Wing Commander Music Marches Along At Graduation (July 9, 2014)

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It seems to be the season for Wing Commander at the orchestra! This past May, the KTH Royal Institute of Technology in Stockholm, Sweden held their traditional Masters graduation at Stockholm City Hall. Among the graduation's musical selections was a medley of Wing Commander tracks during "Fanborgens Exit March." We're not exactly sure what that pertains to as part of the graduation, but we've reached out to the Master of Ceremonies to see why they chose Wing Commander as part of the ceremony. They also played the Super Mario theme song at the event!

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Original update published on July 9, 2014
 
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I'd be curious who did the arrangement (I assume Mr Julin but who's to say) because its quite good.
 
At least I can tell you what "fanborg" means in case you haven't figured it out. "Fanborg" means a group of flagbearers or a group of flags around a podium.

Students at most (if not all) universities in Sweden are represented by a student union who speaks for the students towards the faculties or the university board. The student union is divided in different student groups from different faculties. I do not know the precise organisation at KTH but my guess is that the student groups are called "sections" at KTH and it is their flags we see in the video.

What we see are the flags leaving the hall which makes me believe that we watch the end of the ceremony.

A little side note. The ceremony is in the biggest room of the Stockholm city hall, called the blue hall. This is the same room where the annual nobel dinner is being held every 10th of december where each nobel laureate of that year holds a speech.
 
Students at most (if not all) universities in Sweden are represented by a student union who speaks for the students towards the faculties or the university board. The student union is divided in different student groups from different faculties. I do not know the precise organisation at KTH but my guess is that the student groups are called "sections" at KTH and it is their flags we see in the video.

Wow, like a House system...

Among other things it looks like George Sanger uncovered that the Malmo Symphony Orchestra has performed the Wing Commander suite before, also in May.

http://joystick.mso.se/in-english/
 
Wow, a whole suite showing all the different moods of the WC1 music. Now we just need an orchestra that's willing to perform live as someone plays the game. The conductor can shout out rehearsal marks to keep everyone matched to in-game events. "Missile lock - Figure G! Victory - Figure T! Autopilot - Skip to figure D! Combat - Figure F! Trombones play the ejection alarm! Dead - skip to figure U, and hope they don't press escape during the funeral!"

Meanwhile the players mutter "Why did we spend all that time rehearsing the Golden Sun / Pewter Planet theme when this useless player is never going to earn one?"

Sure, the hourly fee for a professional symphony orchestra isn't cheap, but you'd finally settle the debate about which is the best sound card for Wing Commander...
 
This is awesome! I once paid a piano player $20 to listen to the Kilrathi theme song on a cell phone and see if he could play it back. And he did. Perfectly. Alcohol may have been involved.
 
Got a reply this morning...also learned there is a professional recording of the ceremony. We are going to see about getting it.

Hoping to get more information about why WC was chosen.

The music in the video you are referring to is played by our university’s (KTH) own orchestra consisting of students and teachers of KTH, runned by director musices Gunnar Julin, and can be seen on the video as the conductor.

The video is posted by one of the graduating students I would guess. It is the exit march of the flag parade who starts off and ends the ceremony. Check out more entertainment from the orchestra on our web site for the Academic ceremonies.

http://www.kth.se/aktuellt/akademis...on-promotion/promotionshogtiden-2012-1.357014
http://www.kth.se/aktuellt/akademis...on-promotion/promotionshogtiden-2012-1.357014
 
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