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Tina Sawyer: Hearing atmospheric music is what we expect to hear as we look to the skies in a planetarium, but live music creates an even more immersive experience.
The upcoming event, Music Under the Stars, at the Delta College Planetarium, will feature musicians from the Saginaw Bay Symphony Orchestra. The unique soundtrack will feature The Planets by Gustav Holtz and also Mozart's Jupiter Symphony, music from the film Twilight: New Moon, and Song Under the Stars.
Both shows on Saturday are sold out, but WCMU's David Nicholas spoke with Cameron Massey, executive director of the Saginaw Bay Symphony Orchestra, and Michael Murray, astronomer and manager of the planetarium, to learn how the collaboration came together.
David Nicholas: Who created this animation and when it was made, was it designed to be presented in this immersive way with musicians playing along with it live?
Cameron Massey: As far as I know, the animations themselves are not bespoke created for this event, but they are sourced by Mike Murray at the Delta College Planetarium. He handles all of the animations and projections in the back area, and I think he tweaks some of them so that they fit better in the immersive dome theater, but they're not created specifically for this show.
DN: In selecting then these pieces or portions of the pieces that will be played, how much time do the musicians have? How is that brought together or arranged, I guess would be the best way to put it. If you think about an arrangement like this, how is that done?
CM: It's sort of like choreography, having a dance that is timed to the music, whereas the animations, the projections themselves, are the dance. So the music is a constant. The music is kind of the baseline, and then Mike Murray will be in the projection booth where he's got his computer set up and he is timing the animations so that they go in with the music.
So, whenever there is a major thematic change in the music or if the music, you know, has a crescendo or comes to a peak in the tonality of it, he will switch or transition to a different piece of animation to fit that music. They have one rehearsal where they get to rehearse with the animations, but everything before that is just private practice.
DN: That's Cameron Massey, executive director of the Saginaw Bay Symphony Orchestra. I also caught up with Michael Murray. He's an astronomer, and manager of the Delta College Planetarium.
So if I understand then, editing from other presentations, other shows, and kind of now coming up with a totally new arrangement of the visual that now can be joined with the music, is that what I understand?
Michael Murray: That's correct, and a lot of the 3D immersive content, some of it was created by digital artists from around the world. So, I tapped into a lot of different sources. And yes, some comes from shows, but a lot of it is original content created by artists.
DN: One of the pieces is The Planets by Gustav Holst, so we have several to choose from then in terms of the imagery, and then the reintroduction of Jupiter from that Symphony Number 41 by Mozart. So I'm guessing we have appearances by most of, some of, all of the planets, and what other then stars kind of become some of the mix.
MM: So yeah, in fact, it's a real visual variety. Yes, certain things are astronomical, and when you're doing some pieces like Jupiter from Gustav Holst, then clearly you can expect to see Jupiter in some of that, but there are so many other fantastic immersive visuals of outer space, but also art. And there are other artistic, surrealistic landscapes, spacescapes, but then you can even get into some other forms like mathematical fractals and other abstract art. So there's quite a variety of visualizations that take place.
TS: Michael Murray is the manager of the Delta College Planetarium, and Cameron Massey is the executive director of the Saginaw Bay Symphony Orchestra. They spoke with WCMU's David Nicholas.
