Sunday, October 19, 2008

Ennio Morricone

Saw the legend that is Ennio Morricone last night in Belfast. Really incredible experience. We were very lucky and got seats in the very front row. not ten feet from the Maestro himself!

Like many people I primarily knew Ennio's contributions to Sergio Leone's Man With no Name trilogy' The title theme to The good the bad and the Ugly and The ecstasy of the gold from the same movie. I was also aware of his soundtrack to The Mission, but I hadn't seen that movie in years.

When we got the programme for the night I discovered he also did the composition for John Carpenters The Thing and for Brian DePalma's The Untouchables.

All of the above (barring music from The Thing) were played and in fact the Ecstasy of the gold was played twice.
Here's a a video of the song from a different concert. Same orchestra and incredible soprano ( Susanna Rigacci)



The choir was the Belfast Philharmonic Choir, The video cannot convey the experience of sitting there with a full orchestra and 100-120 person choir belting out Spaghetti western tunes when you're there in person.


As well as the Movie themes I recognised there were a couple of pieces that I had not previously known which were also excellent, one in particular which made full use of the choir is called Abolisson. It highlights the amazing talent this man has, the songs vary from beautiful and melancholy pieces through lighthearted xylophone-driven numbers to the raises-the-hair-on-the-back-of- your-neck majesty of On earth as it is in heaven from the mission.


It just leaves one thing to say...Bravo Maestro!