- The oldest film music event in the world continues with its program of concerts at Teatro Leal and the Paraninfo de la Universidad de La Laguna with three original proposals dedicated to the music that has been part of the cinema of Stanley Kubrick and David Lynch, to the composers Krzysztof Penderecki and Angelo Badalamenti and to video game music written by the renowned author Jesper Kyd.
The Festival Internacional de Música de Cine de Tenerife (FIMUCITÉ), the oldest event of the genre in the world, continues this weekend celebrating its 17th edition with a program of original concerts that will delight fans of soundtracks created for both film and television, as well as for video games.
This Friday July 7th, and Saturday July 8th, Teatro Leal in La Laguna is hosting 'Electronic Penderecki: The Shared Universe of David Lynch and Stanley Kubrick' and 'Jazzdalamenti: A Jazz Tribute to Angelo Badalamenti'. A chamber group made up of solo musicians from the prestigious Sinfonietta Cracovia orchestra, which made its successful debut at FIMUCITÉ last year, again under the direction of Katarzyna Tomala Jedynak, will stage the concert 'Electronic Penderecki', which will address the lines common in the cinematography of David Lynch and Stanley Kubrick. Co-financed with funds from the Ministry of Culture and National Heritage of the Cultural Promotion Fund of the Republic of Poland, this concert will pay tribute to Polish composer and conductor Krzysztof Penderecki, who died in 2020 and is famous for his recognizable compositional style in his atonal works, some of which have been part of the soundtracks of horror movie classics such as 'The Shining' or 'The Exorcist'. The brilliant Polish composer and arranger Jan Sanejko has been entrusted with the monumental task of recreating the dark and fascinating musical universe of Penderecki in this first section of the concert, an experimental exercise never done before at the festival, which promises an experience for the senses.
This proposal, which will fuse chamber music (string quintet, piano, accordion and clarinet) with electronic elements, will feature British band Juno Reactor, a pioneering group of psychedelic trance, trip hop and electronic music from the United Kingdom, and its leader Ben Watkins, who returns to FIMUCITÉ after his spectacular participation last year in the symphonic concert 'Cyberpunk Remastered Vol 1'.
The second part will be eminently dedicated to Angelo Badalamenti, author of the iconic music for the series 'Twin Peaks', for which he won the Grammy Award and was nominated for three Emmys. His collaboration with writer and director David Lynch also included other titles such as 'Blue Velvet' or 'Mulholland Drive', among others, and, after his death last December at the age of 85, he left a commendable musical legacy. Other legendary scores present in Stanley Kubrick's cinema will be played, such as 'Lolita', 'Barry Lyndon' or 'Eyes Wide Shut'. The arrangements of these scores for chamber ensemble have been carried out by internationally renowned composer and arranger Leigh Phillips. In this recital, renowned Polish musicians Piotr Lato, on clarinet, and Maciej Zimka, on accordion, as well as soloists Liliana Izyk and Juan Miguel Castellano (Spanish guitar), will also take part.
The tribute to Badalamenti, who passed away at the end of 2022, will continue on Saturday at the 'Jazzdalamenti' concert, a fascinating journey through the composer's work in a Big Band musical style. Prestigious composer Joseph LoDuca, a close relative and friend of the maestro and an accomplished jazz guitarist, has carried out the exceptional arrangements and will participate in this concert, performed by the Big Band de Canarias, under the musical direction of prestigious saxophonist Kike Perdomo. One of the great voices of the Festival, Esther Ovejero, will also take part, singing some of the most popular songs created by Badalamenti for film and television.
Video Game Music
This Sunday, July 9th, the Paraninfo de la Universidad de La Laguna will host the concert 'Heroes del Píxel', a journey through the music written for video games by Danish composer Jesper Kyd, famous for his works for sagas such as 'Hitman', 'Assassin's Creed' or 'Borderlands'. The author will attend the concert, which will be performed by the Jóven Orquesta Sinfónica de Fimucité, made up of students from the Conservatorio Profesional de Música de Santa Cruz de Tenerife y del Conservatorio Superior de Música de Canarias, conducted by José Antonio Cubas, and with the participation, for the first time, of the Coro Polifónico de la Universidad de La Laguna. The program, which will excite video game fans, includes the world premiere of the music from 'Assassin's Creed Valhalla', a Viking story set in the 9th century, and the soundtrack to original animated series 'Raid: Call of the Arbiter', based on the $1 billion-grossing mobile game franchise, 'Raid: Shadow Legends.'
Soprano Carmen Acosta, closely linked to the educational project headed by the Jóven Orquesta Sinfónica de FIMUCITÉ, will also perform at this concert.
FIMUCITÉ FILM SCORING ACADEMY 2023
Elsewhere, between Monday, July 10th and Saturday, July 15th, the eighth edition of the FIMUCITÉ Film Scoring Academy, which includes an outstanding program of free master classes and round tables, with limited capacity, will take place in the sala multipropósito del Parque Científico y Tecnológico de Tenerife, in Las Mantecas (La Laguna) and the Auditorio del Espacio Cultural CajaCanarias, in Santa Cruz de Tenerife.
The list of speakers includes authors as prominent as the aforementioned Ben Watkins (Juno Reactor) and Jesper Kyd, along with award-winning composer and arranger for film, games, and contemporary music Jan Sanejko; orchestrator and arranger Benoît Grey; drummer Greg Ellis, one of the most in-demand professionals in the post-production phase of big-budget films; Grammy and Emmy Award winner Lolita Ritmanis and her Dynamic Music Partners labelmates Michael McCuistion and Kristopher Carter; the expert in sound techniques in the field of streaming Sara López; and various guest composers attached to Musimagen.
Coordinated by Pedro J. Mérida, the FIMUCITÉ Academy is one of the most anticipated parallel activities of the festival, which is displayed annually in FIMUCITÉ's commitment to specialized training in this field and offers a unique opportunity to students and professional musicians interested in the creation of music for media. Audiovisual composers, music producers, arrangers, music software developers, sound engineers, percussionists, streamers, and even film producers and directors, video game developers, 2D and 3D animators, animation scriptwriters and young people with musical and audiovisual interests are part of the target audience for the different training modules.
Symphony Concerts
The grand finale FIMUCITÉ 17 will be the symphonic concerts that the Auditorio de Tenerife will host on Friday 14th and Saturday 15th July, performed by the Orquesta Sinfónica de Tenerife, the Tenerife Film Choir and the Coro Polifónico de la Universidad de La Laguna, dedicated to the world of comics and its protagonists, heroes and villains, who have so inspired the audiovisual throughout history: 'Excelsior: The Stan Lee Legacy', which will offer a program of the great soundtracks of Marvel and its cinematographic universe, as well as the adaptations of the stories and characters of the iconic comic book publisher to television; and 'Gods and Detectives', dedicated to DC Comics.