The London Games Festival is now on across the capital bringing hordes of teenagers (they’re mostly teenagers) out of their bedrooms to gawp at the latest shoot ‘em ups and fantasy sagas. But don’t dismiss video games as just another way for kids to waste their precious youth – the medium is actually inspiring the creation of a new symphonic sound for the digital age, bringing classical music into the scope of pop-culture consciousness. Video game soundtracks, performed by classically trained musicians, are breaking into the Billboard Top Ten. Meanwhile, children around the world are performing renditions of their favourite video game music by learning piano, guitar and violin. Rob Crossley reports from Video Games Live in Los Angeles.

The floor of the Nokia Theatre in Los Angeles trembled as a 110-person orchestra burst into life with that unmistakable balance of power and finesse that classical music is renowned for.

Professionally trained percussionists and a sweeping string section fed off the energy of composer Russell Brower as intense beams of light fell across the ensemble. Yet, had you momentarily broken your gaze from the spectacle, there was one thing that seemed out of place.

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This time to check music’s beating heart, we have Jonathan Lennie from Time Out spilling the beans with his take on various albums, events and even the Big O (meaning Opera), that you may want to treat your eyes and ears to over the next week.

For Your Playlist: Choral symphonies, we’re gonna need a bigger stage
The Gig: Classical Music in Pubs
The CD to buy
The Composer Anniversary: Frederick Delius (1862 – 1934)
The Event: The Big Gig: The Ring Cycle

Choral symphonies: We’re gonna need a bigger stage

Not to be confused with oratorios or operas, the choral symphony is defined by the choir being incorporated into the structure of the orchestral work, rather than just taking its turn.

Beethoven’s Ninth (1823)

The original, first heard in 1824, broke the symphonic rules by including a choral finale. Ending with the words of Schiller’s ‘Ode to Joy’, it is easily the best known and still the greatest in this genre.

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(The Philharmonia Orchestra, Chorus and soloists under Esa-Pekka Salonen perform Beethoven’s Ninth Symphony (‘Choral’) at London’s Royal Festival Hall on Sept 27.)

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So the Proms is over for another year, waving its jaunty Union Flag and blowing party poppers in celebration. Our undercover reporter was there for many of the concerts, not least the last. Only the Brits could have dreamed up the ticket allocation but as he say, it works and everyone whose lucky enough to join the fun, has a ball.

‘The concert’s the least important part of the day,’ one Prommer told me as another champagne cork flew across the South Steps of the Royal Albert Hall. I know what he means: for all the controversy over dubious notions of jingoism and the Guardian-reader’s typical horror at the thought of Britannia ruling the waves, the Last Night of the Proms is our end-of-term jolly, our chance to let (what’s left of) our hair down for a night of undiluted musical fun. And, despite the poopers, the party starts early.

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Our undercover Prommer reports from the floor, climbs up to the lofty heights of the Albert Hall and feels the intense vibrations from Jupiter, the Hall’s grand organ, at full tilt with an array of bells and bass drum. And later ponders on the meaning of silence against the softly dying shimmer of a gong and tam-tam…

Copyright BBC / Chris Christodoulou

Much as we Prommers love our Hall – our home for the summer months – there’s one angel in the architecture that barely gets a mention. Which is ironic, since we stand staring at her all through the concerts. She’s called ‘The Voice of Jupiter’, the largest organ in the country. And yet all we usually hear of her is as an accompaniment to some choral numbers or as a bolster for the rousing climaxes of orchestral works by Elgar, Tchaik and the like. Organ recitals tend to be apologetic affairs (and organists are uniquely adept at concocting excuses for why nobody turns up to their concerts).

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