Orchestra of local students plays ‘video game concert’

It never gets old for composer Maclaine Diemer to hear the music he wrote being played.

The Evergreen Philharmonic Orchestra, which is made up of Issaquah School District students, performed a concert playing Diemer’s music from the standout video game “Guild Wars 2” at Issaquah High School on March 29.

“The game itself is so big and so beautiful that it’s immediately inspiring, so I never have to struggle for inspiration. The fact that they’re always adding new content means there’s always something new to inspire me,” Diemer said.

“Guild Wars” is the first and, at the moment, the only video game project that Diemer has scored. The opportunity to compose for the video game was given to him by ArenaNet, developer and creator of “Guild Wars,” and is what made his dream of making music for a living come alive.

Diemer studied music in college and started playing in bands and touring around the country.

“When that wound down, I decided I needed to do something that could pay the bills with music and decided to get into games … I started out as a sound designer doing sound effects for ‘Guild Wars,’” Diemer said. “After a couple years of doing sound effects, the opportunity to write music arose.”

The process of writing a piece for Diemer starts with talking with the designers and writers to see what their intention is. From there, he’ll either look at concept art or play the game as it’s in development to get a sense of what he wants the player to feel in that area.

“You sit down at a piano and work until you have something… it usually starts off with a melody or a couple of chords and you see where it leads you,”he said. “That’s kind of where the magic happens.”

“I feel very lucky. Tonight is an incredible honor because this stuff was never designed for public performance, it was just supposed to be part of the game.”

What Diemer was most excited to hear that night was the Evergreen Philharmonic’s interpretation of his pieces.

“The fact that the orchestra and the kids put in the work to learn it and rehearse it and bring it to life, that’s always the magic part really. Without an orchestra playing music, it’s notes on a page and it doesn’t really mean anything,” Diemer said.

The Evergreen Philharmonic is a professional training symphonic orchestra that prepares its members, 80 honor students who are selected yearly by audition from Issaquah, Liberty and Skyline High Schools, to be independent, functional musicians. Many go on to play in local orchestras or in professional careers.