Composer Hans Zimmer, 67, outside of St. Peter’s Square today in Rome, just as the Christmas tree in the square is being decorated. Zimmer has been involved in preparing a major concert to be held in the Vatican tomorrow, Saturday, December 7, at 5:30 p.m. — with 2,000 poor people as special guests of honor

    CONCERT

    “This is not just a concert, it is an act of love, a concrete gesture towards those less fortunate, an invitation to reflect on what unites us as human beings.” –Hans Zimmer, 67, who wrote the brilliant musical scores for films like The Lion King, Gladiator, Dune, Interstellar, Inception, and The Last Samurai, on tomorrow’s concert

    “Well, you still have to practice (laughs). Even if you have that muscle memory. But yes, on stage when you perform, then it is playing, it’s freedom.” –Tina Guo, a world-class cellist who has collaborated with Hans Zimmer for about 15 years. She explains that freedom, in music but also by extension in many other areas of human life, is a result of discipline and practice

    Letter #70, 2024, Friday, December 6: Hans Zimmer    

    All artists have their muses.

    Someone who inspires them, or some person, or idea derived from a person, that drives them forward, ignites their genius, strengthens them when their attention flags, or their genius begins to subside into the normal, the dull, the everyday, something less than great art.

    Today, in a remarkable press conference in the Vatican’s Sala Stampa to present a concert to be performed tomorrow with the poor as “honored guests” in the Vatican, the German-born musical genius Hans Zimmer, 67, and the brilliant Chinese-born American cellist from San Diego, Tina Guo, 39, spoke of the forces and feelings that have moved and inspired their unforgettable compositions and performances.

    Dante, Italy’s and Europe’s greatest poet, had his Beatrice, who inspired him to write his epic poem stretching from hell to heaven, with purgatory in between, The Divine Comedy, which has lasted now more than 700 years.

    Hans Zimmer told us he was inspired to write his hundreds of film scores by a woman named Doris “who lived in Bradford, England, outside of London, with two children leading a very hard life,” a place where he played music in a band in the 1980s.

    And Tina Guo told us how she was inspired by her parents, who made her practice playing the cello up to seven hours a day, until her own being of flesh and blood, she said, virtually merges into the resonating wood and strings of her cello, creating art.

    The press room where so many points of Catholic doctrine, so many words and actions of Church leaders have been presented, parsed and probed over the past few decades, today became a room where brilliant and driven creative artists explained what has moved them toward musical greatness.

    Dante and Beatrice

    I draw these remarks from this essay.

    In an early writing, the Convivio, Dante speaks of his admiration for a Florentine girl named Beatrice.

    Here Dante reveals that he first looked at Beatrice when he was only nine years old, and she was only eight.

    It was at this moment that, in a chivalric manner befitting of a young medieval man, Dante fell in love.

    Over the course of the next nine years, Dante saw Beatrice occasionally, but he did not have the chance to speak to her.

    This changed, however, when Dante was 18 years old. Walking down the street with her two friends and veiled in a dress, the young Beatrice looked at Dante to say hello. The two did not exchange any more words, yet this encounter would remain one of the most memorable of Dante’s life.

    Dante meets and memorializes Beatrice in his magnum opus The Divine Comedy. In particular, Beatrice is given a central role as Dante’s guide through the heavens.

    As the woman who Dante loved in real life, Beatrice symbolizes in the poem the beauty of the highest heavens. Throughout the poem, special treatment is given to Beatrice’s eyes which, as symbols of beauty, reflect like mirrors the splendor of God.

    Beatrice as Dante’s Guide in the Paradiso

    In real life, Beatrice died at the young age of 24.

    Dante writes in the Convivio that after her death, he immersed himself in the study of philosophy. This was, Dante explains, in order to cope with Beatrice’s death.

    The mourning Dante first turned to Boethius’ Consolation of Philosophy and then to Cicero’s On Friendship.

    Over time, however, Dante’s philosophical studies became more serious, prompting him to read the philosophical masters, especially Aristotle. In the dark years that followed the death of Beatrice, Dante had the “gentle lady” of philosophy to comfort him.

    Dante explains in the Convivio that, due to Lady Philosophy’s comfort, during this time he thought of no other woman.

    Here Dante also reveals that, in order to receive a more serious education in philosophy, he watched public disputations and attended the schools of the religious orders for over two years.

    He writes:

    “And just as it often happens that a man goes looking for silver and apart from his intention finds gold, which some hidden causes presents, perhaps not without divine ordinance, so I who sought to console myself found not only a remedy for my tears but also the words of authors, sciences, and books. Pondering these, I quickly determined that Philosophy, who was the lady of these authors, sciences, and books, was a great thing. I imagined her fashioned as a gentle lady, and I could not imagine her in any attitude except one of compassion, so that the part of my mind that perceives truth gazed on her so willingly that I could barely turn away from her. I began to go where she was truly revealed, namely to the schools of the religious orders and to the disputations held by the philosophers, so that in a short period of time, perhaps some 30 months, I began to feel her sweetness so much that the love of her dispelled and destroyed every other thought.”

    In his book Dante and the Blessed Virgin Mary, the late Prof. Ralph McInerny wrote that Dante’s motive for studying was not merely to cope after Beatrice’s untimely death. More specifically, Dante wanted to compose poems dedicated to her memory, many of which would be included in the La Vita Nuova. Although Dante had other motives for pursuing academic studies, one of them was to sing the praises of Beatrice. Academic study, he hoped, would give him the intellectual tools to accomplish this ambitious task.

    Toward the end of his life, Dante fulfilled this goal by writing The Divine Comedy, his greatest masterpiece.

    In this regard, Dante was successful in writing the greatest poem ever composed in honor of a woman.

    McInerny’s analysis is confirmed by the words of Dante himself in the La Vita Nuova.

    After writing this final sonnet about the death of Beatrice, a miraculous vision appeared to him.

    After this vision, he would write nothing else of Beatrice until he could do it more worthily — a task he completed by writing the Divine Comedy.

    He writes:

    “… a miraculous vision appeared to me, in which I saw things which made me decide to write nothing more of this blessed one until such time as I could treat of her more worthily. And to achieve this I study as much as I can, as she truly knows. So that, if it pleases Him by whom all things live, that my life lasts a few years, I hope to write of her what has never been written of any woman. And then may it be pleasing to Him who is the Lord of courtesy, that my soul might go to see the glory of its lady, that is of that blessed Beatrice, who gloriously gazes on the face of Him qui est per omnia secula benedictus: ‘who is blessed throughout all the ages.’”

    As Richard Pearce points out, throughout his journey in the Divine Comedy, Dante longs to see Beatrice.

    The pilgrim descends into the cold darkness of the Inferno, informed by Virgil that he must do so in order to travel upward and see Beatrice.

    He suffers up the mountain of the Purgatorio, and the hope of meeting Beatrice at the top motivates him to go on.

    Dante gains the courage to walk through the wall of fire at the top of purgatory only when Virgil reminds him that doing so will bring him to Beatrice.

    The desire to see Beatrice motivates Dante to move onward when his journey seems difficult.

    (It is worth noting here that Dante’s love for Beatrice as poet and pilgrim was not a physical or sexual love that a reader today might assume. Dante’s love instead had a distinctively chivalric character. To borrow the words of Francis Newman, it was morally elevating, passionate, disciplined, and transcendent.)

    This background is important to keep in mind when interpreting Beatrice’s presence in the Divine Comedy.

    After all, Beatrice is not simply a literary figure that Dante invents and places into his poem. She is, instead, a flesh and blood person who Dante loved. Of course, this has for many years been pointed out by scholars.

    For instance, as theologian Hans Urs von Balthasar writes:

    “It is true that the figure of the beloved is enriched with symbolic content, but it would be ridiculous to maintain that she is only a symbol or allegory — of what? of faith? of theology? of the vision of God? Only dusty academics could fall for something as abstruse as that. No, the figure of the beloved is a young Florentine girl of flesh and blood. Why should a Christian man not love a woman for all eternity and allow himself to be introduced by that woman to a full understanding of what ‘eternity’ means? And why should it be so extraordinary — ought one not rather to expect it — that such a love needs, for its total fulfillment, the whole of theology and Heaven, Purgatory, and Hell?”

    Thus, when Dante places Beatrice into the poem, she serves a two-fold purpose.

    On the one hand, she serves whatever literary purpose Dante has in mind, symbolizing the ideas of beauty and grace.

    On the other hand, she is the real-life woman from the streets of Florence who Dante loved from the time he was young.

    Without first understanding the significance that Beatrice had in the life of Dante, it is impossible to understand her significance as a literary figure in the poem.

    The Eyes of Beatrice in Dante’s Divine Comedy

    In the opening lines of the Inferno, Dante finds himself lost in a dark wood. His pathway to happiness is blocked by three beasts, representing the sins which got Dante lost in the first place.

    As Dante finds himself wandering in these dark woods, it is none other than Beatrice who coordinates Dante’s rescue. This is, of course, what Virgil reveals to Dante in Canto 2 of the Inferno. “I was among those dead who are suspended, / when a lady summoned me. She was so blessed / and beautiful, I implored her to command me.”

    In other words, Virgil was in limbo with his fellow pagans when a blessed and beautiful lady summoned him. Virgil implored her to send him on a quest, and she did.

    It is Virgil who references Beatrice’s eyes for the first time in the poem. Her eyes, claims Virgil, were brighter than any star in the heavens. Beatrice was beautiful and she sounded like an angel. “With eyes of light more bright than any star, / in low, soft tones she started to address me / in her own language, with an angel’s voice.”

    Virgil then describes how Beatrice instructed him to find the pilgrim Dante and guide him out of the dark forest. The Roman poet, of course, could not say no to such a request. How could a man deny the request of a lady so beautiful, who has eyes brighter than a star?

    At the request of Beatrice, the Roman poet Virgil guides Dante into the underworld of the Inferno. He then struggles with Dante up the mountain of the Purgatorio. It is Virgil who does this indispensable work of showing Dante the ugly reality of sin and damnation, as well as the importance of redemptive suffering to cleanse a sinful yet sorrowful soul.

    Toward the end of the Purgatorio, however, Virgil’s guidance has reached his limit. Virgil announces that he has “reached the place/ where my discernment now has reached its end.” Since he is completed with the mission given by Beatrice, Virgil knows that Dante will soon need another guide — Beatrice herself.

    Therefore, in Canto 29 of the Purgatorio, Dante discovers that Virgil has vanished. The pilgrim and his guide have reached the garden of Eden at the top of Purgatory and now, unable to go higher, another guide is needed. Virgil is gone, but the pilgrim Dante is not abandoned.

    Beatrice replaces Virgil as Dante’s guide in the poem, and the poet makes clear that Beatrice represents not only a flesh and blood woman who Dante loved. As the woman who Dante loved in real life, she also represents the splendor of Christian revelation itself.

    It is for this reason that Canto 29 of the Purgatorio is filled with rich symbolism representing the treasures of revelation which Dante now has available. “Yes, look at me! Yes, I am Beatrice!”

    Beatrice’s entrance into the poem is the climax of the Purgatorio. Dante can now look into the beautiful eyes of his lover. Even better than on Earth, however, the gaze of Beatrice is now the means through which Dante can soar into the highest heavens. (…)

    Hans Zimmer and “Doris”

    In these following lines, I draw on Hans Zimmer‘s own words, spoken today in the Vatican press office, and also, here.

    And what Hans tells us is that, in the 1980s, he saw and met among the listeners to his music a woman who had suffered a great deal in life, and yet, had continued to work and live and seek what is beautiful, and true, and good — and her longing to hear these universals in the music he was playing led Hans to conceive of his mission: to provide music that could touch the heart, uplift the mind, console the soul…

    Hans said:

    The first and selfish truth is I write for myself.

    Because the seconds of my life are ticking by, and I want to have a good life.

    And I want to write music that I like or that I’m interested in.

    But — and this goes back 40-odd years, when I was in a band and I was touring in the ’80s in England. And times were tough. Margaret Thatcher was in power.

    And if you went outside London, you went into the working class. You went up into the north, and you saw people working hard and trying to make ends meet.

    And so, weirdly, every night playing in these pubs, you knew you were creating… an escape for people.

    And so somehow over the years, in my mind, I have this fictitious character.

    She’s called Doris.

    She lives in Bradford.

    She’s of a certain age.

    She’s got two boys, doesn’t have a husband.

    She works really hard every week. (Those boys are impossible, by the way. I mean, they’re a real pain.)

    She works really hard to try to make ends meet.

    And at the weekend, she’s got a choice.

    She can either watch the television, or she can go to the cinema.

    And she plunks down her hard-earned money. (And it really is hard-earned money. And life is tough.)

    And she wants to have an experience. Just for two hours, she wants to have an experience that she wouldn’t have in her normal life.

    [My note: my interpretation of what Hans sensed: he realized that he needed to give something in his music to that woman, who was struggling in life, “life-giving,” not superficial, not bland, not a mere distraction, but a type of “revelation” of the good, the true, the beautiful… something… spiritual]

    And I am part of the responsibility of giving her that experience and not short-changing her on her hard-earned money.

    So yeah, most of it’s written for Doris, who doesn’t really exist, but completely and utterly exists.

    I like to do a temp dub. And I like to preview the movie. I like to put the music in front of an audience. And it’s got to be a sizable audience. Because if it’s just 15 of your best friends, you’re never going to learn anything. They’re just coming for the free drinks.

    But if you have 600 people in a room, you know pretty quickly if you overstepped the mark.

    Gladiator is a good example where when we started out and I had Lisa Gerrard, and her voice, I mean, the studio really didn’t like the idea of the voice, just thought, what is a female voice doing in a gladiator movie?

    And Ridley and I had a very specific point of view about it. So we would literally go — and we had many screenings where we would test, see —because the audience really liked it. An audience is — they just feel things differently. They’re there for an experience.

    I noticed it, of course, most in Inception, that idea of shared dreaming that you get in a cinema.

    So we would preview it just to see how far we could push it. And there came a point, as well where even I went, hang on a second, OK? We’ve got to go and pull back a bit. You feel them getting a bit restless.

    It’s not like you just sit there amongst them and — you know, you’ve broken some sort of agreement you had with them to stay within the reality of whatever world you create…

    Tina Guo and Her Parents

    As a child, she didn’t like practicing the cello, but her parents made her practice for up to seven hours a day.

    In the text below, I am drawing on a November 29, 2019 interview of Tina Guo, here (slightly edited for the sake of brevity):

    Tina Guo is probably the best-known cellist in the world of film music. She’s been a key part in many soundtracks (Wonder Woman, Sherlock Holmes, Pirates of the Caribbean, Pacific Rim, Journey, The Lion King-2019, etc..) a core musician of the ‘Hans Zimmer Live’ tours, and she is actually touring across Europe with the ‘World of Hans Zimmer’ show.

    Gorka Oteiza had the chance to interview her in 2019, and they talked about her classical training, the first steps in her career, how she entered the world of film music…

    INTERVIEW WITH TINA GUO

    Gorka Oteiza: First, we’d like to know a little bit more about you. How did you decide to go into music and not into engineering or being a lawyer or… any other career?

    Tina Guo: I was born in China, in Shanghai, and when I was five I came to the United States. Both of my parents are classical musicians. I didn’t have a choice. I was forced into the family trade. (*laughs*)

    So you were led into the family tradition!

    Yeah, family tradition, like Russian circus families… Asian music families. (*laughs*) Well, my father is a cellist and my mother is a violinist. At first, I started on the piano like all Chinese children. Okay, maybe not all but most… so when I was three I played the piano and then when I moved to America, being around six years old, I tried violin for one year. I was horrible! I was so bad! One year, I played Twinkle Twinkle Little Star and it just sounded really bad and they said, “Oh, my god. It’s horrible.” (*laughs*)

    So you decided to do something else…

    Yeah. My dad said, “Okay, maybe you could try the cello.” Initially, it was too big for me… But, we found a very small cello and that was much easier. So I started cello when I was about seven and a half, almost eight, but, it came to me much more naturally. I progressed much faster, so that actually helped the many, many hours of practicing and training, which I’m grateful for now. When I was growing up, of course, it wasn’t fun.

    When you’re a kid you have to do things you don’t want to… looking into your future…

    Yes! Now I’m so grateful that I was forced to, because without the constant practicing, you can’t build the muscle memory and if you’re struggling when you perform, like… “Oh God, can I play this? Am I going to be able to play it in tune? Is it too fast?” So, if you start thinking about the technical part, all the music goes away.

    That brings to my mind a phrase that Hans Zimmer said in one of his concerts of the ‘Hans Zimmer Live Tour’ I attended… he said something like… “It is incredible, you are practicing and training your whole life, and one day, you don’t have to train anymore. You know everything. And you just go and enjoy it, and make music with your friends.”

    Well, you still have to practice (*laughs*). Even if you have that muscle memory. But yes, on stage when you perform, then it is playing, it’s freedom. And after the concert, back to practicing! (*laughs*)

    When you started playing the cello and you started developing the skills and saw that you liked it, did you have any idea what your career could be, or where you could get to?

    There were two sides of me. I think I’m usually pretty calculated, so I try to tell myself, “I don’t want to think about things that are ridiculous”, so I didn’t think, “Oh I want to be famous.” I didn’t really think that, but on the other side, I always wanted to play rock music and metal music. So I thought “Oh, it would be really cool if I could play in bigger venues.” Not just classical venues, but rock shows and stuff like that, and so it was in the back of my head. But for me, it was more of being trained from such a young age in a very Asian mentality where you have to be the best, you have to keep practicing, you have to win first place… I did every competition you can imagine. Constantly working, working, working… so it wasn’t really necessarily a specific goal. For me, it was just to try to, with each thing that came up, to do the best that I could and to keep practicing and keep growing.

    I’ve read that you entered into the rock world playing with metal bands, which looks quite a contradiction considering your classical training. How did that happen? How was that experience?

    Well, I started out when I was in college, cause my parents were, again, very conservative and they didn’t allow me to play different kinds of music. So when I was growing up, until I was eighteen, I only played classical music. I listened to classical music. So everything was very, very small. Not bad, but just a small world.

    It was a great training ground, but when I got to college and I moved out for the first time… I had access to the internet! When I was in middle school (I think the internet started to boom when I was about thirteen) my parents were again very strict – no internet, no email, so I couldn’t have a lot of exposure. But when I got to college it was like this explosion of freedom… you know?… “Oh my God, I can listen to anything.”

    So many new inputs and so many new areas you could explore…

    It was very exciting. So that’s when I really started experimenting, and after a couple of years I bought my first electric cello at Guitar Center, a Yamaha electric cello. And at first I played sitting (now I play standing), but it was very awkward because the position is different. The instrument keeps moving, and it sounded very bad. It’s harder to play the electric cello in tune because when you’re sitting, it doesn’t move. The cello’s a little bit more parallel to the ground, so it’s easier when you play the bow, but standing it’s completely perpendicular, so it’s a very strange position, but I thought, “Oh, it would look cooler. It would look better, you can move more.”

    Well, I’ve seen you moving on stage like a rock star when you play the cello…

    Yes! You can be more expressive. Which again, nothing wrong with it, but I just wanted to do more. It took about one year until I started being able to play in tune (*laughs*) and it’s been a learning process for the last thirty-four years… I started playing electric cello when I was eighteen, nineteen, so it’s been fifteen years that it’s taken, and I keep learning. There’re always new things to learn.

    Let’s talk about soundtracks now, because you moved from playing in rock bands to getting into the soundtrack world. How was that transition? Was it something that you wanted to do or it just came in your way?

    When I went to college and I was studying classical music, classical cello, I was experimenting with the electric cello, but honestly I didn’t really think about soundtracks. I didn’t even know that there was a whole world. I don’t know what I thought – maybe that the music just magically appeared on movies! (*laughs*) I just didn’t think about it. I didn’t think, “Wow, there’s a whole industry behind that.” So when I was in college at USC, they have an amazing film scoring program, and I started doing some gigs for very little money, like twenty dollars for one hour to record for student composers.

    So you were part of the soundtrack of some student films…

    Yeah, student films. And for me at the time, I was teaching piano, I was teaching cello, I was doing small gigs here and there, and so when they said, “Do you want to record?” I said, “Okay, sure.” I’d never used click track, I’d never used headphones in a studio, so it was an amazing learning experience. It was fun, it was nice, I’m like, “Oh, this is cool that I can get paid to record.”

    So I started by doing student films, and then I met Austin Wintory when I was in college. I’ve played on so many of his projects! So he was in college at the same time, and he was the first composer to hire me for a solo feature on Journey, the PlayStation game.

    I know Journey! I love the music in Journey!

    I love it too. I’m so excited when I think about it – goosebumps already! (*laughs*)

    Indeed! Just thinking of the main theme…

    Yes, it is wonderful! So, we worked on a lot of different projects together, but for me, playing on bigger movie projects specifically, not in the orchestra but as a soloist, came through a music video I released called ‘Queen Bee’. It was my first music video. An electric cello heavy metal video. I think that came out in 2009. Then Hans Zimmer, John Debney, Brian Tyler, a few composers saw the video and they actually just contacted me. Hans had his office call my cell phone. John Debney just wrote to me on Facebook like, “Hey, I saw your video!”

    Really it was unexpected. I didn’t make music videos to try to be on scores. For me, I wanted to play with Rammstein. I was hoping like, “Oh, maybe a metal band will see my video and invite me on tour!” But that didn’t happen. (*laughs*)

    And it was funny because that video started a completely different career, but I loved it, I really enjoyed it. I remember going in for Iron Man II, John Debney‘s score, and he just let me be myself. It was like a guitar solo, like, “Yeah, just play whatever over the changes”, so I got the solo. I got to be free to experiment. (…)

Interview by Gorka Oteiza

    ***

    On Saturday, December 7, the Paul VI Audience Hall in the Vatican will host the 5th edition of the musical event that combines artistic beauty and concern for the poor and which this year will see the participation of the Oscar-winning composer Hans Zimmer.

    Together with him will be Monsignor Marco Frisina, Dario Vero and the cellist Tina Guo.

    The evening will be hosted by the actress Serena Autieri.

    An Act of Love

    “This is not just a concert,” Zimmer continued, “it is an act of love, a concrete gesture towards those less fortunate, an invitation to reflect on what unites us as human beings.”

    An event, therefore, that “allows us to connect with the guests of honor, our most vulnerable brothers,” the composer explained.

    “True wealth is the ability to share and give,” Zimmer added.

    The concert, scheduled for tomorrow afternoon at 5:30 pm in the Paul VI Hall, will be attended by 7,000 people, including approximately 2,000 poor people: they will be the guests of honor, invited by the Dicastery for the Service of Charity through the numerous voluntary associations that assist them daily.

    Music is union

    Also present at the presentation press conference were Monsignor Marco Frisina, composer and artistic director, Tina Guo, cellist and composer, and the creators of the initiative Riccardo Rossi and Gualtiero Ventura.

    “I hope that this evening can inspire all of us to look to the future with optimism, reminding us that, through music and compassion, we can build a more just and humane world,” Zimmer emphasized.

    The concept was reiterated by Frisina: “Music is a gesture of union and communion, it can elevate everyone. The union of different people and experiences leads to the same goal: to give something beautiful with music.”

    Created in 2015, the “Concert with the Poor” allows great figures from the world of classical music to come and perform before an audience of people living in poverty, giving them the opportunity to live an exceptional experience while also supporting the Pope’s charitable works.

    In 2016, the great Italian composer Ennio Morricone performed one of his last concerts as part of this charity event. Another important performance was in 2019 as it featured Nicola Piovani, composer of the soundtrack of the 1997 award-winning film Life is Beautiful (La vita è bella).

    This year, one of the greatest names in film music is performing at the Vatican: Hans Zimmer.

    This German composer has created more than 200 soundtracks in his career, including The Lion King, Gladiator, Pirates of the Caribbean, Interstellar, The Last Samurai and, more recently, Dune.

    Proceeds of paid tickets will go to charity

    The composer sought after by all of Hollywood will not be alone on stage: He will be accompanied by the Nova Opera Orchestra and the Choir of the Diocese of Rome, that is celebrating its 40th anniversary this year. The latter is directed by sacred music composer and priest Marco Frisina, who will also be taking part in the concert.

    Last but not least, the famous Grammy-nominated Chinese-American cellist Tina Guo will perform at the event.

    “There will be about 2,000 poor people from more than 25 different voluntary associations who take care of them on a daily basis, convened through the Dicastery for Charity,” Gualtiero Ventura, a Knight of Malta and one of the organizers of the event, told me. “We have reached the maximum capacity of the hall with the tickets given to the various sponsors, organizers and artists who will perform at the concert together with the tickets made available with reservation on the concert website. All tickets are obviously free, and the 1,000 tickets made available on the site were booked within 12 minutes of requests being opened. After the concert, all the poor people present will be given a complete hot dinner upon leaving.”

    OFFICIAL DESCRIPTION

    The “Concert with the Poor and for the Poor” was created in 2015 from an idea by Riccardo Rossi and Gualtiero Ventura, with the Artistic Direction of composer and Conductor Monsignor Marco Frisina. Since its first edition, it has received the Blessing of Pope Francis. The Concert with the Poor is organized by Nova Opera to offer an experience of art and culture to the most disadvantaged people.

    Since the first edition, the venue for the concert has been the evocative Paul VI Audience Hall in the Vatican, which can accommodate around 8,000 people, including more than 3,000 seats reserved for the less fortunate: homeless people, migrants, detainees with special permits, and those living in mental and social distress, they are invited through the Dicastery for the Service of Charity – Office of the Papal Almoner and numerous volunteer organizations that support them daily. They are given the privilege of being the “special guests” of the event. At the end of the event, a packed dinner and other comfort items are also distributed to the 3,000 special guests.

    From the very beginning, the great event has seen the participation of prestigious names in the field of international music. The editions have featured renowned conductors such as Daniel Oren, Speranza Scappucci, Ennio Morricone, Nicola Piovani accompanied by the constant presence of Monsignor Marco Frisina. Under their direction, prestigious symphony orchestras and choirs have taken turns, such as the Orchestra of the Teatro dell’Opera di Roma, the Salerno Philharmonic Orchestra Giuseppe Verdi, the Rome Sinfonietta Orchestra, the Italian Cinema Orchestra, the Choir of the National Academy of Santa Cecilia, the Choir of the Teatro dell’Opera di Roma and the Choir of the Diocese of Rome   

Here below is a link to a scene from Gladiator which features the music composed by Hans Zimmer

    Hans Zimmer in Rome today

    And here is a picture of Hans Zimmer and myself today, December 6, just after the press conference to present tomorrow’s concert. We were standing in the shadow a few feet closer to the camera, and the photo would have been dark, and Hans kindly turned and said, “Let’s go back a little,” so we went back a few steps, into the sunlight

    And here is a photograph of internationally known cellist Tina Guo with myself in the Vatican press office this afternoon. Tina said she needed to practice today for the concert tomorrow…

THE ARTISTS AND MUSICAL ENSEMBLES

HANS ZIMMER, composer, producer.

(12 Oscar® nominations, including 2 Academy Awards, 10 BAFTA nominations, 15 Golden Globe nominations, 20 GRAMMY nominations).

    Hans Zimmer has scored more than 500 projects across all mediums, which, combined, have grossed more than 28 billion dollars at the worldwide box office. Zimmer has been honored with two Academy Awards®, three Golden Globes®, four Grammys®, an American Music Award, and a Tony® Award. His work highlights include Dune: Part One, Top Gun: Maverick,  No Time to Die,  Gladiator,  The Thin Red Line,  As Good as It Gets,  Rain Man,  The Dark  Knight trilogy,  Inception, Thelma and Louise,  The Last Samurai,  12 Years A Slave,  Blade Runner 2049 (co-scored w/ Benjamin Wallfisch) and Dunkirk, as well as multiple seasons of David Attenborough’s Prehistoric Planet, including the upcoming third season, and Denis Villeneuve’s Dune: Part Two, the follow-up to his Academy Award®-winning score for Dune: Part One. Upcoming,  he scored  Steve McQueen’s  Blitz  and Joseph Kosinski’s  F1.

    Beyond his award-winning compositions, Zimmer is a remarkably successful touring artist, having just concluded his second “Hans  Zimmer Live” European tour and performing in the Middle East at Dubai’s renowned Coca-Cola Arena for two consecutive nights as well as Formula 1’s Singapore Grand Prix.

    MARCO FRISINA, composer and conductor

    Marco Frisina graduated in composition from the Conservatorio di Santa Cecilia and obtained a licentiate in Sacred Scripture from the Pontifical Biblical Institute.

    Ordained as a priest in 1982, he serves his ministry in the Diocese of Rome. He is currently a Consultant for the Dicastery for Evangelization and Spiritual Assistant of the Pontifical Academy of Virtuosi at the Pantheon.

    As the author of liturgical hymns known and appreciated in Italy and abroad, often translated into various languages, in 1984, he founded the Choir of the Diocese of Rome, with which he leads the most important liturgies, some of which are presided over by the Holy Father.

    In 1991, his collaboration with Rai’s international “Bible” project began, both as a biblical consultant and as the composer of the films’ soundtracks. He has also composed the scores for over thirty films with historical and religious themes. His musical production includes about forty Sacred Oratorios and Theatrical Works, among which the following deserve mention: The Divine Comedy, the world’s first musical adaptation of Dante’s masterpiece, continuously performed in theaters throughout Italy since 2007; In hoc Signo, performed in Belgrade in 2013; Passio Caeciliae, performed in 2013 in both Rome and New York; Passio Christi, which debuted in Malaga in April 2018.

    He was the coordinator of the Jubilee of Choirs in 2016 and the International Choir Meeting in the Vatican, involving thousands of choristers from around the world, which took place in 2014, 2018, and 2024, on the occasion of the 40th anniversary of the founding of the Choir of the Diocese of Rome. Since 2015, he has been the Artistic Director of the “Concert with the Poor,” an event where he alternated conducting with Maestros Daniel Oren and Speranza Scappucci, and composers Ennio Morricone and Nicola Piovani, alongside international-level orchestras and choirs. In 2018, his first interview-book, Mio canto è il Signore (“My Song is the Lord”), was published, and in 2019, the book La santità è il volto più bello della Chiesa (“Holiness is the Most Beautiful Face of the Church”), written together with Cardinal Angelo De Donatis, was released. In 2022, he composed the Mass for the Holy Year of St. James in Santiago de Compostela, performed in the presence of the King of Spain. In 2023, he composed and conducted the Mass for the 1700th Anniversary of the Lateran Basilica in the Papal Basilica of St. John Lateran.

    TINA GUO, musician and composer

    Tina Guo, GRAMMY nominee and Female Artist of the Year at the BRIT Awards, is known for her genre versatility as a virtuoso cellist, multi-instrumentalist, singer, composer, and entrepreneur. One of the most recorded solo cellists of all time in film, TV, and video game soundtracks, Tina’s recent projects include DUNE, DUNE 2, Gran Turismo, Top Gun: Maverick, The Creator, Minecraft Legends, Shazam! Fury of the Gods, and The Flash. Tina composed the main theme for Wonder Woman with her long-time friend and collaborator Hans Zimmer. As a classical soloist, Tina has performed with the San Diego Symphony, the State of Mexico National Symphony, the Thessaloniki State Symphony in Greece, the Petrobras Symphony in Brazil, and the Vancouver Island Symphony. She has collaborated with violinist Midori Goto and completed four national tours in Mexico and Italy, performing the Cello Concertos of Shostakovich, Dvorak, Haydn, and Saint-Saëns. Tina has been the electric cello soloist in the Hans Zimmer Live tour since 2016. She also performed with Hans at the Inception premiere and has been a featured performer at many video game events, including the League of Legends World Championship, Comic-Con, BlizzCon, and Video Games Live. From 2011 to 2013, she was the electric cello soloist on the worldwide tour Michael Jackson: The Immortal by Cirque Du Soleil, performing globally.

    She received a GRAMMY nomination in 2017 for Best New Age Album for Inner Passion with pianist Peter Kater, as well as a nomination for Female Artist of the Year at the 2018 Classic BRIT Awards. With her solo project, Tina recently headlined Wacken Open Air 2024 on the Louder Stage.

    DARIO VERO, composer and conductor

    Composer, orchestrator, and conductor. He studied in both Europe and the United States of America. He graduated from the Conservatorio di Santa Cecilia in Rome.

    Then Dario won a scholarship at the Hollywood Music Workshop in Vienna, and he studied with the famous Hollywood orchestrator Mr. Conrad-Pope (Star Wars, Jurassic Park, The Matrix, Harry Potter) and the composer Joe Kraemer (Mission: Impossible – Rogue Nation, The Way of the Gun, Jack Reacher).

    Dario is also active on the institutional side, working as official composer for the European Parliament, the Italian Senate, the Matteotti Foundation, RAI, Bronzi di Riace, Deluxe Film Festival, Noir in Festival, Lux Prize, the U.S. Embassy.

    Since 2017, he has been collaborating on a regular basis with the “Kiev Virtuosi” orchestra.

    His collaboration with them also extended to the production of Tom Cruise “Mission: Impossible”.

    Among his most recent works are the box-office hit “Mavka”, Sofia Coppola’s “Priscilla”, the TV Series “Klincus”, produced by Rai, ZDF, Fabrique d’Images, and Telegael, and the movie “The Daughter”(Warsaw Film Festival 2024- official selection).

    His orchestral soundtracks are available on iTunes, Spotify, Apple Music, and all the digital stores.

    SERENA AUTIERI, Actress and Singer

    Serena Autieri is recognized by audiences as a versatile performer, having been a leading figure in the musical theater scene for decades as an actress, singer, and television host. Born in Naples, she grew up nurturing a passion for the performing arts. From a very young age, she dedicated herself to studying acting, dance, and singing. In her hometown, she began her theatrical and musical training, which became the solid foundation for her future artistic career. Her career is marked by numerous successes, including duets with renowned artists such as Michael Bolton, Renato Zero, Claudio Baglioni, Lucio Dalla, Amedeo Minghi, Ron, Edoardo Bennato, and Andrea Bocelli.

    In theater, she has worked with masters such as Giorgio Albertazzi, Pietro Garinei, Armando Trovajoli, Gino Landi, and Piero Maccarinelli. In cinema, she has collaborated with acclaimed directors including Carlo and Enrico Vanzina, Neri Parenti, Leonardo Pieraccioni, Alessandro Siani, Ficarra and Picone, and Fausto Brizzi.

    She has starred in numerous TV series for Rai and Mediaset and has hosted various television programs, including the 53rd Sanremo Festival alongside Pippo Baudo, the David di Donatello Awards, Uno Mattina Estate, Dedicato, Premio Campiello, and Cantare è d’amore.

    In 2015, she won the Nastro d’Argento award as Best Actress in a Comedy, and two SIAE Gold Tickets with the box-office hits Il Principe Abusivo in 2013 and Si Accettano Miracoli in 2015.

    In 2016, she received the Italian Musical Award for Best Actress in a Leading Role for the musical Vacanze Romane and the Alberto Sordi Award. Walt Disney selected her as the Italian voice of Elsa in the animated films Frozen and Frozen II, with the song Let It Go winning an Oscar for Best Original Song.

    On stage, she has been a leading actress since her youth in productions such as Vacanze Romane, Diana & Lady D, La Sciantosa, Rosso Napoletano, and My Fair Lady.

    From June 2024, her international presence has been increasingly sought after. She performed at the Italian Republic Day celebrations in Abu Dhabi and, in July, represented Italy in Los Angeles during the global tour of the Amerigo Vespucci. Her performances were so well-received that she was invited to perform in Tokyo and Singapore as part of the tour.

    On April 13, 2025, she will inaugurate the Osaka Expo as the ambassador of the Italian Pavilion.

    NOVA OPERA ORCHESTRA

    The Nova Opera Orchestra is made up of the finest musicians in Italy and Europe. It was founded to engage musicians and conductors in international-level musical and artistic experiences, with a repertoire ranging from classical and opera music to film soundtracks. The orchestra has participated in important cultural and charitable events both in Italy and abroad and has collaborated with renowned artists and performers.

    CHOIR OF THE DIOCESE OF ROME

    The Choir of the Diocese of Rome was founded in 1984 by Monsignor Marco Frisina with the purpose of animating diocesan liturgies. Since then, it has performed at numerous events in service of the Diocese of Rome and its Bishop, the Pope. Among the various musical, cultural, and concert events the Choir has participated in, notable mentions include the presentations of RAI’s Bible Project films, participation in the 56th Spoleto Festival, and the Perosi Festival 2022.

    Over the years, the choir has recorded numerous albums and soundtracks and is often invited to perform concerts in Italian dioceses as well as abroad in countries such as France, Germany, Austria, Spain, Turkey, and the United States. In 2014, it celebrated its 30th anniversary by organizing the first International Meeting of Choirs in the Vatican.

    During the Holy Year of Mercy, it promoted the first Jubilee of Choirs, and in 2024, it organized the fourth International Meeting of Choirs in the Vatican, events attended by over 8,000 singers in Paul VI Hall in the Vatican. The choir regularly participates in the Concert with the Poor in the Vatican and celebrated its 40th anniversary in 2024.

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