Not my ordinary Tuesday

Yesterday was certainly not my ordinary Tuesday.

To start off with, Liz turned up at the office at 3:30, and said "You're coming with me.", she then told me Jim already knew I was leaving early, so I left (after making sure Jim really knew).

When we got to the car there was a brown paper bag with some clues in it for what we were doing. The clues seemed completely random to me, so when we got home Liz told me there was a shirt upstairs that I might want to wear that would give it away. When I got upstairs it was my "Chewie is my co-pilot" t-shirt. No way - we're going to Star Wars in Concert!!!!!!

Now I'm really psyched, because anyone who knows me knows I have listened to those soundtracks more than any other music I own. So we went out for an early dinner, and jumped on the interstate to spend some anxious time in traffic on the way to the concert.

Inside the foyer area there was a display of props (mainly weapons and helmets) and also some costumes, including Darth Vader, Plo Koon & Kit Fisto, Chewie, C-3PO and a couple of others. Even Boba Fett was just walking around the crowd!

Then it was time to take our seats and get ready for the show. The score is performed by the Royal Philharmonic I think, and behind them is a 3 storey high screen that they show footage on, and also a choir for the vocal performances. Here is what the stage looked like before the performance started. Also, the host for the performance was none other than Anthony Daniels (C-3PO)!!!

They played a lot of music, the performance was around 2 hours. I'll try to remember as many tracks as I can. They opened with the THX sound effect. Then, the orchestra performed (trying to get order right):

- The 20th Century Fox Fanfare

- Star Wars Opening Titles, then some of the closing from Return of the Jedi

- Duel of the Fates (Ep I)

- Anakin's Theme (Ep I)

- Droids theme (Ep IV, I believe, could have played something better than this I thought)

- Podrace intro (Ep I, also could have played something better I thought)

- Across the Stars (Ep II)

- Battle of the Heroes (Ep III), which also included flame pyrotechnics coming out of the stage!!!

- Imperial March (Ep V)

Then there was:

When the orchestra came back from intermission they played (can't remember exact order, but this is close):

- Parts of the Battle of Yavin (Ep IV)

- Binary Sunset leading in to Cantina Band (Ep IV)

- Princess Leia's Theme (Ep IV)

- Asteroid Chase (Ep V)

- Luke and Leia (Ep VI)
- The Forest Battle (Ep VI)
- Clash of the Lightsabers (Ep V)

- Light of the Force (Vader armor burning track) (Ep VI)

- Medal Ceremony (Ep IV)

- Closing Theme, with some of the Return of the Jedi closing credits (Ep VI)

That was the end of the show. I loved it - the show was great, and it was cool to hear the music live. They had some laser stuff happening at times, too!

One of the orchestra members looked like the British version of Quagmire from Family Guy, expect with long, curly ginger hair. His jaw was huge!!!

So, to finish off, here is a short video of Anthony Daniels hosting. I'll try to post a short clip of music performance soon, if people seem interested...