Orchestra Hero

[steuard]

A month or two ago, Kim and I started playing Rock Band; it's a lot of fun. I've mostly been playing drums, in part because I've always been a little interested and in part on the theory that the skills there could transfer reasonably well to the real instrument. Better than the guitar, anyway!

I began to wonder if someone would eventually create "Orchestra Hero" so I could indulge my love of classical music, too. Kim and I spotted some significant difficulties, like:

• Shorter songs are good for game play, so rock works well but classical less so. Playing through a single piece (or even a single movement) could take up a whole game session. And how obnoxious would it be when the clarinetist "fails out" ten bars before the end of Beethoven's 9th?
• Rock band requires just three or four controllers for a standard rock setup, while to field an orchestra you'd need at least a dozen. Sure, not everyone would need to buy every controller, but it still fragments the market for those items. (And if you did get a dozen friends together to play, how would you show all the parts on the TV screen?)
• While a lot of people might end up enjoying Orchestra Hero, many fewer would think they'd enjoy it: the market just isn't there. (Related is the point that one fun thing about Rock Band/Guitar Hero is getting to play songs you already know. Fewer people know a wide range of orchestral music.)

By the end of that conversation, I felt disappointed to realize that Orchestra Hero probably wouldn't ever happen, but I moved on.

So it was a bit of a surprise to see an article on the NY Times website today entitled "Orchestra Hero". The article isn't actually all that great (the author spends half his time talking about his composing, which has pretty much zilch to do with the topic), and it doesn't really touch on any of those difficulties or suggest ways to overcome them, but it's still neat to see other people considering the idea.

It's made me start wondering if something like this could actually work. There are lots of classical CDs with titles like "20 Romantic Classics" or "Bach's Greatest Hits" that pick out short, well-known pieces, so maybe length isn't such a big concern if you're willing to give up playing full symphonies. You could reduce the number of controllers by combining similar instruments (e.g. one controller design might work as a clarinet, oboe, and even flute). Maybe someone will eventually create Orchestra Hero after all.

Comments

[steuard.livejournal.com]

I've yet to read any Lemony Snicket. I take it the books are good?

I think a full keyboard would be much more complicated than the other instruments, but any simplified model would just leave out too much. (Part of the problem is that it would inevitably look like a piano without enough keys: sort of the "uncanny valley" of musical instruments.)

The software in Rock Band is designed specifically to play all the parts unless 1) a player is actively in charge of one part and 2) they screw up. That should transfer over fine.

Marketing would indeed be hilarious. Also, Rock Band has features where you can pay for new and better clothes for your characters, or new haircuts, or other things to define their style. That would be amusing for a formal orchestra: "You unlocked new cuff links!" "A London cummerbund is now in your closet!"

Different instruments would simplify more or less faithfully, much as in Rock Band. The tympani would be close to identical (but smaller?). The trumpet would presumably have exactly the right fingering but omit the actual lip buzzing (and omit subtleties like fine-tuning pitch with finger slides). The violin would be extremely simplified, like the guitar is now; I think the woodwinds would be similarly stripped down.

I, too, would pay good money to see "Piccolo Hero", as long as I wasn't the one stuck trying to look like the hero. (But I think the piccolo would end up left out of Orchestra Hero entirely.)

[ukelele.livejournal.com]

They are totally excellent, though I admit to not having finished them all. _Composer_ isn't part of his children's series, but that's good too, what I've read of it.

I like the uncanny valley of instruments idea. Hee :). Now I have a vision of a piano staring at me, with eyes just a little too shiny.

New cufflinks! A *blacker* dress! Ha. Awesome. (Although concertmasters and soloists can wear some actually interesting clothes...)