Film Music Reporter

Last night, the Academy of the Motion Pictures Arts & Sciences (AMPAS) presented its first-ever official Oscar concert at UCLA’s Royce Hall celebrating the nominated scores and songs of the 86th Academy Awards. The event was hosted by rapper Common and produced by Academy governors Charles Fox and Arthur Hamilton. To start off the show, Fox conducted an 80-piece orchestra consisting of studio musicians with a performance of Jerry Goldsmith’s Fanfare for Oscar. Film critic Elvis Mitchell moderated a Q&A with each of the nominated composers in the Best Original Score category before each performance. Six-time nominee Alexandre Desplat discussed his approach composing the score for Philomena and his continuing relationship with director Stephen Frears before conducting a suite from his music from the Oscar-nominated picture. Twelve-time nominee Thomas Newman discussed the challenges of bridging P.L. Travers’ character (portrayed by Emmy Thompson) across the different times from 1906 to 1961 in John Lee Hancock’s Saving Mr. Banks through his music before conducting an 11-minute suite from the score. Newman’s performance was followed by a short Q&A with the film’s music consultant and Mary Poppins songwriter Richard Sherman. First-time nominee Steven Price talked about his approach to the score for Alfonso Cuaron’s Gravity as a fusion of organic and electronic elements with processed cello and human breath to create “moments of calm and sadness “, as well as “moments of terror”. Joseph Trapanese (Oblivion) guest conducted a suite featuring selections from Price’s score. Arcade Fire’s William Butler and Owen Pallett appeared on stage for a discussion of their music for Spike Jonze’s Best Picture nominee Her before Pallett conducted a suite of the score with the full orchestra. John Williams who has a record number of 49 nominations (second only to Walt Disney) was welcomed to the stage with a standing ovation and discussed his music for The Book Thief and praised the contribution of the orchestra to film music before he went to the podium to conduct selections from the score.

Also performed throughout the evening were the four nominated songs. Kristen Anderson-Lopez performed Let It Go from Disney’s Frozen with Robert Lopez accompanying her on piano. They also gave out a shout-out to the film’s composer Christophe Beck who was in attendance at the concert. Pharrell Williams’ nominated song Happy from Despicable Me 2 was performed by Jill Scott who was joined on stage with the Debbie Allen Dancers. Charles Bernstein (A Nightmare on Elm Street) conducted the orchestra for the performance. Karen O’s The Moon Song from Spike Jonze’s Her was performed by Cristin Milioti who recently starred in The Wolf of Wall Street and U2’s Ordinary Love from Mandela: Long Walk to Freedom was performed by The Voice finalist Matt Cermanski. At the end of the concert, Charles Fox mentioned that the event was the first of possibly many Oscar concerts and judging from the reaction of the near-capacity crowd, it appears to be a good bet that the event will return in 2015.