Project Promise Update: The Arrangers’ Circle and Upcoming Q&A

UPDATE: We finally have a review up of the Makoto Shinkai Promise album.

For people who have not read this post, the Eminence Symphony Orchestra, based out in Sydney, Australia, will be releasing a 13-track disc this December containing arrangements of Tenmon’s musical compositions in honor of Makoto Shinkai and his 10 years of work as an anime director, animator, and scriptwriter. Until recently, we’ve only had a glimpse of what this disc was capable of delivering through the tracklist; what we didn’t have was a solid idea of what what to should expect out of these arrangements. But now that my Eminence contact has disclosed the names of the arrangers, fans of Tenmon and Makoto Shinkai can rejoice! With people like Shiro Hamaguchi, Akifumi Tada, and Yasunori Iwasaki at the helm, the arrangements should turn out to be awesome!

First off, we have none other than Shiro Hamaguchi. The fact that his name came up isn’t a huge surprise since he’s done a lot of orchestral arrangements for such franchises like the Final Fantasy series as well as the spectacular String Concert of Haruhi Suzumiya along with anime works like One Piece and Rosario to Vampire (both of which were done with Kouhei Tanaka). Furthermore he has worked alongside Eminence for many of their concerts including the Night in Fantasia Concert just last month and because of his experience, he was probably a natural choice to have in this group of arrangers. His presence alone is a strong indication that this CD will be definitely worth listening to because of the creative spin that Hamaguchi puts into his music. That is, he does a really good job with taking the original piece and seamlessly working it so that while one can still recognize the original melody, it’s different enough such that it can stand really well on its own. After all, if he can improve something like “Koi no Mikuru Dentetsu,” there’s no piece that’s beyond his ability to arrange into an excellent orchestral or piano track.

Koi no Mikuru Densetsu
[audio:01 Haruhiorch.mp3]

Though I’m very much familiar with Hamaguchi, the other two aren’t exactly household names (at least, they didn’t ring a bell to me when I saw their names). As you might have been able to guess from the picture, Akifumi Tada will also be a part of the circle of arrangers and while I recognize the titles that he’s worked on, I’ve never actually watched any of them, so I wouldn’t be able to tell you how skillful he is with composing and arranging music. I suppose the least I can do is listen to Ah! My Goddess’s ED theme to at least get some idea for how it’ll go.

Finally, Yasunori Iwasaki rounds out the list of arrangers. Like Tada, the anime series that he has worked on are recognizable, and unlike Tada, I have watched one of the shows that Iwasaki has worked on. Unfortunately, that doesn’t mean I actually remember much about its music. The show in question was Grenadier, and given that show’s fanservicey tendencies, I don’t really remember all too much about the music, effectively putting me at square zero in terms of knowing what to expect out of Iwasaki.

Upcoming Q&A
With that in mind, I’d like to turn it over to you, the reader. I have been granted an opportunity to send a list of questions to the people working on Project Promise and while I do have my list, it’s also likely that you’ll have some questions you’d like to have answered by the arrangers and even by Tenmon himself! If so, just type your questions into the comments and I’ll include it along with my list of questions to be submitted to the arrangers. Just let me know to whom the question is to be addressed (e.g. Hamaguchi, Tada, Iwasaki, or the group as a whole). Also feel free to ask general questions about Project Promise if you have them since Eminence’s founder, Hiroaki Yura, will be more than happy to take your questions. I’ll be sending the questions fairly quickly (in about 24 hours) so get them in while you can!

As a note, the Q&A will be submitted on the Eminence website. Hopefully a response will come by quickly so with no further ado, submit away!