NY Phil Announces Spring Film Programs

The New York Philharmonic will present three film music programs in May 2016: a complete screening of Charlie Chaplin's City Lights, May 19, 2016, with the Orchestra performing Chaplin's score live, conducted by Timothy Brock, who restored the score for live performance; Disney Fantasia Live in Concert, May 20-21, 2016, in honor of Fantasia's 75th anniversary, in which scenes from Fantasia and Fantasia 2000 will be screened as the Orchestra performs the music live, led by Assistant Conductor Joshua Gersen; and the Spring Gala, A John Williams Celebration, May 24, 2016, with the Orchestra performing music from the Oscar-winning film composer's iconic scores, led by David Newman, along with clips from select films.

Chaplin composed the City Lights score (with the exception of "la Violetera," by Jose? Padilla), and the music was arranged and orchestrated by Arthur Johnston and Alfred Newman. Chaplin wrote in My Autobiography (1964): "One happy thing about sound was that I could control the music, so I composed my own. I tried to compose elegant and romantic music to frame my comedies in contrast to the tramp character, for elegant music gave my comedies an emotional dimension." The Philharmonic presented Chaplin's Modern Times and his 1914 short film Kid Auto Races at Venice in September 2014 to celebrate the centennial of the character he invented, The Little Tramp, as part of the second annual THE ART OF THE SCORE: Film Week at the Philharmonic, conducted by Timothy Brock. The program will be presented Thursday, May 19, 2016, at 7:00 p.m.

Disney Fantasia Live in Concert will feature scenes from Fantasia and Fantasia 2000 along with live performances of the music, including selections from Beethoven's Symphony No. 5; Beethoven's Symphony No. 6, Pastoral; Tchaikovsky's The Nutcracker Suite; Debussy's Clair de lune; Stravinsky's The Firebird Suite (1919 version); Ponchielli's Dance of the Hours; Dukas's The Sorcerer's Apprentice; and Elgar's Pomp and Circumstance. The program will be presented Friday, May 20, 2016, at 7:00 p.m.; Saturday, May 21, 2016, at 1:00 p.m.; and Saturday, May 21, 2016, at 7:00 p.m.

The New York Philharmonic's Spring Gala, A John Williams Celebration, will feature David Newman leading the Orchestra in music from the Oscar-winning film composer's iconic scores from Close Encounters of the Third Kind, Jane Eyre, Memoirs of a Geisha, Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone, Jaws, Born on the Fourth of July, Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade, Schindler's List, Star Wars Episode VII: The Force Awakens, and Star Wars, along with clips from select films. The program opens with For New York, variations on themes by Philharmonic Laureate Conductor Leonard Bernstein, and takes place Tuesday, May 24, 2016, at 7:30 p.m.