For those unfamiliar with Arnie Roth, he is a Grammy-winning composer, conductor, and record producer who has worked with big names like Diana Ross, Charlotte Church, Jewel, and The Three Tenors. He is also currently serving as conductor of the Chicagoland Pops Orchestra and has conducted numerous other orchestras throughout his successful career. To Final Fantasy fans around the world, however, he is best known as the conductor for Distant Worlds: Music from Final Fantasy.
Currently in its fourth year, Distant Worlds is set to perform two concerts this weekend at the Chicago Symphony Center. These concerts are a celebration of the music of Final Fantasy, and are set to include many of the most famous pieces crafted by series composer Nobuo Uematsu (who will also be in attendance for both concerts). Arnie took a few minutes to sit down and chat with us about the past, present, and future of Distant Worlds.
GrE: First of all, thank you taking a few minutes out of your busy schedule to chat with us.
Arnie Roth: No problem.
GrE: How did you first get involved conducting music for Final Fantasy? Not just Distant Worlds, but Dear Friends, More Friends, Play!: A Video Game Symphony, etc.?
Arnie Roth: It’s quite the long line of concerts, actually. That all started around the time of the first Dear Friends. I was doing some research on the viability of whether our orchestra (the Chicagoland Pops) should attempt to do a video game concert. Nobody had done it in Chicago, and up to that point only a few concerts had been held in Japan. There had been one concert – the very first Dear Friends – that was performed in Los Angeles. But that was during E3, which was more of an industry-centric crowd. That performance did not convince the world and all the orchestras of North America and presenters, that a video game music concert (Final Fantasy, HALO, World of Warcraft, or anything else) could stand on its own as an entertainment event that would actually sell tickets. They didn’t believe it, still, even though that first concert sold out very quickly. But again, most of the attendees were in the game industry, and the orchestras and presenters still thought that it was impractical to present a concert outside of a video game conference, or anime conference, or something else that was going on. So I turned out to be the first presenter to take a chance on the music of Final Fantasy as a separate, commercially-sold, ticketed concert event. That was in February, 2005 for Dear Friends in Chicago at the Rosemont Theatre. That was approximately 5000 seats, and sold out completely. It was a very exciting concert and that was also my first time working with Nobuo Uematsu, and meeting him. We definitely hit it off very quickly. After a brief tour of North America, it was done.
After that, Square Enix asked me to produce the Live CD of the concert More Friends, which I did in Los Angeles. In that one we had Uematsu and his band, the Black Mages, play on a couple of pieces, which was a lot of fun. I produced and mixed the CD for release in Japan only for Square Enix directly. Following that, there was a period of time where there weren’t any concerts with music from Final Fantasy. I was honored to be asked by Square Enix to fly into Tokyo and conduct their Voices concert, which was highlighting the vocal music from Final Fantasy but still contained a full orchestra and choir as well as the soloists. That was a wonderful concert and was filmed by Square Enix for DVD release.
It was after the Voices concert that we went into negotiations to start a real, proper, world tour of music from Final Fantasy. This was prompted by Square Enix approaching us. At Uematsu’s prompting, they came to us and asked me to produce a larger world tour that would expose the music of Final Fantasy to other areas of the world. Not just North America and Japan, but the rest of Asia and Europe as well. We are now in our 4th year, by all accounts I’m happy to say it’s been quite successful and Square Enix is quite happy with it. They are so happy with it, in fact, that we’ve been able to extend the license for another three years. Distant Worlds is set to continue for some time to come, and our challenge now is finding new markets.
GrE: It is my understanding that you and Mr. Uematsu worked together on arranging music for Distant Worlds. Of these new pieces, which is your favorite and why?
Arnie Roth: That’s a very tough question you’re asking. Both Nobuo and I always get asked these questions – about our favorite piece – and it’s very tough to single out. I will tell you that there are days when my immediate reaction will be something like “One Winged Angel” or “Liberi Fatali”. Other days I would say “Aerith’s Theme”, by far. The remarkable thing about the music of Final Fantasy and Nobuo Uematsu is his unbelievable ability to write carefully-crafted melodies.
I can tell you as a composer, arranger, and producer that the ability to craft such melodies is neither easy nor automatic. It is a natural ability, but very few people have it. There are people who are great craftsmen, great technicians – they write gorgeous scores – but to write a melody that is so compelling that it will stand the test of time is very difficult (even when considering major composers over the last 300 years), so as you can tell I have great respect for what Nobuo Uematsu has done. My favorite piece? You’re going to have to ask me at the end of each concert. I love doing “Dancing Mad”. I love doing “Aerith’s Theme”. There are aspects of each piece that I just can’t get enough of. Certainly “One Winged Angel”, that one has stood the test of time. It never gets tired in my mind, conducting that and bringing it to life.
GrE: What do you enjoy most about participating in Distant Worlds?
Arnie Roth: When it really comes down to it, it’s the joy of the performance. There’s a lot of pre-production and a lot of decision-making that I have to do. Some of the most difficult work I have to do involves pleasing as many fans of Final Fantasy as possible while still keeping in mind the constraints of each individual orchestra, performance length of time, how much rehearsal I have, what the acoustics of the hall are like, whether we have a strong choir or not – all these factors go into what pieces I choose. It’s a huge juggling act that we’re trying to do, and it’s very difficult. I always feel bad leaving anything out, but there’s a finite amount of time that we have. My favorite thing – as a musician – is to be able to stand on the stage with some of the best musicians in the world and perform these scores. I want the fans to know that there is joy is in the music-making itself. It’s not just about Uematsu as a composer, or just about Final Fantasy, but the ability to bring these scores to life.
I must emphasize that Distant Worlds is a live concert. We will never send prerecorded tracks out to the audience that are in sync with us or playing instead of us. We will never lip-sync to any track. That’s not what we do. In Chicago this weekend there is hardly any sound reinforcement whatsoever – we are playing acoustically. This is including, by the way, Nobuo Uematsu as an organ soloist on stage for the first time, along with me on violin, performing Final Fantasy VI‘s “Dark World” in Chicago this weekend. Both of us are playing acoustically. There’s a small speaker right on stage, and the sound goes out to the audience live. It’s not going over a PA system, it’s just Nobuo controlling the volume, and me, and of course the live orchestra.
I think Final Fantasy fans are so sophisticated that they know this, but this is quite a different show and concert than just about anything else out there, including Video Games Live, Play!, and others. Video Games Live might have 20-25 people on stage and play tracks out to the audience. That’s not what we do. This is totally live, and totally acoustic. We are a totally live music production and we would love to stay that way.
GrE: Were there any unique challenges working with a largely international team/Square Enix?
Arnie Roth: Absolutely. And we have a large amount of people flying in this weekend. Yasuhiro Takamatsu from Square Enix will be flying in, of course Nobuo Uematsu and his assistant Hiroki Ogawa will be in town. We also have a wonderful German pianist that will be flying in for these performances as a featured soloist for 4-5 pieces including “Those Who Fight” solo on piano. Fans are really getting a treat here. Susan Calloway will be singing “Melodies of Life”, “Suteki Da Ne”, “Kiss Me Goodbye”, and “Answers”. Some of these pieces fans would not normally get the chance to hear because it’s difficult to get all the right performers together for every concert. We’re pulling out all the stops this weekend in Chicago.
Are there challenges? Yes. We have somehow overcome some of the basics such as translation, currency exchange, and adapting certain elements from the Final Fantasy catalogue that may or may not be used due to legal issues. Sometimes the hands of Square Enix may be tied in one form or another, and all of these things have been problems for people working with Square Enix, but we’re very fortunate. We seem to be riding a wonderful wave of approval with them. We’re looking towards the future of developing more productions with them.
On June 1, I conducted the Royal Stockholm Philharmonic with my good friend Thomas Böcker, performing all the music of Nintendo. Working with Nintendo was very difficult. They do not allow us to use multimedia assets at all. So when we perform the music of Nintendo, nobody has been given the right to show HD video on screen while performing any of the music. We have that in our license with Square Enix for Final Fantasy. We feel very lucky, fortunate, and unique that we have HD video, artwork by Amano, and these wonderful scores by Uematsu and others.
GrE: Video game symphony concerts are a relatively new medium. A few years ago, having such an event in the West was unheard of (though they were performed more often in Japan). How do you feel about the worldwide reaction to Distant Worlds?
Arnie Roth: It really is amazing. I think we sometimes forget – here we are in our 4th year of Distant Worlds – but it’s actually quite a recent phenomenon. In Japan, they have for many years been able to do concerts without any video content, music only, and those have been very successful. We just performed Distant Worlds in Japan, doing it in our same format, and it went very well. I’m always struck at the fan reaction around the world being so similar (equally strong and forceful). In some places there are cultural issues that make a difference, and Japan is one of those places. It sells out fast, but the reaction of the audience is much more restrained. Simple, polite applause throughout the concert, but by the end we have a much more thunderous response.
I have to tell you one funny story. I had written a new arrangement for the Japan concert “Clash on the Big Bridge” (from Final Fantasy V). It turns out that that particular piece of music is the most requested piece of music from Final Fantasy in Japan, according to Square Enix. In North America I’m fairly certain that “One Winged Angel” is the most popular, but in Japan, it’s “Clash on the Big Bridge”. We were going to do it as a special surprise encore.
I don’t speak fluent Japanese by any stretch of the imagination. “Watashi wa Arnie Roth desu” (Ed: “My name is Arnie Roth”) is one of the statements I’ve mastered. We managed to do an ingenious thing with our screen: as I was speaking in English, someone was displaying the text in Japanese up on the large screen for the audience. We had this person triggering the translation screen-by-screen. It all worked great…until the encore. I was about to say “We are about to perform a very special surprise encore: Clash on the Big Bridge.” Before I could get the word “Clash” out of my mouth, the person that was prompting the screen popped the entire sentence up there, and before I could even say it, there was this huge roar from the audience for “Clash on the Big Bridge” just like the response we get in North America. I almost fell off the podium, it was really funny. It was a great line.
GrE: How has Distant Worlds evolved over the years of your participation?
Arnie Roth: Probably from the fan standpoint the most significant thing we’ve been able to do is expand the repertoire. We’ve gotten both Square Enix and Uematsu on board for making Distant Worlds the ultimate Final Fantasy tour, because we’ll perform the classics as well as a lot of pieces that aren’t widely played at other concerts. Distant Worlds is an all-encompassing Final Fantasy tour. I’m happy to tell you that we now have enough repertoire that we could easily play 3 successive concerts and not repeat anything. Here in Chicago we’re trying to cover as much as we can but still not disappoint people. It’s a great joy to introduce new pieces. Here in Chicago we’re introducing two new pieces: “Dark World” from Final Fantasy VI and “You’re Not Alone” from Final Fantasy IX. With “Dark World”, I managed to pick a piece after a lot of debate that would get Nobuo to come up and play a solo – as he’s refused several times, saying he’s too nervous. I knew he wouldn’t turn that one down, and he didn’t. We try to stay very faithful to the structure, format, melody, and style of the original release of the music.
We are about to hit the 25th anniversary of Final Fantasy in December of next year. I’ll pose a question back to you. What should we do for this special year? I encourage fans to write in and provide suggestions. We read everything on the Facebook site, and the fans should know that.
GrE: A lot of the fans we talk to really enjoy the vocal themes of Final Fantasy. Perhaps bringing some of the original vocalists back, such as Angela Aki, would be something to look into.
Arnie Roth: That can be difficult due to schedules and so on, but I like that suggestion. I’ll think about that.
GrE: Is there anything new and exciting coming up for Distant Worlds beyond the Chicago shows?
Arnie Roth: We have Masashi Hamauzu coming out with us to Houston and will be with us for the Houston Symphony performance in July. It’s been a pleasure to be able to play some of his works from Final Fantasy XIII. I certainly look forward to performing “Dark World” this weekend and putting that into our repertoire for when Nobuo is touring with us. The problem is that I can’t add something in without taking something away, so it’s a really painful thing. As much as it is a joy to add new pieces, something always has to go because of time constraints. As far as upcoming concerts, aside from the upcoming concert in the UK at Royal Albert Hall on November 5th, other European dates are being locked in. Additionally, dates for Mexico City will be announced soon, and the same for South America. We’re also looking at Hawaii for next year. Los Angeles is an exciting one because we’re going to do 2 nights of performances, so we’ll be able to play more music. Not quite as much as Chicago but still a lot. We also have a Nobuo Uematsu tribute concert coming up in Cologne with music from Final Fantasy, Blue Dragon, Lost Odyssey, and Last Story that I’m working on with my colleague Thomas Böcker.
GrE: Well, Arnie, thank you so very much for talking with GamesAreEvil.com.
Arnie Roth: You’re welcome.
For more information about Distant Worlds, or to purchase tickets for an upcoming show, visit: http://www.ffdistantworlds.com
Popularity: 2% [?]
