Music To My Thumbs - Video Games Live Returns to Canada

Posted April 27th, 2011 by Keadin
Check out more blog postings by Keadin

Video Games Live is back in Canada and it's looking bigger and better than ever. With more tour dates right across the country, there are plenty of opportunities to catch this amazing video game orchestra live. I was lucky enough to catch show host and Canadian gaming legend, Tommy Tallarico in a rare moment between performances to talk a little bit about life on the road and what Halo fans can expect from the concert.

You've worked in a lot of different sectors of the video game industry. How does doing a show like Video Games Live compare to composing music for games, or doing shows like Electric Playground with Victor Lucas?

The big difference between putting on a live show is that you get this instant feedback and live energy from the crowd, and you feed off that. As a video game composer you kind of sit in your little cave studio and you write the music, which is like putting a little message in a bottle because sometimes you don't get any feedback. It's the same with television where you do your thing and it gets broadcast over the airwaves and that's it. Putting on a live concert where anything can happen you get real instant feedback when you're performing and you hear the crowd get excited. As a performer there's nothing cooler than that, I think.

These shows are massive; can you give us some insight in to what it takes to put each of these tour dates up?

So, for the Canadian tour we're doing 16 shows in 21 days. To put on one show we need to roll in to the city at 8:00 AM to an empty venue, it's completely empty like a blank canvas. The tech guys do all the lights and the video while the pre-show festival is getting set up. Then we start rehearsals after lunch and that lasts until about 6:00 PM, and it's a tech rehearsal so we're adjusting the lights and I'm tuning my guitar and stuff. Then we take a quick break and we let people in for the pre-show festival. After we do the show and everyone's happy we'll do a small meet and greet before we tear it all down, pack it up and move to our next city, get up at the next venue and do it all again. It's crazy, but it's fun though.

Setting up the show from a musical standpoint, how do you decide which songs are going to be really good in the show?

Well, the cool thing about Video Games Live is that I've never played the same setlist twice. We've never done the same show twice, and that's going back over the 6 years. The important thing people need to know is that if you've seen Video Games Live before, it's going to be a completely different experience this time around. We've been to Toronto 4 or 5 times before, Vancouver same thing, but it's always different and dynamic which makes it interesting.

For me the hard thing is deciding whether I play Metal Gear Solid or Street Fighter II, Castlevania or Mega Man. That's the nice thing about doing it live, we can change and keep doing new shows forever. There's always new content, and we're playing music from games that aren't even out yet! Between that and the list I keep on me of all the things people request there's so much content to choose from.

When I create a setlist I want it to be as dynamic as possible. I want a good mix of classic games and new ones, I want big orchestral scores and some softer slower stuff. We've got these interactive segments and the orchestra changes the music as we go. There's soloists and rock 'n roll pieces which bring their own vibe to it. So it's always telling a story and changing, I pick music that lets the show be dynamic and have those peaks and valleys. It doesn't have to be a popular game, as long as it has good music.

Halo has been one of the most popular pieces in the show, wherever you play. Will there be anything new for Master Chief fans during this tour?

For sure, this year there's a couple new things. It depends what show in the tour you go to, we're always changing it up, but we did 2 new Halo things this year. I don't think we've done a show where Halo hasn't been a big part because it gets a really big reaction wherever we are.
There's a new piece I call the Halo Trilogy where we take music from Halo 1, 2 and 3 and sort of switch from game to game. That's kind of new this year, but also we have this other segment that's all Halo: Reach. We debut it in Seattle with Marty O'Donnel and Mike Salvatori, the composers from Bungie. It's definitely one of the most popular segments all over the world, you can always count on Halo to be in one of our shows.

Thanks Tommy, it sounds like this year's show is going to be quite the spectacle.

Thank you, it's going to be a great show and I look forward to seeing the rest of Canada soon.