On Thursday, Maurice Kirya surprised many when he decided to program the Kampala Music School in the first ever Orchestra live concert at the Sound Cup café and the building.
Directed by Kiggundu Fredrick Musoke, the group whose set was only cut short by grand piano which I assume they could hardly ship to the location played their hearts out.
Classical music has never been a mainstream thing in many countries, despite being the oldest genre, it is been referred as a type only favored by the richer people of the society.
The marvelous music at the Sound Cup was mostly from films like classical Sound of Music, Star Wars and James Bond chronicles.
Given the beauty of such pieces and the performance delivered by the orchestra, it wasn’t surprising that the Garden City floor that harbours Kirya was filled to the brim, it even became worse that some had to go to the topmost floors to watch the magic.
They opened with various numbers from the movie Sound of Music, being a Christmas favorite over the years; it was a wise decision considering fears that many of those in attendance may not have been ready to accommodate very hard classical music.
The very beginning of the music could have easily fooled many into believing the group had started off in a wrong key, but the consistency and the constant interludes by the three guys on the trumpets proved it was all intentional, it was easy listening but not that involving.
In fact, it was 1959’s My favorite things that pulled heart strings even of the nonmusical guests, the song has been redone various times by Julie Andrews as Maria in the Sound of Music in 1965, The Supremes, Carrie Underwood, Kelly Clarkson and the Glee cast among others.
Written by Richard Rodgers and Oscar Hammerstein, the orchestra may have taken many on the memory lane as they pulled off this classic. Mostly infused in between various violins, trumpets and a piano; the double bass summed it up by creating a warm sound that easily settled and talked to us.
Overture has been a hit especially with the classic TV show Lone Ranger and BBC’s Adventures of William Tell. Italian composer Giachino Rossini wrote this music in 1829, for many first timers though, it channels the famous war sound of the Universal Studios theme by Jerry Goldsmith, thus, when they started playing it, the excitement was visible only to realize it was merely a similarity.
Later as they ended the show, an encore of Overture was requested for which they did. Other songs played included Nella Fantasia from The Mission, Waltz from The sleeping beauty…generally much of the music done was from movies.
Uganda having very many football fans, you could expect them to slot in some Zadok the Priest sample which forms the champions League theme song – that didn’t happen.
There was a general consensus that Kampala Music School had nailed it, Maurice Kirya had taken some strides to do what Club Silk’s Unplugged has failed to do as well as Kampala’s music lovers learning to embrace all forms of music.
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