Distant Worlds: Music from Final Fantasy July 22, 23

Felix Mendelssohn, composer (1809–1847) Symphony No. 4 in A major, Opus 90 (Italian)

• An avid traveler, Mendelssohn was inspired to write his “Italian” symphony upon taking a 10-month trip across Italy, which he began in 1830. He began sketches for the work while in Italy, before returning to London to finish the score as part of a commission from the Philharmonic Society of London.

• Mendelssohn completed the symphony in 1833 and conducted the premiere in London that same year. Despite the success of the premiere,

Mendelssohn was never completely satisfied with the symphony. He continued to make revisions to the score until his death in 1847, and although several more performances took place, he refused to publish the work during his lifetime.

• Mendelssohn begins his symphony with a joyous exclamation in the strings, which unfurls over a scurrying accompaniment in the winds and low strings before transitioning to a sweet secondary melody in the woodwinds. These two themes eventually give way to a brief, brooding development section before returning to the triumphant tone of the opening.

• In the second movement, a darker, meandering melody in the woodwinds and strings is propelled by the constant motion of the bass, which advances briefly to a sentimental string and woodwind section before moving to the plodding bass line once more.

• The third movement takes the form of a graceful minuet, with a long, flowing melody in the violins soaring above the orchestra. A stately trio section is then ushered in by a fanfare in the bassoons and horns, which is answered by the trumpets and strings in alternation before concluding with a restatement of the opening minuet.

• It is in the joyous finale that Mendelssohn writes his most distinctly “Italian” music, which is based around two Italian folk dances. The movement begins with a lively saltarello, a Roman dance, which Mendelssohn brings to life with skittering melodies in the strings, accompanied by leaping figures in the low voices. The piece concludes with an equally energetic Neopolitan tarantella, bringing an end to what Mendelssohn himself describes as the

“jolliest piece I have ever done.”

YUE BAO, CONDUCTOR

Conductor Yue Bao serves as the Ting Tsung and Wei Fong Chao Foundation Assistant Conductor of the Houston Symphony, assisting Music Director Juraj Valčuha. In May 2019, she completed a two-year tenure as the Rita E. Hauser Conducting Fellow at the Curtis Institute of Music, working closely with Yannick Nézet-Séguin. She has been active as both a conductor and assistant, working with conductors Andrés Orozco-Estrada, Michael Tilson Thomas, Osmo Vänskä, Esa-Pekka Salonen, Marin Alsop, David Robertson, and Itzhak Perlman.

Yue made her subscription debut with the Houston Symphony on the opening night concert of the 2020-21 Season, and conducted the orchestra for its 2021 summer concert series at Miller Outdoor Theatre. She made her Chicago Symphony Orchestra debut at the 2021 Ravinia Festival. Highlights of this season include debuts with the San Francisco Symphony and the Detroit Symphony Orchestra.

Yue was the Bruno Walter Memorial Foundation Conducting Fellow at the Cabrillo Festival of Contemporary Music in 2019. In 2018, she served as the David Effron Conducting Fellow at the Chautauqua Music Festival, where her concerts with the Festival Orchestra received accolades from audiences and musicians.

In 2019, she toured China with the Vienna Philharmonic, assisting Andrés OrozcoEstrada. She served as an assistant for the Buffalo Philharmonic Orchestra under JoAnn Falletta and David Lockington, making her conducting debut with the orchestra in 2016. She has also assisted Osmo Vänskä at the Minnesota Orchestra and Gilbert Varga at the St. Louis Symphony. Recent appearances include the Shanghai Opera Symphony Orchestra, the Xiamen Philharmonic Orchestra, and the New Symphony Orchestra. Equally at home with symphonic and operatic repertoire, she has conducted Tchaikovsky’s Eugene Onegin, Bizet’s Carmen, Kurt Weill’s Mahagonny: Ein Songspiel, and Gian Carlo Menotti’s The Medium. She is also active as a pianist, recently playing for a production of Les contes d’Hoffmann at the National Centre for the Performing Arts in Beijing. Along with her artist diploma from The Curtis Institute of Music, Yue holds bachelor's degrees in orchestral conducting and opera accompanying from the Shanghai Conservatory of Music and a master's degree in orchestral conducting from the Mannes School of Music.

Featured Program

DISTANT WORLDS: MUSIC FROM FINAL FANTASY

Friday July 22 7:30 p.m. Hobby Center Saturday July 23 7:30 p.m. Hobby Center

Arnie Roth, conductor

Houston Symphony Chorus,

Emily Hobson, choral preparation

Program to be announced from the stage SUMMER SERIES

About the MUSIC

DISTANT WORLDS: MUSIC FROM FINAL FANTASY

• Final Fantasy is one of the oldest and most consistently released massive multiplayer role-playing games. It was first released in 1987. • Composer Nobuo Uematsu wrote the “Crystal Theme” as a last-minute addition to the original Final Fantasy, which took him only 10 minutes to create.

• The whimsical “Crystal Theme” is arguably the most iconic piece of music from Final Fantasy. The simple melody is used throughout the series and layered on top of fanfares and choruses in opening scenes, credits, menus, and while saving the game. • The game’s director and character designer Tetsuya Nomura briefly considered turning Final Fantasy XV into a musical. • One of the most iconic characters, Cloud Strife, also appears in Super

Smash Bros.

PROGRAM BIO

ARNIE ROTH, CONDUCTOR

A classically trained violinist, conductor, composer, producer, and Grammy Award-winning artist, Arnie Roth performs across a wide array of musical genres. He has performed with a host of artists and is a long-time member of the Grammy-winning group Mannheim Steamroller. He has conducted leading orchestras throughout North America, Europe, and Australia and brought critical acclaim to the Chicagoland Pops Orchestra as music director and principal conductor. Under his direction, that orchestra appeared in a nationally broadcast PBS special featuring The Irish Tenors. Arnie was music director and conductor of the national concert tour “Dear Friends: music from FINAL FANTASY.” He conducted “VOICES: music from FINAL FANTASY” with the Tokyo Philharmonic, then became principal conductor and music director of PLAY! A Video Game Symphony featuring music from blockbuster video games. As producer and music director, Arnie premiered Distant Worlds: music from FINAL FANTASY in 2007 with the Royal Stockholm