From movies to mentoring with Mercer island composer Hummie Mann

The arrival of a new orchestra on the Northwest scene is always an occasion. And the newest kid on the block, the Pontiac Bay Symphony Orchestra, is drawing an unusual amount of interest, at least partly because its founders have created a niche all their own.

The Pontiac Bay (named for a pioneer-era community north of Magnuson Park on Lake Washington) is a mentoring orchestra — one in which adult musicians, professionals and teachers rehearse alongside younger players, ages 12 to 18, and perform with them in concert. What further distinguishes this orchestra, however, is its focus on film and theater music, a discipline that has been getting a lot of attention recently with the rise of its close relative, interactive game music, as a legitimate musical form.

Founder Sheila Espinoza, herself a graduate of UCLA's film scoring program and an experienced composer of music for theater and film, has brought in the region's dean of film composers, Hummie Mann, for the group's first concert Saturday. Mann, also a noted teacher, will conduct his own music and that of John Williams in the opening program.

"I've been threatening for years to get together suites from my movie scores," says Mann, "and this has given me the push to do that. So I'll be conducting world premieres of my suites from 'Robin Hood: Men in Tights' and 'P.T. Barnum.' " He'll also conduct music from his scores to "Language of the Heart" and the IMAX film "Cyberworld 3D," as well as Williams' suites from "Harry Potter," "Star Wars" and "Jurassic Park."

Mann, a two-time Emmy Award-winning composer/arranger born in Canada, moved to Mercer Island in 1996 with his wife and two daughters, after 17 years in Los Angeles. He has scored feature and television projects for such directors as Mel Brooks, Jonathan Kaplan, Norman Jewison, Peter Bogdanovich, Jim Abrahams, Rob Reiner, Simon Wincer and Joe Dante.

You might also have heard his music for "Thomas and the Magic Railroad," "Year of the Comet," "Fall Time," "Benefit of the Doubt" and "After the Rain." Coming up in January is another feature film, "The Wooly Boys," starring Peter Fonda and Kris Kristofferson. Or you might have heard his music on TV, in the HBO film "The Second Civil War," the Showtime movie "Rescuers: Tales of Courage — Two Women," the MTV biopic "Meatloaf: To Hell and Back" and the CBS movie "... First Do No Harm" (starring Meryl Streep). Among the scores he has orchestrated: "Sister Act," "Misery" and "Dying Young."

"I've done a lot of studio conducting, too," Mann explains, "in as many as 30 or 40 films, including 'City Slickers' and 'The Addams Family.' I'm really excited about conducting this new orchestra. It's a great idea, people with experience helping those who need experience. I'm a big believer in sharing information; that's why I teach film scoring."

Mann's Pacific Northwest Film Scoring Program classes have gotten more and more popular (www.pnwfilmmusic.com); last summer, students came from as far away as Scotland and Brazil to work with him. He has taught at Bellevue Community College and Music Works Northwest.

"I believe that film music is the contemporary orchestral music that people are attached to," says Mann. "There isn't that attachment to a lot of other contemporary music."

Film music, with its pictorial qualities suggestive of a world beyond the aural, also carries along the additional emotional energy of the film itself (especially, of course, in movies that have been widely seen). Most scores are tonal, too, written in a vocabulary that's designed to reach listeners, not necessarily to challenge them.

The same is true of game music, a growing field that has become a lot more like movies, with elaborate characters and scenarios. Sophisticated, high-end game music has been featured in a couple of fairly high-profile recent concerts, with participation of such groups as the odeonquartet (their preferred spelling) and Seattle Composers' Alliance.

"Meanwhile, the Pontiac Bay Orchestra is coming together nicely," reports Mann. "There was some initial hesitancy about getting involved in an orchestra that wasn't playing Mozart and Mahler, but I think people now are excited about the concept."

Mann himself will be increasingly busy in upcoming months writing scores to a new Bogdanovich film and Robin Swicord's new "Mermaids Singing."

After the opening Pontiac performance, the orchestra has two more outings this season. According to Espinoza, the group provides "a performance opportunity and magnet for students whose career goals are to perform as a professional musician on film scores, compose film music and work as a musician in musical theater."

Participation is free to the young and adult players; they interview or audition to get in, and must commit to the three-concert season (the young members are described as "strong intermediate and advanced players"). Every summer, more musicians will be able to apply to participate in the next season. There's also a summer-camp program where youths will have an opportunity to read through music from film and theater and work with an established conductor.

Espinoza won a King County Municipal League "Citizen of the Year" award for founding the Pontiac Bay Symphony Orchestra last spring.

"I was first captivated by film music in childhood, started playing movie themes on the piano when I was around 12, and around 14 realized that writing music for film was a job possibility when I grew up," Espinoza says. "The mentoring orchestra is a product of all my music experiences and the things I have enjoyed doing in my life: working with youth, being involved with an orchestra, and being involved in film music. It's something I have always wanted to do."

Melinda Bargreen: mbargreen@seattletimes.com