“You’ve heard of the Ben Folds Five,” writes Scott Mervis in Thursday’s (2/11) Pittsburgh Post-Gazette. “On Saturday at Heinz Hall, it will be more like the Ben Folds 95, when the adaptable pianist takes the stage with the Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra as his ‘rock band.’ Although this will be his first gig with the PSO, his orchestral bookings date back to 2005, when the nerd-rock icon was invited to front the Western Australian Symphony, and soon after made his U.S. orchestral debut with the Baltimore Symphony. Since then he has performed with symphonies across the world, perfecting the scores as he goes along.” Ben Folds comments, “We don’t go in and bring a rock band that they’re supposed to play pretty whole notes over while we drown them out. They are the rock band and they’ve been arranged in such a manner. And the thing is, the orchestra grooves. Orchestras groove, they have a different groove, but they groove and I’ve put quite a bit of time in the last six, eight years revising charts and going over things with conductors and going more than halfway to the orchestra.”
Posted February 11, 2010
