since conducted a number of PLAY! A Video Game Symphony concerts in place of Arnie Roth.

Last time I saw Arnie Roth in concert (with Distant Worlds: Music from Final Fantasy last December), his conducting arm was in an arm sling. I wonder if that has anything to do with the change…

PLAY! – A Video Game Symphony
via Original Sound Version

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For this week’s edition of Friday Night Concerts, I’ve decided to dig up something from the Final Fantasy series. The above video is supposedly from the Voices – Music from Final Fantasy 2006 concert, a concert held at the Pacifico Yokohoma Conference and Convention Center back on February 18th of that year. That concert and this particular piece were performed by the Prima Vista Philharmonic Orchestra, conducted by Arnie Roth. There’s an official DVD of the concert floating around, so you might want to track it down if you love Final Fantasy music.

Anyway, this video is of “Liberi Fatali,” the epic piece from Final Fantasy VIII. I’m actually hoping to hear it live when I check out the Distant Worlds concert in less than a month, so I’m crossing my fingers that it’s on the setlist. There’s already at least one FFVIII piece that will be performed, in the form of “The Man With The Machine Gun.”

YouTube

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I’m starting to run out of concerts to show you all! …or at least, I can’t seem to find much more. Luckily, the rare occasions I find a symphony concert for you all to enjoy, it’s usually a good one I stumble across.

This week, Arnie Roth takes the podium for the Play! Symphony’s Stockholm performance last year. It’s the theme to The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion by Jeremy Soule. I’ve not played the game – though I’ve got at least one or two friends who absolutely love the game – so this is the first time I’m getting to hear the score. I must say… I need to play more games. I’m missing out on some great soundtracks.

YouTube

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