The Phoenix Foundation in rehearsal with the NZSO Photo: Bryson Rooney/NZSO
William Dart looks at the thorny issue of combining rock bands with full symphony orchestras.
It can often be dire, but there have been some great successes - one of them, in William's view, happening just last month in New Zealand.
We set off in Concerto Land today with Deep Purple’s Concerto for Group and Orchestra wowing the assembled multitudes in the Royal Albert Hall.
I find this work curiously unsatisfying today.
It’s a strange genre, cross-over.
There’s a memorable moment in a 1970 concert involving the Mothers of Invention and the LA Philharmonic, when Frank Zappa turns to the conductor, Zubin Mehta and says, “All right Zubin, hit it”.
Strangely enough, Zappa himself didn’t always keep the beats flowing when he wrote for orchestra. Too often he slipped into presenting himself as the new Californian love child of Stravinsky and Boulez.
But there’s no denying what wonderful sounds an orchestra can conjure up, especially in times when we’ve come to accept imitation synthesized strings.
My own life would be so much the poorer without the cultural highs and lows supplied by Frank Sinatra with Nelson Riddle, Helen Shapiro with Norrie Paramor or, an old favourite this one, Elvis Costello in tow with the Royal Philharmonic and taking a country ballad into the hallowed hall that is the Royal Albert.
Some might feel, like Kipling’s colonialist dictum on East and West, that classical music and rock 'n' roll will never find a common ground.
Not that there hasn’t been a minor industry of folks trying to bring them together. Disastrously so in the early 80s when the Royal Philharmonic’s Hooked on Classics spun concert hall lollipops over a disco thud.
And perhaps even more embarrassingly in 1994, when the London Symphony Orchestra recorded its Symphonic Music of the Rolling Stones. The low point being a snarling Mick Jagger original gentrified by tenor Jerry Hadley, with lashings of satanic hocus pocus brewed up by the choir and orchestra.
A year later, Peter Scholes, who wielded the baton for that LSO venture, performed the same duties for a homegrown piece of musical inflation, when the New Zealand Symphony Orchestra paid tribute to Split Enz.
The ENZSO album, masterminded and arranged by Eddie Raynor, brought names like Dave Dobbyn, Annie Crummer and Sam Hunt on board. But how did the cool, early-80s funk of a song like "Dirty Creature" get blown up into to this?
Following these ... mmm ... examples, William goes on to look at two much better adventures in symphonic rock - the Auckland Philharmonia's Starman tribute to David Bowie, and the recent concerts that The Phoenix Foundation gave with the New Zealand Symphony Orchestra.
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Music Details
'Song title' (Composer) – Performers
Album title
(Label)
'Concerto for Group and Orchestra' (Lord) – Deep Purple, LSO / Paul Mann
Deep Purple in Concert with the London Symphony Orchestra
(Eagle)
'Mo and Herb’s Vacation' (Zappa) – LSO / Kent Nagano
Zappa Vol I & II
(Zappa)
'I’m Your Toy' (Costello) – Elvis Costello, Royal Philharmonic
Almost Blue
(Edsel)
'Sympathy for the Devil' (Jagger, Richards) – LSO / Peter Scholes
Symphonic Music of the Rolling Stones
(RCA)
'Dirty Creature' (T Finn et al) – Tim Finn, NZSO / Peter Scholes
ENZSO
(Epic)
'Space Oddity' (Bowie) – Laughton Kora, APO / David Kay
Starman, Live Concert recording
(RNZ)
'Young Americans' (Bowie) – Laughton Kora, APO / David Kay
Starman, Live Concert
(RNZ)
'Most Important' (Toogood, Carter) – The Adults, Christchurch SO / Hamish McKeich
The Adults Live in Concert
(Warner)
'Black Mould' (PF) – The Phoenix Foundation
Fandango
(Universal)
'Morning Pages' (Scott, PF) – The Phoenix Foundation
Pegasus
(FMR)
'St Kevin' (PF) – The Phoenix Foundation
Horse Power
(Capitol)
'St Kevin' (PF) – The Phoenix Foundation
Live Concert recording
(RNZ)
'Buffalo' (PF) – The Phoenix Foundation
Live Concert recording
(RNZ)
