Last Saturday I attended Symphonic Anime 2024. Unsure what pieces from which series would be performed, but knowing with high probability I will NOT recognize all the tracks, I kept an open mind.
Me and Anime
If you've been following my blogs for some time, then you know that I watch anime. I don't consider myself a hardcore fan, but I'm not a casual fan either. I'm somewhere in between. I sometimes watch popular series but sometimes I don't. To this day I still haven't watched some "staples" like Ranma 1/2, Fushigi Yuugi, or Inuyasha. I generally just watch what piques my interest or sometimes what has been recommended to me by friends. And I have no problems watching series that have over 100 episodes if the episode length makes sense.
Some of my favourite anime series include Mushi-Shi, Black Lagoon, Parasyte Maxim, 86, Nodame Cantabile, Azumanga Daioh, Chihayafuru, Yu Yu Hakusho, Death Note, and of course, One Piece (I've been a fan of One Piece for over 20 years). Really, I could go on... XD
For anybody curious, below is my MyAnimeList page, where I keep track of all the anime I've watched. These days I usually don't add an entry until I've finished the series completely or I drop it. My manga section is very out of date.
The Little Details
Date of Concert: September 7, 2024
Venue: Meridian Hall (Toronto, Ontario)
Time: 7:30 PM
Ticket Price Total: $69.69 (general admission)
Seating: Balcony 6, Aisle 4, Row G, Seat 55
Went With: My boyfriend and my sister
6:45-ish PM @ Meridian Hall
When my boyfriend, my sister, and I got to Meridian Hall, I was expecting a line to the front entrance. Instead we scanned our tickets and got inside right away. I was also expecting our bags to be checked and we'd be told to throw out our water bottles, but that didn't happen either.
I was glad because I needed my water attached to me at all times. I recovered from COVID but still had a lingering cough and having no water would have made me stressed and anxious to no end. I also did not want to pay $4 for water, which was the price at the bar inside the hall. My boyfriend was thinking about getting beer but the $14 price tag was a bit ridiculous.
I looked around for a merch table but sadly I didn't find one. I was hoping to at least get something to commemorate the event, like a nicely designed programme booklet or a pin / button. I did, however, find papers taped on the pillars and auditorium doors stating that no photos and video recordings were allowed.
While we were waiting for the doors to the auditorium to open, we were guessing what series would be on the setlist. For a concert featuring anime music as a whole, I was thinking they would likely prioritize pieces from series that may not be seen by everybody but could be familiar with a large number of people. Our guesses were (a couple were wishful thinkings):
-One Piece
-Attack on Titan
-Demon Slayer
-Sailor Moon
-Pokemon
-Naruto
-Dragon Ball
-something from Hayao Miyazaki (I specifically guessed My Neighbor Totoro)
-Frieren
-Jujutsu Kaisen
-Death Note
-Full Moon wo Sagashite
-Evangelion
The auditorium doors opened around 7:15 PM.
7:30-ish PM -- Music START!!
When the lights started dimming, the audience started cheering. The emcee came on stage and spoke for a few minutes, encouraging us to give our energy (or "chakra") to pieces and series we liked.
The conductor then came onstage and seconds later the auditorium exploded with choir voices, drums, and brass. An image of Death Note with the subtitle "Death Note Theme / Death Note" showed on the screen above the orchestra. The audience cheered, including me. It was a great track to open the concert.
A few minutes later, I noticed that the subtitle changed to "Low of Solipsism / Death Note". A thought crossed my mind -- I have to write this down! It would save me so much time when I blog about it later if I had the setlist down right now. I whispered to my boyfriend, asking if he had a notebook I could write with. He said no. I turned on my phone and my boyfriend covered the screen with his hand, saying it was too bright. I lowered the brightness and wrote down "Death Note theme" in my "Notes" app. Not wanting to keep track of the setlist this way, I asked my sister if she had a notebook I could write on, and she handed me a small notepad. It was difficult to write in the dark, but I managed for the most part.
Why did I not want to keep track of the setlist on my phone? Because I was crappily recording the concert. Like what I do at previous concerts I record the tracks for my own personal use. And by personal use, it's mainly so I can put together a setlist when I blog or cross-check that the recording matches the tracks when I put together a playlist on Spotify. Sometimes the track names are in Japanese on Spotify and if I can't find out what the Japanese track name is supposed to be, I listen through each one until I find one that matches the recording. Recording this way has never stopped me from attending any future concerts, because I intentionally record it crappily. The recordings will always pale in comparison to the live experience.
After the Death Note pieces, the conductor talked about Kira in Death Note as a type of anti-hero. He also said that the next pieces will stick to the theme of heroes in anime. Then he hinted that the next series has something to do with grails. Ooo, I thought. Fate!
It was "To the Beginning" from Fate/Zero. The strings sounded very beautiful. It also brought back a lot of memories -- of chasing Akai Ryusei from Active NEETs and TAM that one year when they were guests for a couple anime conventions in Canada (looking back, I hope I wasn't too annoying to them! ^^'') -- and then finally watching the Fate/Zero series.
After Fate/Zero was One Punch-Man, a series I watched with my boyfriend last year. The pieces were nice and fun. I really enjoyed the "Theme of One Punch-Man ~Ballad~". What can I say? I like my ballads.
Then came pieces from My Hero Academia, the first series I didn't watch. When it comes to listening to pieces from series I'm not familiar with, I generally ask myself these questions to gauge if it was a good piece:
-Can it stand on its own (without needing some kind of imagery to make it "whole")?
-Do I feel anything from it?
-Does it pique my interest in the series?
Satisfying at least the first two questions means the song is pretty good. If it can satisfy all three then the song is fantastic. If it can't satisfy the first two questions, then I wouldn't consider the piece very good... because it relies on having watched the series to really enjoy it or appreciate it.
Unfortunately, all of the pieces (except for one) from My Hero Academia did nothing for me.
Afterwards, the conductor spoke some more and mentioned they couldn't have a three-hour concert without an intermission. My eyes widened. Three hours?! At most I thought the concert would be about two hours. O_O
The last pieces before intermission were from Fairy Tail and Naruto: Shippuden, series I never watched. I enjoyed one song from each series.
8:30-ish PM -- Intermission
During the intermission, I chatted with my friend who was seated closer to the stage. He wasn't super impressed, wanting more variety of genres and more covers of opening and ending themes. I agreed with the variety of genres but didn't mind the instrumental pieces. Good music is good music, regardless of whether there are vocals or not.
We also talked about the screen being a bit underutilized since it only showed a picture of the anime and the song track subtitle underneath. Sometimes there wouldn't be a picture of the anime and just the song track subtitle. In past concerts, I've seen the screen used to feature footage from the series. If they decided not to do that to avoid spoiling parts of the series, I can respect that.
I told my friend I was hoping for Attack on Titan to be performed. I also asked if he thought the concert would really run for three hours and he said it was a possibility.
When I got back to my seat, I told my sister to head out early if the concert was getting too late. In my head, if the concert ended around 10:30 PM, it'd take about an hour to get home. Getting home by 11:30 PM may not seem late to some, but it is late for me. >_>!
My friend texted me a screenshot of a website saying that the approximate runtime for Symphonic Anime was three hours. No.... =_=''' Later that night, my friend would point out that the screenshot also mentioned Attack on Titan being cut from today's performance. NOOOOOOO.... T_T''''
8:55-ish PM -- Part Two Start!
The second half started with "il vento d'oro" from JoJo's Bizarre Adventure. I haven't watched the series, but the jazzy sounds were great and pumped me up. That was a song that satisfied my three questions above!
After that was "Tank!" from Cowboy Bebop, which sounded fine until the very end. Then a couple pieces from Spy x Family, another series I haven't watched (though it's on my to-watch list). The pieces were fine but nothing spectacular for me.
The conductor then said he'd like us to delve into anime with fantasy elements and play a piece that we probably know very well. I chuckled, thinking that the wording was amusing. When a picture of Inuyasha showed up on the screen (a series I never watched), I chuckled more. The piece itself was very good, which delighted and surprised me. Good music is good music.
Then the conductor said he'd like to switch to slow ballads. I suspect they wanted the audience to cry at this section. They got pretty close with "One Summer Day" from Spirited Away (what nostalgia).
"Nandemonaiya" from Your Name was the first track that featured the guest vocalist, Nan Sathida. It was going pretty good until it reached the bridge. Then... something didn't sound right. The melody sounded a bit offkey. Was I just hearing things? o.O
After that, the conductor said the next series would be the last. The audience was sad. I think they saved the best for last because we got treated to three great pieces from Demon Slayer. Nan Sathida sung during the third piece and she did a much better job.
The conductor bowed and left the stage. The audience gave a standing ovation. Little did we know that we would end up giving a standing ovation three times.
The conductor came back onstage, performed one encore song, and left the stage again. Then he came back to perform the last encore song, which was "My Neighbor Totoro" from My Neighbor Totoro. Credits rolled on the screen as they played.
The concert ended around 10:05 PM (earlier than three hours!).
The Inuyasha piece. It was called "Inuyasha Fantasy" in the subtitle, but I had to type "Inuyasha Gensou" to find the track on Spotify. I enjoyed this very much. Remember that this is crappily recorded. If Kashamara Productions finds this blog and would like me to remove the recording, please either leave a comment or drop me a message through the Contact Form and I will remove it.
Setlist
Here is the setlist for Symphonic Anime 2024. I'm glad that the concert provided the track names. It would have taken me ages to figure out the setlist, especially for the series I'm not familiar with. Track names with the * after them were tracks I enjoyed and were performed well. For example, there is no * after Tank! because it wasn't performed well, despite being a track I enjoy.Here's the Spotify playlist for Toronto if you want to check it out. This was a bit difficult to put together since some of the track names were in Japanese on Spotify. Unfortunately I couldn't find the original tracks for one of the tracks for Spy x Family and most of the tracks for Demon Slayer so in place are covers.
-Death Note Theme *
-Low of Solipsism *
-Domine Kira
Fate/Zero
-To the Beginning *
One Punch-Man
-Seiki Shikkou *
-Theme of One Punch-Man ~Ballad~ *
-The Hero!! *
My Hero Academia
-I Am Here!
-My Hero Academia
-All For One
-The Power of All For One
-You Say Run *
Fairy Tail
-The Power of Justice
-Dragon Force *
Naruto: Shippuden
-Main Theme '16
-Homecoming
-Akatsuki *
-Heaven Shaking Event
----Intermission----
JoJo's Bizarre Adventure
-il vento d'oro *
Cowboy Bebop
-Tank!
Spy x Family
-Mixed Nuts
-Strix
Inuyasha
-Inuyasha Gensou *
Naruto: Shippuden
-Early Summer Rain
Spirited Away
-One Summer Day *
Your Name
-Nandemonaiya (with vocals)
Demon Slayer
-Demon Slayer Corps *
-Nezuko ~Aratana Kibou~ *
-Kamado Tanjirou no Uta (with vocals) *
Encore:
Demon Slayer
-Gurenge *
My Neighbor Totoro
-My Neighbor Totoro
My Feedback
Below are some of my feedback for the concert:
The first half needs more variety from different genres
It is fine to try focusing on anime with heroes as a theme, but the term "heroes" can also encompass magical girls. Heroes do not need to fall only in the Shounen genre. Listening to something from Puella Magi Madoka Magica, Sailor Moon, Revolutionary Girl Utena or Magic Knight Rayearth (these are just examples) would have offered a slight change of pace and musical variation to the pieces in the first half.
Tracks do not always need to focus on mainstream
I understand needing to perform pieces that cater to a wide audience, but having a concert is a great opportunity to showcase or make nods to lesser known series that are wonderful and have fantastic music.
While I am aware that part of the setlist was likely structured to showcase music from the three guest composers, each of their discography are varied so pieces from different series could have been considered.
I think having a couple medleys -- one medley showcasing spectacular music from lesser known series and another medley showcasing spectacular music from the guest composers from lesser known series -- could add some variation and some memorability. Imagine an audience member hearing an awesome piece from a series they know nothing about, which then leads them to search out the series when they get home, which could potentially turn them into a fan... and it was all thanks to listening to that awesome piece at a concert.
Please do more advertising
If my friend didn't tell me about this concert, I never would have known it existed and it would have passed me by. I'm not sure what advertising was done, but unfortunately it didn't reach me. I am a person who watches anime a fair amount, but I do not actively check out anime news. Advertising could have reached me via YouTube, Facebook, sometimes gacha games, and the subway.
Also, this is totally random, but below are a couple track suggestions I have for a future setlist:
"Lost My Pieces" from Toradora! If the goal during the ballads section was to make the audience cry, for anybody who have watched the series, this would definitely achieve it.
"Allegro Cantabile" from Nodame Cantabile. It's just very fun and upbeat.
Overall Experience
Symphonic Anime had strong opening pieces and strong outro pieces. It needed some work in the middle. Despite that, my time was not wasted and I would check it out if it comes back to Toronto. Hopefully with Attack on Titan staying on the setlist. *fingers crossed*
Thank you so much for reading!
If you have any questions / comments, feel free!
Take care, stay safe, and until next time! :)
