Riposare in Pace, il Maestro x

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Re: Riposare in Pace, il Maestro x

By NathanLurker
-  Mon Jul 06, 2020 5:48 pm #129439
RIP Mr.Morricone !
I'm currently confined at my girlfriend's place without my records, the only one I have on hand is the new Soave record for Bacalov/Morricone's ''Pitturamusica'', so I'll be spinning that when I'm done working.
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Re: Riposare in Pace, il Maestro x

By deafmetal
-  Wed Jul 08, 2020 12:23 am #129534
Still having some difficulty processing that Morricone is gone. I was never able to see him conduct a live orchestra, which is something I that I was always hoping to see one day. Did any of you catch some of the final concerts over the last few years? Please share some memories if so. I am seeing some widespread appreciation for the man being shared across all manner of social media and forums, with a lot of similar stories of people being exposed to "soundtracks" from his early western films. Quite an inspiration.
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Re: Riposare in Pace, il Maestro x

By ScoJo
-  Wed Jul 08, 2020 8:29 am #129546
deafmetal wrote: ↑Wed Jul 08, 2020 12:23 am Still having some difficulty processing that Morricone is gone. I was never able to see him conduct a live orchestra, which is something I that I was always hoping to see one day. Did any of you catch some of the final concerts over the last few years? Please share some memories if so. I am seeing some widespread appreciation for the man being shared across all manner of social media and forums, with a lot of similar stories of people being exposed to "soundtracks" from his early western films. Quite an inspiration.
Most of us here owe him so much, it's hard to articulate. Part of our shared musical DNA, without doubt. (I'd guess that Carpenter alone runs him even close, along with Williams)

I was truly blessed to see him conduct in 2016, an outdoor show at Blenheim Palace with a classy opera-singer Dell'Orso stand in (I forget her name sorry but the programme bigged her up!) and full Czech quoir. I had sortof given up seeing him after he cancelled an O2 Arena show a few years earlier that we had tickets for due to poor health. And if I'm brutally honest? I imagined it being a 'greatest hits' set which would possibly leave me feeling that a huge part of his career would be unrepresented- the earlier 'Mondo Morricone' years, the swinging pop years, the ones my heart truly belongs to. (not to mention his 'scary' music for Gialli and horror, of course, though I had no allusions that this was remotely possible)
But my awesome sister went ahead and scored us tix for my birthday and we pitched up in pouring rain for an outdoor show... it didn't start on a great footing! Then, as we wandered around the grounds of the royal palace, getting soaking wet, suddenly the skies cleared and we heard the orchestra preparing in the distance- soundchecking 'The Mission'. All my precious, personal qualms of 'yeah great, but early stuff?' were immediately squashed as we stood transfixed by The Most Epic Music Ever Written thundering around the palace. I was speechless. I managed to video a few seconds and post online (I was new to both my iphone, roaming data and twitter) and from there our excitement just grew exponentially. Somehow, I'd managed to remain quite distanced and unmoved about the show up to this point (it's a fun trick of mine!), not reading anything about the show in advance, and right up until getting the programme I hadn't even fully clocked that Il Maestro was going to be conducting in person! 'You mean.... he's here??' I remember saying to my sister. She looked at me in full understanding, knowing how I am about 'blinkering' myself to stave off potential disappointment. (I did exactly the same thing when she got us Prince tickets that following year, where I remained weirdly unmoved right until the moment His Royal Badness took the stage behind his symbol mic stand and I COMPLETELY LOST MY SHIT FOR TWO HOURS!!)
So back at Blenheim: I am now pretty hyped, but still fully expecting a by-the-numbers hits medly. Then, Ennio takes the stage - super frail, naturally, but very present. He acknowledged the audience a few times, but mostly he was all business. And it sounded in-cred-ible. The first of five or six musical 'blocks' was a kind of classical section if I recall- something I wasn't especially familiar with. And then at some point, a very familiar opening refrain started up, and they launched into 'Metti Una Sera a Cena'!! I just couldn't believe it, every goosebump, slack jawed, tears... I'd convinced myself so hard that I wouldn't hear any of those glorious 60s pop themes that are likely unfamiliar to 'greatest hits' concert goers, that I was utterly blindsided hearing one of my all time favourite themes at full force. It was... a lot.
The show was fantastic needless to say- yes it was essentially 'The Hits' (and ffs, what hits they are!) with some interesting classical-style moments, and nothing else from the 'Mondo' era. But I couldn't have enjoyed it more. When the orchestra took the stage for an encore, and Il Maestro led them in a few tunes before finishing with exactly the same main theme from The Mission that they had already played, I even chuckled to myself and thought 'you got me signor - you're the only band I know who I will let get away with closing on a hit song that you've already played...' :)

Here's that brief glimpse of the magical rain-evaporating soundcheck:


https://twitter.com/scottjohannsson/sta ... 92928?s=21


.
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Re: Riposare in Pace, il Maestro x

By Bezulsqy
-  Wed Jul 08, 2020 10:23 am #129549
ScoJo wrote: ↑Wed Jul 08, 2020 8:29 am
deafmetal wrote: ↑Wed Jul 08, 2020 12:23 am Still having some difficulty processing that Morricone is gone. I was never able to see him conduct a live orchestra, which is something I that I was always hoping to see one day. Did any of you catch some of the final concerts over the last few years? Please share some memories if so. I am seeing some widespread appreciation for the man being shared across all manner of social media and forums, with a lot of similar stories of people being exposed to "soundtracks" from his early western films. Quite an inspiration.
Most of us here owe him so much, it's hard to articulate. Part of our shared musical DNA, without doubt. (I'd guess that Carpenter alone runs him even close, along with Williams)

I was truly blessed to see him conduct in 2016, an outdoor show at Blenheim Palace with a classy opera-singer Dell'Orso stand in (I forget her name sorry but the programme bigged her up!) and full Czech quoir. I had sortof given up seeing him after he cancelled an O2 Arena show a few years earlier that we had tickets for due to poor health. And if I'm brutally honest? I imagined it being a 'greatest hits' set which would possibly leave me feeling that a huge part of his career would be unrepresented- the earlier 'Mondo Morricone' years, the swinging pop years, the ones my heart truly belongs to. (not to mention his 'scary' music for Gialli and horror, of course, though I had no allusions that this was remotely possible)
But my awesome sister went ahead and scored us tix for my birthday and we pitched up in pouring rain for an outdoor show... it didn't start on a great footing! Then, as we wandered around the grounds of the royal palace, getting soaking wet, suddenly the skies cleared and we heard the orchestra preparing in the distance- soundchecking 'The Mission'. All my precious, personal qualms of 'yeah great, but early stuff?' were immediately squashed as we stood transfixed by The Most Epic Music Ever Written thundering around the palace. I was speechless. I managed to video a few seconds and post online (I was new to both my iphone, roaming data and twitter) and from there our excitement just grew exponentially. Somehow, I'd managed to remain quite distanced and unmoved about the show up to this point (it's a fun trick of mine!), not reading anything about the show in advance, and right up until getting the programme I hadn't even fully clocked that Il Maestro was going to be conducting in person! 'You mean.... he's here??' I remember saying to my sister. She looked at me in full understanding, knowing how I am about 'blinkering' myself to stave off potential disappointment. (I did exactly the same thing when she got us Prince tickets that following year, where I remained weirdly unmoved right until the moment His Royal Badness took the stage behind his symbol mic stand and I COMPLETELY LOST MY SHIT FOR TWO HOURS!!)
So back at Blenheim: I am now pretty hyped, but still fully expecting a by-the-numbers hits medly. Then, Ennio takes the stage - super frail, naturally, but very present. He acknowledged the audience a few times, but mostly he was all business. And it sounded in-cred-ible. The first of five or six musical 'blocks' was a kind of classical section if I recall- something I wasn't especially familiar with. And then at some point, a very familiar opening refrain started up, and they launched into 'Metti Una Sera a Cena'!! I just couldn't believe it, every goosebump, slack jawed, tears... I'd convinced myself so hard that I wouldn't hear any of those glorious 60s pop themes that are likely unfamiliar to 'greatest hits' concert goers, that I was utterly blindsided hearing one of my all time favourite themes at full force. It was... a lot.
The show was fantastic needless to say- yes it was essentially 'The Hits' (and ffs, what hits they are!) with some interesting classical-style moments, and nothing else from the 'Mondo' era. But I couldn't have enjoyed it more. When the orchestra took the stage for an encore, and Il Maestro led them in a few tunes before finishing with exactly the same main theme from The Mission that they had already played, I even chuckled to myself and thought 'you got me signor - you're the only band I know who I will let get away with closing on a hit song that you've already played...' :)

Here's that brief glimpse of the magical rain-evaporating soundcheck:


https://twitter.com/scottjohannsson/sta ... 92928?s=21


.
beautiful story @ScoJo!
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Re: Riposare in Pace, il Maestro x

By inksb
-  Wed Jul 08, 2020 1:09 pm #129555
Thanks for sharing that @ScoJo
As many of you know I came into the whole soundtrack collecting much later than most of you on here. I wish I could have seen him conduct, it would have been wonderful but at least I get to live vicariously through some of your stories on here. And I'm very thankful to have at least seen Frizzi and Simonetti in person.
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Re: Riposare in Pace, il Maestro x

By deafmetal
-  Thu Jul 09, 2020 4:48 am #129592
@ScoJo - Thank you, that is exactly the kind of story I was hoping to read. I am really glad you were able to attend the concert (at a castle, no less), and he even dropped Metti Una Sera a Cena (just for you). ;) I am going to live vicariously through your story for a while now.
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Re: Riposare in Pace, il Maestro x

By ChrisMcQueen007
-  Sat Jul 11, 2020 2:04 pm #129661
After giving this some thought I decided to share a little story here that doesn't directly involve me (but my dad) and that made me smile again these days - as it provides a little glimpse of Il Maestro's personality.

So my dad is fluent in Italian, he used to live there for some time in his youth and much later then represented an Italian company in Germany. My mother also loved Italy, we often spent our holidays there or even long weekends as my dad was able to combine this with visiting the company he worked for.

Depending on where you go to Italy, it's only a 4-5 hour drive from the south of Germany where I grew up. We often went to a rather small village in the mountains above lake Garda as my parents liked hiking and while they enjoyed the lake they preferred to be a bit away from the more touristy areas.

Anyways, in this village there is one of these typical Italian shops where you can buy everything from small kitchen appliances to shoes and handbags. My dad got to know the owner and in one of their conversations he told him that he actually was a childhood friend of Morricone, they had gone to school with each other in Rome, he had then moved to the North of Italy because of his wife. This must have been more than 25 years ago that the owner told this to my dad, I still remember my dad pointing it out to me (obviously I stopped going on holiday with may parents in my late teens). The shop owner was in his late sixties then, the shop still exists, I actually went back to the place 3 years ago (the owner must have passed away shortly before but his daughter took over).

Ok, that's quite a lot of context but now I'm getting to the point. As Morricone and the shop owner had stayed good friends over the years, Morricone sometimes came to this little village and would conduct an unannounced concert in a small venue for the locals as a favour to his friend. This must have been roughly every 3 - 4 years or so.

My dad continued to go to this village and spend some time there every now and then even after my mother sadly passed away. Five or six years ago (I actually phoned him today and asked if he remembered exactly when this was) he was taking a walk around the village and saw the shop owner standing in front of the local church with someone else - and when my dad greeted the shop owner he was presented to Il Maestro!

They had had a little chat about Rome (that's where my dad spent some years in his youth), the village, and life in general and in the evening my dad was able to join a small, intimate concert conducted by Il Maestro in the village church.
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