Do not miss this special concert featuring seventy musicians on stage to perform a stunning tribute to the Apollo Space Program. Aaron answers questions below about this one-of-a-kind program. Also, award-winning composer, Austin Wintory and celebrated artist, Angela Bermudez will perform prior to Saturday night's concert from 6 - 6:30pm. Read more below about it.

"One small step for man. One giant leap for mankind." Those were Neil Armstrong's famous first words upon setting foot on the lunar surface. The Space Coast Symphony Orchestra pays tribute to the courage and innovation of NASA engineers and the Apollo mission with  One Giant Leap: A Tribute to Apollo  at 7:00 PM on Saturday, July 27 at the Scott Center for the Performing Arts at Holy Trinity Episcopal Academy, 5625 Holy Trinity Drive in Suntree and 3:00 PM on Sunday, July 28 at The Community Church of Vero Beach, 1901 23rd St in Vero Beach. 

The space-themed concert commemorating the 50th anniversary of the moon landing will feature several musical premiere's including the Southeast US premiere of composer Michael Daugherty’s  To the New World , a three-movement work celebrating America's lunar milestone. Composers Austin Wintory and Kevin Wilt will be in attendance to hear their works performed. Wintory's concert work and film scores have been lauded, with his greatest recognition coming from the video gaming world, where he has won accolades for his music to games Journey and Assasin's Creed Syndicate. Fans of the Star Trek television and film series will not be disappointed, as the orchestra will play various themes from throughout the years. Selections from two film scores will also be presented on the program, James Horner’s  Apollo 13  and Justin Hurwitz’s Golden Globe winning  First Man , as well as works from John Williams and Dmitri Shostakovich. The music will be enhanced by footage of the Apollo missions and other NASA programs, projected on a large screen above the orchestra. 
 
Some would say that the young conductor and artistic director, Aaron T. Collins, took  One Giant Leap  himself when choosing to start the Space Coast Symphony during the economic recession a decade ago. Growing up in Cocoa Beach, the influence of the space program was all around him.
 
"Innovation breeds innovation," said Collins. "If the scientists at NASA hadn't tried new things during Apollo, we wouldn't have landed on the moon and met the challenge by President Kennedy." Reflecting on the concert programming, Collins continued. "One Giant Leap honors the courage to try new things with a concert that includes scores from films about space along with several pieces of new music by some of America's most talented composers."  
The Scott Center
5625 Holy Trinity Drive 
Melbourne, 32940
Community Church of Vero Beach
1901 23rd St
Vero Beach, FL 32960
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Music & Paint is is an improvised duet between Artist Angela Bermudez and composer Austin Wintory. The two engage in a sort of "wordless storytelling" by reacting in real-time to one another: the music is a reflection of the evolving painting and the painting is a reflection of the explorational music. The performances range from meditative and tranquil to bombastic and uplifting, and are always unpredictable!

*This FREE special feature takes place from 6 - 6:30pm in the concert hall at The Scott Center.
First of all, this sounds like a huge and exciting concert! What did it take to pull all of these compositions together, and how does it feel to have composers Wintory and Wilt invited to the concert?

This will be one of our most exciting programs of the Season. As you know, we are big advocates of new music. This special concert gives us the opportunity to highlight some of the best composers working today. While each work is new to our audience, they are all very accessible and engaging. I’m thrilled that Kevin and Austin will be joining us. They’re friends and to share the stage with them will be very special. And for our fans, the opportunity to meet the composers, hear about their works, creates a very personal connection to the overall experience.  

The orchestra has performed a number of space-themed concerts by now. What is your biggest inspiration behind these concerts?

Growing up on the Space Coast, I always looked up at the night sky, finding myself continually in awe of our immeasurably vast universe. My feelings of wonder eventually gave way to curiosity. Like most children, I wanted to become an astronaut, travel to space, and explore the alien worlds that danced above in the skies.  NASA continues to push the boundaries of what’s possible.   Their monumental achievements over the years show that there is nothing that humanity can’t achieve when they put their minds to it.   This is a large part of our community and to highlight it, means the world to us.  

As the founder of the SCSO, what innovative steps have you taken with the orchestra?

Our Symphony for Everyone Program is something you can’t find anywhere else in America.  It enables anyone to attend any concert, no matter what their current financial situation.  Locally, it has allowed more than 11,000 economically challenged individuals and families to attend a live symphonic concert. Some of our patrons are experiencing live music for the first time and it is an incredible thing.   

We have a very adventurous spirit at the SCSO.  We are always experimenting — whether it is with programming, the presentation of programming, trying new concepts — and like NASA, we are continually trying to push the boundaries of what’s possible.  

What do you think audiences will enjoy most about this "Giant Leap" of a concert?

The concert will feature stunning film clips from the Apollo missions. This multimedia element will be icing on the cake. It’s engaging and exciting music and we hope our community will come out and support it.  

ABOUT KEVIN WILT, COMPOSER
Kevin Wilt (b. 1984) composes music for a variety of ensembles that balances sophistication with accessibility, and experimentation with solid craftsmanship. Composer John Corigliano praised his expert orchestration and beautiful writing, while the Bloomington Herald wrote, “[his music] has a keen sense of mood and tonal balance.” Kevin recently composed Running on Rooftops for Michael Francis and The Florida Orchestra in honor of their 50th anniversary season. He was a recent resident at the Millay Colony for the Arts, and winner of the Music Teachers National Association Commission in Florida. He won the Fresh Squeezed Opera Call for Scores with his chamber opera, Prix Fixe, and the Musical Chairs Chamber Ensemble Composer Search. He was awarded a grant by the Atlantic Coast Conference Band Directors Association to create Urban Impressions, a multimovement work for large wind ensemble. He was a finalist for the ASCAP/CBDNA Frederick Fennel Prize, the Symphony Number One Call for Scores III, the Hartford Opera Theater Call for Scores, and the American Prize in both the band and chamber music categories. Recent performances include those by the Space Coast Symphony Orchestra, the Sydney Contemporary Orchestra, the Boston New Music Initiative, Fifth House Ensemble, the h2 Quartet, Project Fusion, the Apollo Fund, SHUFFLE Concert, the Mexico City Woodwind Quintet, ensembles at the Indiana University Jacobs School of Music, the University of Texas at Austin, Florida State University, the University of Kansas, the University of Oklahoma, Michigan State University, Kennesaw State University, as well as a reading by the Detroit Symphony Orchestra under Maestro Leonard Slatkin. Kevin is equally at home composing for film and television, earning him a Michigan Emmy® Award Nomination for Best Musical Composition. Other film projects include The Inevitable, The Happy Couple, a string quartet for the short film Renegade, and The Wars of Other Men. He holds a Doctorate of Musical Arts in Composition from Michigan State University, where he studied with Ricardo Lorenz. He completed his Masters Degree in Music Composition at MSU, working with Jere Hutcheson and Charles Ruggiero, and his Bachelors Degree in Music Composition and Theory from Wayne State University in Detroit, Michigan, where he studied with James Hartway. He is an Associate Professor of Music and Composer-in-Residence at Florida Atlantic University in Boca Raton. His works are published by Whistling Vine Music and Murphy Music Press.
ABOUT AUSTIN WINTORY, COMPOSER & CONDUCTOR
Austin Wintory has built his career on exploring and curiosity. He began his obsession with composing back when he was ten years old, when he discovered Jerry Goldsmith’s scores to Patton and A Patch of Blue.

After a busy high school career composing for the student orchestras, Austin went on to study at NYU and USC with composers Morten Lauridsen, Charles Fussell, and Erica Muhl. Never satisfied with working in a single medium, Austin has worked in the concert world, film music, video games, and miscellaneous others.
 
In March 2012, the PlayStation3 game Journey was released, after three years of work. The game instantly became Sony’s fastest-selling PlayStation title, and the soundtrack album debuted on the Billboard charts higher than any original score in gaming history. In December 2012, more history was made when it was announced that Journey had become the first-ever Grammy-nominated videogame score.
 
The score subsequently won an Academy of Interactive Arts & Sciences D.I.C.E. award, two British Academy Awards, a Spike TV VGA, and IGN’s “Overall Music of the Year,” five G.A.N.G. Awards and host of others. The score features the Macedonia Radio Symphonic Orchestra and a lineup of top soloists (Audio excerpts available here). Orchestral excerpts, and the stand alone mini-concerto “Woven Variations” have been consistently scheduled for concert performances all over the world since its release.

Beginning humbly as a Kickstarter campaign, Austin’s next major game effort was Stoic Studio’s The Banner Saga, a unique and mature turn-based strategy / RPG hybrid with a dazzling art direction. The score featured the Dallas Wind Symphony, America’s premiere wind ensemble, and an all-star trio of YouTube musicians: Malukah, Peter Hollens and Taylor Davis. The game and soundtrack were released in early 2014 to critical and commercial success; the score earned Austin over a dozen awards and nominations, including his 4th and 5th British Academy Award nominations, and won the first-ever peer-voted ASCAP Composer’s Choice Award for “Best Video Game Score of the Year.” He is currently working with Stoic on The Banner Saga 2, which was announced live, on-stage at The Game Awards in December 2014 to an audience of nearly 2 million people.
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Most recently (released August 2016), Austin scored the debut title for Giant Squid Studios, ABZÛ. The score was an ambitious blend of orchestra, choir and large harp ensemble recorded in both the US and the UK. The game and score were both immensely well-received, earning a number of publications’ “Best Of” lists for top soundtrack of the year, in addition to Austin’s second D.I.C.E. Award nomination, a Hollywood Music in Media nomination, and others.
 
In 2015, Austin wrote and produced the score for Ubisoft’s latest blockbuster: Assassin’s Creed Syndicate. The music is at its heart a chamber score deeply rooted in 19th century traditions, featuring virtuoso musicians Sandy Cameron and Tina Guo, and an all-star ensemble recorded at the legendary Abbey Road Studios in London. The score earned Austin his 6th British Academy Award nomination, and second ASCAP Composer’s Choice Award win, and has been lauded as among the top game scores for 2015 by major industry organizations like GameTrailers, IGN, Movie Music UK, the International Film Music Critics Association and the Hollywood Music in Media Awards.
 
Austin has also scored nearly 50 feature films, and his first major film score, for the Sundance Film Festival-winning film Captain Abu Raed, was shortlisted for the 2009 Academy Awards for Best Original Score by the LA Times. His next major film, Grace, was also a hit at the Sundance Film Festival. Austin’s score (which featured a wild array of custom-recorded sounds such as babies crying and horse flies, in addition to a large ensemble of clarinets at London’s famed Abbey Road Studios), was also highly lauded, earning a notorious Fangoria Chainsaw Award nomination and being cited by “Visions in Sound” (a popular film scoring radio program) as among the Top 10 Scores for 2010. His most recent films are writer/director Adam Alleca’s Standoff, starring Thomas Jane and Laurence Fishburne, and Amin Matalqa’s The Rendezvous, starring Stana Katic.
 
Outside of games, Austin also maintains a busy concert composing schedule, with regular appearances throughout the world. Most recently he premiered the commissioned work “This Gaming Life” with the Melbourne Symphony Orchestra, a theatrical work created in collaboration with the legendary comedians called “Tripod.” Announced in 2016 was also the unveiling of his partnership with the Chicago-based chamber group Fifth House Ensemble, with whom he will tour in a production of “Journey LIVE,” a recreation of the hit PlayStation title, performed interactively live. His chamber music show “Mythos,” combining his own music with other contemporary works, is also touring throughout 2015 and beyond following a successful world premiere in Manhattan at New York Comic Con in 2014. Forthcoming he will also have premieres with the West Michigan Symphony, Colorado Symphony and others.
 
Passionate about education, Austin is a regular public speaker at schools and events around the world, in addition to pre-concert talks and workshops. He also serves on the Board of Directors for the non-profit Education Through Music – Los Angeles, as well as the Board of Directors for the Society of Composers and Lyricists.