Rochester Philharmonic Orchestra STAR WARS Goes on Sale May The Fourth

The Rochester Philharmonic Orchestra (RPO) will put tickets on sale to the general public on May 4th for Star Wars: A New Hope, Film Live With Orchestra at Rochester's Auditorium Theatre (885 E. Main St.) on January 3, 2024, at 7:30 PM. Tickets start at $34 and will be available at 10 AM on May 4, 2023, by phone at (585) 222-5000 or online at www.ticketmaster.com.

"When we talked about an on-sale date for this Special Concert, we knew it had to be May the Fourth," says RPO VP of Marketing & Communications Herb Griffith. "So far, this 23-24 Special has been available to subscribers only, but we decided to open it up to the public earlier than the rest of our Centennial Season concerts, which go on sale August 7th."

Eastman School of Music's Director of the Beal Institute for Film Music and Contemporary Media, Mark Watters, will conduct the concert. The six-time Emmy Award-winner - who also heads Eastman's Contemporary Media and Film Scoring graduate program - has conducted three tours of Star Wars in Concert, including with the Tokyo Philharmonic.

While the complete film plays in HD on a giant screen above the orchestra onstage, the RPO will perform legendary composer John Williams' Oscar-winning musical score live. In 2005, the American Film Institute selected it as the greatest American film score of all time, and the soundtrack was preserved by the Library of Congress in the National Recording Registry for being "culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant." Williams has won five Academy Awards, four Golden Globe Awards, seven British Academy Film Awards, five Emmy Awards and 23 Grammy Awards. With 51 Academy Award nominations, Williams is the Academy's most nominated living person and the second most-nominated individual in history, after Walt Disney.

Star Wars: Episode IV - A New Hope is the first of the series' films to be released in 1977, titled simply Star Wars at the time. (Later, it became the fourth chronological chapter of the "Skywalker Saga.") A young Luke Skywalker (Mark Hamill) begins to discover his destiny when, searching for a lost droid, he is saved by reclusive Jedi Obi-Wan Kenobi (Alec Guinness). As a civil war rages in the galaxy and Rebel forces struggle against the evil Galactic Empire, Luke and Obi-Wan enlist the aid of hotshot pilot, Han Solo (Harrison Ford). Joined by the quirky droid duo R2-D2 (Kenneth Baker) and C-3PO (Anthony Daniels), the unlikely team sets out to rescue Rebel leader Princess Leia (Carrie Fisher) and make use of the stolen plans to destroy the Empire's ultimate weapon. In a legendary confrontation, the rogue group mounts an attack against the Death Star for a climactic battle with the evil Sith Lord Darth Vader (James Earl Jones).

The Star Wars: Film Concert Series is produced under license by Disney Concerts in association with 20th Century Fox and Warner/Chappell Music. STAR WARS and related properties are trademarks and/or copyrights, in the United States and other countries, of Lucasfilm Ltd. and/or its affiliates. © & TM

The RPO thanks Season Sponsor M&T Bank, Pops Series Sponsors Canandaigua National Bank & Wegmans, and Special Series Sponsor Pittsford Federal Credit Union. RPO performances are made possible by the New York State Council on the Arts with the support of Governor Kathy Hochul and the New York State Legislature. The RPO is supported in part by an American Rescue Plan Act grant from the National Endowment for the Arts to support general operating expenses in response to the COVID-19 pandemic.

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