Watch a 160-Piece Virtual Orchestra Perform Iron Maiden’s ‘Fear of the Dark’
All the metal bands that revere Iron Maiden have undoubtedly had a rough past year without many live, in-person gigs. But what about classical musicians? They’ve felt the pinch of the pandemic as much as any other concert performers, and, hey, they like Iron Maiden, too!
That’s why Ulf Wadenbrandt, conductor of the Sweden Symphony Orchestra and principal guest conductor for the Russian Philharmonic Orchestra, decided to symphonically adapt Maiden’s “Fear of the Dark,” pandemic-style — with around 160 musicians performing the song mostly virtually.
Watch the video down toward the bottom of this post.
The musicians involved in the performance include those from Germany’s Dortmund Philharmonic, New Zealand’s Christchurch Symphony Orchestra as well as players from Argentina, Brazil, China, Norway, Russia, Spain and Sweden. Wadenbrandt says he “gathered everyone from absolutely world-class musicians and excellent music teachers to talented amateurs and students from music and cultural schools from all over the world.”
Indeed, due to the pandemic, of which Wadenbrandt speaks in the video, it’s “very hard to do music together and play in front of you, the audience, so I have put together around 160 musicians, fantastic musicians, around the world to do one song for you. As you heard, ‘Fear of the Dark’ [by] the great band Iron Maiden. We have done it symphonic, and it sounds really, really great.”
He continues, “We want to show the world how important music is to everybody. And we hope that the world and the venues and the audience will come to us very soon.”
“Fear of the Dark” is the title track from Iron Maiden’s 1992 album of the same name. It was the last studio effort from the iconic English rockers to feature current singer Bruce Dickinson on lead vocals before the musician’s 1993-1999 absence. (He first joined the group in 1981.)