Distant Worlds- Baltimore

[Hutz]

So, this past weekend I had the opportunity to attend the Jun 27 Distant Worlds concert in Baltimore. And by opportunity, I mean drove 5 hours to get there for it...
You can check out the website at ffdistantworlds.com, but if you don't know- its a concert of music of the FF series, fully orchestrated including choir. And let me tell you what...it was epic. Website says there are about 2400 seats, and from what I could tell, it was either a sellout, or darn near it. There were cosplayers, people all dressed up formal-like, and people like me, with a FF t-shirt and jean shorts. So anyway, the concert started off with an amazing rendition of Liberi Fatali, with choir. A little after that they showed the FFXIV E3 trailer (apparently some people didn't know it existed yet as evidenced by cheers) and the "Victory Fanfare" as played by an orchestra. Wow. Nobuo Uematsu also had recorded a message for us, which was as wildly bizarre as some of the Sundi-isms on the internet. Nobuo showed off his new car which was a hard-top convertible...

To Zanarkand was OK...I liked the original composition more than this one. Don't Be Afraid (FF 8 battle theme) started off with video of FFVIII in Dollet, as the team was crossing the bridge there. They encountered a random battle, and the orchestra seamlessly picked up with the battle theme as the video continued. Aerith's theme...very good...could almost feel everyone's eyes welling up in tears... Dear Friends and Vamo' alla Flamenco included guitar solos, they were pretty good as well. Love Grows (instrumental Eyes On Me) came next, which was another of my favorites from back in the day...

Now, as a proud Bastokan citizen, I didn't know how to take the next song, Ronfaure. Well, It was great, sounded fantastic coming from all the stringed instruments. The classic theme ended the 1st half. Now, as this was an upscale performance at a large hall, so too was the intermission. As was the case before the show began, you could schmooze out in the halls while sipping champagne and cocktails. Yeah...mixed drinks at a video game concert. Second half kicked off with the Bombing run of the mako reactor in FFVII, awesome... Fisherman's Horizon up next, with the choir providing some ambient backgrounds. Distant Worlds, the namesake of the tour was next, with vocals provided by Catherine MiEung Choi. I'd say the majority of people in attendance were not FFXI veterans, but I couldn't say. A couple more songs, then Swing de Chocobo, the sort of '20's glitzy version of the theme. Now, the only song on the program I was not familiar with was probably the most anticipated by the audience- the opera from FFVI. I didn't play that game...Apparently they played the whole opera, with 3 vocalists covering the roles of the characters in the game. It ran on for I swear 10 minutes? By the end it got a standing ovation from the audience, which was pretty amazing. Finally, Terra's theme wrapped up the evening.

Encore~
Everyone knew it was coming, the conductor, Arnie Roth basically said it too, "Ok, you know what's next!"
One Winged Angel. Of course. Freaking amazing...wow.
That wrapped up the concert. I would have posted some videos and pictures, but they had signs on top of signs on top of announcements saying if they caught anyone with any recording device, they'd remove you from the hall. No way I wanted to get tossed after a 5 hr drive...I guess the message got through, No one else did anything to try to photograph it either. Which kind of sucks, since it's all in my head now, and I'll eventually forget. If any of you live near the upcoming tour sites, I encourage you to attend.