ASCAP Film Composers Present Series of Concerts at the Film Music Festival of Krakow, Poland

Tan Dun rehearsing in the Blonia Fields, one of the concert sites Photographer: P. Ksiazek Source: Krakow Festival Office Archives

The second edition of the Film Music Festival of Krakow took place in May, 2009 and featured several prominent ASCAP composers who performed music from their films. The Festival is entirely dedicated to music created for cinema, and includes both film retrospectives and exclusive gala concerts. This year's festival featured the music of Ramin Djawadi, Tan Dun, Reinhold Heil and Johnny Klimek, along with their long-time collaborator, director/composer Tom Tykwer, Howard Shore and Jan A.P. Kaczmarek. SGAE composer and conductor Diego Navarro, music director of the Fumicite Film Music Festival in Tenerife, Canary Islands, conducted suites from several films, and renowned Swiss conductor Ludwig Wicki conducted the entire score from Shore's Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers, with film, in the famous Blonia Fields of Krakow. The concerts were performed by several local ensembles, including the Sinfonietta Cracovia, the Polish Radio Choir, the Krakow Philharmonic Orchestra, and the Choir Pro Musica Mundi.

Five concerts were held during the three-day festival, and attracted an audience of more than twenty thousand film music fans from throughout Poland and other European countries.

ASCAP's Nancy Knutsen was invited to address representatives of the Polish music industry, film industry and copyright management organizations, and spoke about various developments and perspectives of the American film music industry.