NSO presents Notes & Frames: 'Metropolis' Full Film with Organ

• Cameron Carpenter, organ

Surreal, sprawling, and operatic, Fritz Lang's 1927 science-fiction silent film depicts a world in which the privileged live in luxury on the surface, while deep in the bowels of the city an unseen underclass labors on machinery that supports the Metropolis. Grammy–nominated organist Cameron Carpenter performs his original score perfectly suited to the industrial, stylistic backdrop of this deeply influential pulp masterpiece. 

Please note: the NSO does not perform on this program.

About Notes & Frames: A Film & Music Festival

The NSO's 2024–2025 Classical season closes in June with a three-week festival exploring the overlap between film music and concert music, June 4–21, 2025. In the first, the NSO will present a program led by Teddy Abrams and two live-to-film concerts: Amadeus live with orchestra and Metropolis featuring organist Cameron Carpenter's original score to Fritz Lang's 1927 science-fiction silent film. The second week James Gaffigan will conduct film scores by Bernstein, Rota, and Shostakovich and concertos by James Newton Howard featuring violinist James Ehnes, Michael Abels with an NSO string quartet, and John Williams with NSO Principal Horn Abel Pereira as soloist. The final week of the festival culminates in a world premiere by Academy Award–winning director, composer, and pianist Kris Bowers (The Last Repair Shop, Green Book, King Richard, and The Color Purple) who will curate and perform a program of contemporary film music to be conducted by Anthony Parnther.

About Cameron Carpenter, organ

Organist and composer Cameron Carpenter — who has performed across the United States and Europe as a chorister, accompanist, and keyboard soloist — was the first organist nominated for a Grammy, for the album Revolutionary (Telarc, 2008). He premiered his first concerto for organ and orchestra, The Scandal, Op. 3, in 2011 with the Deutsche Kammerphilharmonie Bremen at the Cologne Philharmonie. He also premiered Terry Riley's organ concerto, At The Royal Majestic, in Los Angeles, reprising it in Geneva and Berlin.