The players first
The first useful line in Braunschweig’s La La Land programme is the personnel: the Braunschweig State Orchestra under Erik Ochsner, alongside a jazz ensemble. Justin Hurwitz’s score meets the projected film through those live forces. A familiar song such as City of Stars returns to its position within a complete screening. The arrangement of the evening interests me before the fame of an individual number.[1]
Orchestra director Verena Rast says the classical orchestra and jazz band each bring their own sound culture. That identifies a concrete working condition. Listing both forces gives different performance practices a place in the accompaniment. The programme establishes the choice to make two ensembles performers of one film score; it offers no basis for a judgment about how the new performance actually sounds.[1]
The decision also defines the opening’s scale. The November 9 screening at Volkswagen Halle marks the festival’s 40th edition and the film’s 10th anniversary. The film is presented in English with German subtitles; its lyrics are by Benj Pasek and Justin Paul. Images, words and live instruments carry different tasks within the evening. To my reading, the programme’s strength lies in naming the forces responsible for the accompaniment.[1]
The image’s timing
A basic constraint of live film music is that the image carries its own timing. The orchestra and jazz band’s shared accompaniment therefore raises a question about how musical flow meets the film, beyond simply placing musicians together. That is a working question I draw from the announced forces. A competing explanation is that the selection primarily serves an anniversary opening with a familiar title rather than a musical experiment. Either reading requires attention to the named ensembles.[1]
La La Land’s 6 Oscars and 14 nominations supply historical context for the evening. An award count cannot measure the accompaniment’s performance. The useful comparison is between the music’s place in the film and how live forces carry that place. Where the orchestra and jazz ensemble leave room for each other becomes a concrete musical question for this format.[1]
I return from the named work to the named forces: Hurwitz’s music, Ochsner’s conducting and Braunschweig’s combination of orchestra and jazz musicians. The festival’s choice makes the performers visible as it brings film music into a concert programme. For a listener, there is value in placing the ensemble carrying a familiar melody alongside the melody’s name.[1]