The London Soundtrack Festival made a bold move last year, with its event in March. They chose to do The Silence of the Lambs, which has a score by Howard Shore, with a live orchestra. Since then, the production has returned multiple times, with fans of the movie praising the live experience as a way to reinvent the movie.
Live Orchestras Create an Experience that Cannot be Replicated
Live orchestras encourage audiences’ feelings, rather than just listening. From the opening scene, where Clarice Starling pushes through mud, climbs over ropes, and claws her way through the training exercise, the orchestra’s low woodwinds create a sense of atmosphere. Fixed recordings simply can’t replicate this, and when you consider the fact that live performances introduce variation, it helps to create an experience unlike any other. What you are hearing exists in the room, at that time, for that audience. When it’s gone, it’s gone, as even the most rehearsed orchestras have some slight variation in performance, and that’s what makes it special.
It’s not just cinema that we are seeing more live experiences in, either. Other verticals are gravitating towards live moments, as they not only make experiences more immersive, but they also cannot be replicated, meaning that each is as unique as the next. Take live museum tours, for example. A tour guide may do the same tour multiple times a day, but they are all in their own way slightly different.
Experimental dining is another example, with restaurants like Ultraviolet by Paul Pairet pairing menus with narrative performances to make each dining session more unique and interactive. The human touch shapes the experience. In other verticals, like iGaming, blackjack games at a live casino feature live dealers, who deal the cards and interact with the player. Although digital versions exist, the live touch helps to craft immersive experiences that cannot be replicated ever again. It’s unique to the moment, which makes it more human. Examples like this show how important that human touch is, and in the instance of The Silence of the Lambs, it’s made cinematic history.
Could More Movies Be Done with a Live Orchestra?
The fact that The Silence of the Lambs was such a huge success with the live orchestra, and that it has come back multiple times since the film festival, shows that this could well become a trend. Not only do live orchestras give older movies the chance to come back with a revitalised purpose, but they also allow new movies to be shown in a more immersive way. In The Silence of the Lambs, the score put the focus on Clarice, rather than Lecter, which helped to give the movie a whole new dynamic, even for people who have seen the original multiple times. By changing the audience’s experience, movies like this can continue their cultural impact.
Howard Shore has composed the score for multiple movies over the years and has even won Oscars and Grammys. His work on Se7en, The Departed, and The Aviator also stands out, but with that said, this movement is about so much more than The Silence of the Lambs. It’s a testament to how much potential there is for movies to be shown like this in the future.