Last night, Jen and I went to the "Distant Worlds: Music from Final Fantasy" concert. Jen was quite miserable when we got there from bring sick, but I think she started feeling better once the music started. ^_^;;

I'm not going to recount everything they played, but I went into the concert without knowing what would be on the playlist (even though the did have a concert in Stockholm, Sweden in December, and it's listed on the website), but after doing some counting my reaction at Intermission was "ok, they're missing 4, 6, and 11."

They all did show up in the second half, including the "Memoro de la S'tono" from FFXI with the choir backing and a soprano soloist. "Theme of Love" from FF4 showed up soon enough too. And so I'm sitting there thinking... "so, what about 6?"

Then Arnie Roth made the announcement that they were doing "Maria and Draco", the opera scene. OMG did my eyes light up like a kid on Christmas morning. That alone would have made the concert worth seeing, because I've always wanted to see it. There were 3 opera singers for the parts, too, and somehow the women's voice actually sounded quite reminiscent of the synthesizer sound from the game. But it was just AMAZING! And in the lead-up to it, Arnie announced that not only have The Black Mages just finished recording another CD (note to self: buy them all), but they've recorded "Maria and Draco" for it. Can't wait to hear that.

After they finshed, Arnie Roth runs off-stage to mass applause, then comes out like 20 seconds later to say that was the last piece, and they're going to do one encore. Some guys shouts out "One Winged Angel!" And after some joking around, Arnie announces Terra's Theme.

However, the choir was on stage the entire 2nd half. Everyone knew there was a reason for that. So after they finished Terra's Theme, Arnie went back off stage to be accompanied back about 30 seconds later by Nobuo Uematsu-san himself. After much bowing, Nobuo told him to do one more, and we got "One Winged Angel."

All in all, a wonderful concert. I wish we hadn't been at all sick and were able to fully make a night of it (dinner and what-not), but I think it was still enjoyable in the end. I especially loved the performance of the FF6 Opera, and the Swing de Chocobo arrangement.