In between the Bach, Elgar, and Aaron Copland, Youth Orchestras of San Antonio (YOSA) occasionally finds time to perform arrangements of popular songs. You can see some of their videos on YouTube. Now conductor Troy Peters is arranging all of Radiohead’s seminal album OK Computer for orchestra, and they’re going to perform it on Saturday night at the Tobin Center with nearly a dozen local singers and bands.
"Radiohead’s music lends itself to orchestra because they think like composers. It has all kinds of layers of color and rhythm that are built into it that are really fun to explore when you have 65 musicians onstage," says Troy Peters, conductor of the YOSA Philharmonic.
Nicolette Good is one of the local acts that will be joining YOSA at the Tobin. She says she signed up for the project immediately when Peters approached her with the idea.
"People remember where they were when we landed on the moon… I remember where I was when I first heard OK Computer," Good says. "Getting to share not only a stage with musicians I admire and respect, but the Tobin Stage, was a pretty easy sell!"
Nina Diaz, Demitasse, the Lavens, Femina X, and Jaime Ramirez are among the acts that will be joining YOSA onstage to recreate OK Computer live.
To help them pull off the gig, YOSA launched a Kickstarter page. The show’s going to happen no matter what, Peters says. But if the Kickstarter campaign is successful, Peters says that means "more of the revenue can benefit YOSA musicians. Because the point of this concert—besides great music—is to give us funds to offer financial aid to bring more kids into YOSA who can’t afford to be part of what we do."
That means more young lives changed through the power of music and YOSA’s eight ensemble programs.
Performance info: Saturday, June 27, 8pm, at the Tobin Center for the Peforming Arts.
Below: Video of Demitasse performing with a YOSA string trio at the studios of News4SanAntonio.
Hear all of Radiohead's original album, OK Computer, via Spotify:
