Led by guest conductor Jack Everly, the Kansas City Symphony Orchestra performed to a sold out theater Friday night in the new 1,600 Helzberg Hall of the inaugural season of Kansas City’s Kauffman Center for the Performing Arts.  The concert featured actor George Takei, known for portraying Mr. Sulu in the original Star Trek, greeting the crowd and reciting the opening lines to the original Star Trek theme, as well as Klaatu’s speech from The Day the Earth Stood Still.  The concert featured the musical scores of numerous science fiction movies and TV shows, with on ongoing light show across the top of the giant theater.

Nationally known soprano from numerous opera companies Kristin Plumley sang beautiful renditions of the original Star Trek theme as well as When You Wish Upon a Star and she appeared dressed as both a science officer from the original Star Trek and Princess Leia.

Both Everly and Takei praised the futuristic design and state of the art acoustics at the Kauffman Center, now one of the leading performing arts facilities in the nation, and Takei said he wouldn’t be surprised to see such a cutting-edge facility in the 23rd century predicted from Star Trek’s future.

Highlights of Friday’s concert, which will be performed again Saturday night at a second performance at the Kauffman Center, included selections from John Williams’ scores to Superman, main themes from Star Wars: A New Hope, and Star Wars: The Phantom Menace, Close Encounters of the Third Kind, E.T., the Extra-Terrestrial, and the theme from Lost in Space as part of a TV theme song medley.  Other highlights included a stunning trio of excerpts from Bernard Herrmann’s The Day the Earth Stood Still, 2001: A Space Odyssey, the theme to Somewhere in Time, the themes from Star Trek series Voyager, The Next Generation, and Deep Space Nine and the selections from the score to Star Trek (2009).   The medley of TV tunes included the theme to the X-Files, the Jetsons, and Twilight Zone, among others.

Maestro Jack Everly has served as Principal Pops Conductor of the Indianapolis Symphony Orchestra, Principal Pops Conductor with the Baltimore Symphony Orchestra, the National Arts Centre Orchestra in Ottawa, Canada, and Pops Conductor of the Naples Philharmonic Orchestra. Originally appointed by Mikhail Baryshnikov, he was the Music Director of the American Ballet Theatre for 14 years. On Broadway, he teamed with Marvin Hamlisch to conduct The Goodbye Girl and A Chorus Line and he has conducted concerts for the 2010 National Memorial Day Concert and A Capitol Fourth, two of PBS’ highest-rated programs.

In addition to the original Star Trek series and six Star Trek movies, George Takei’s past work includes guest star roles in episodes of series such as Psych, Perry Mason, I Spy, Twilight Zone, Mission: Impossible, The Six Million Dollar Man, Baa Baa Black Sheep, Miami Vice, and Hawaii Five-O as well as film credits including Ice Palace with Richard Burton and The Green Berets with John Wayne.

Soprano Kristin Plumley’s credits include work with New York City Opera, Chautauqua Opera, Virginia Opera and L’Opéra Francais de New York, and she has starred in productions of West Side Story, Carousel, Brigadoon, and Oklahoma! as well as performing at Carnegie Hall.

C.J. Bunce

Editor

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