It was by pure coincidence that over the Christmas break the family sat through the entire eight Harry Potter movies. Not exactly kid stuff to my mind, particularly late in the series where the content becomes some what dark. But good does triumph over evil and that was probably the whole point. Through out the movies I was not completely oblivious to the music. It was there and it enhanced the movie without becoming a distraction. That, in itself, is an indication of the quality of the music score. However, at the Symphony of the Kootenays rehearsal on Saturday the true scope and magnificence of the movie scores positively leapt out at the audience. It was big music and it required a big orchestra. The program listed nearly 50 musicians that included the string orchestra, 6 percussionists and a big horn section. To hear the music unimpeded with visual distraction was to become aware of the magnificent orchestrations and its modern musical language. I don’t mean modern in a rock/pop sense. I mean it in an academic scholarly sense. That may sound kind of dry and dull with a possibly teeth on edge sensibility. The music of John Williams is none of that. It is startling and entrancing at the same time with lots of melody and dramatic effects. Here is the program from the concert and some images from the rehearsal.

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