If you’re reading this, odds are likely you don’t need much persuasion to attend a Video Games Live performance.

Game music has a way of infiltrating the mind of a gamer throughout his or her daily life, to the point that they will likely hear the Zelda key item fanfare during their wedding. Subsequently, the opportunity to hear some of the best and most iconic game music performed by a live, professional orchestra should be as appealing as an all-Kobe burger.

So when Video Games Live, the brainchild of industry composers Tommy Tallarico and Jack Wall, returned to my area, I jumped on tickets as soon as I could and got my friend, Matt, to come with me. Matt does love games, but I still like to think it was my reminder of how I once drove him to and from an Avril Lavigne concert, while having to stay for the concert as well, that convinced him he owed me his attendance and, maybe, a life of indentured servitude.

I wasn’t quite sure what to expect when I arrived — more due to the venue than the performance itself. Video Games Live had come to Artpark in Lewiston, NY, a quaint, beautiful historic village settled next to the Niagara River, and that’s what made me uneasy. Lewiston has an older, calmer, natural feel, with hometown businesses, bistros and bars that the students at nearby Niagara University seemed to keep away from in light of the flashier, rowdier spots just across the border in Canada. Nothing about Lewiston says it would have anything to do with gaming at all. And as Matt and I pulled up at Artpark, we spotted a few people in dresses and button-ups that made me wonder if my shirt depicting the first board of Donkey Kong would be considered under dressed.

Those fears were dashed, however, upon entering the outside foyer where pre-event activities were being held. There were still people a little more formally dressed, but they were intermingled with fan shirts of every stripe, gathered around the Guitar Hero competition table or hanging out with handheld systems. Then, on one side of the area, I saw them: cosplayers.

Perhaps it’s only because it was my first real exposure to them, but I was truly surprised. I knew that Video Games Live holds cosplay contests, but again, I didn’t think my region had any people who did it. I thought maybe two or three people would show up in some quickly thrown together outfits. Instead, there were about a dozen people who obviously put time into their work. You had the common costumes, including two Links (one Ocarina of Time and one Twilight Princess, admittedly), a Lulu and a standard Princess Peach, but the group also included a Little Mac, a young Revolver Ocelot with dual gun-twirling talent and a summery Mario Sluggers Peach complete with pink bat. All of them were brought on the concert hall stage before the performance to decide the winner through audience applause. Lulu won, and it was a worthy choice, but come on, people! Dual gun-twirling!

After a hilarious tribute to Michael Jackson that put his Moonwalker sprite in other games and a video of Ms. Pac-Man getting chased around Manhattan, the performance began. Video Games Live often uses the “house band” of the region it stops at, and in this case it was the Buffalo Philharmonic Orchestra accompanied by the Buffalo Chamber Choir. Wall served as conductor.

The screen behind the orchestra switched to a game of Pong. “That brings back memories!” an older woman yelled from behind me. No one made an effort to quiet her, nor any other outbursts during the concert. In fact, as Tallarico would soon come out and tell the audience, cheering and responses were encouraged.

The beeps and blips of the Pong game transitioned into hits from the orchestra, and quickly they were off on a whirlwind tour of retro games up to the arcade version of Tetris, with simple pieces from games such as Space Invaders, Donkey Kong and Gauntlet all receiving the full-band treatment.

From that rousing beginning, it was on to segments concentrating on various games or series. According to Tallarico, Video Games Live has more than 60 different segments, fewer than one-third of which are played at an individual performance. It would be foolish to go in-depth regarding what I heard as many of the segments may not be performed at other venues, but hopefully a quick run-down will provide a taste of the kinds of games within the repertoire.

Metal Gear Solid was the first series directly featured and not only featured footage from all the games on the screen — largely in time with the music — but also included a fun little on-stage vignette with a guard and a cardboard box. Kingdom Hearts was next, although footage from the actual Disney movies was shown instead of the game (a trend that would continue through the night with any SquareEnix game music performed, for some reason).

Civilization IV I initially thought was an odd choice, but hearing the choir majorly kick in for the first time that night quickly changed my opinion. The audience was captivated, and that captivation only continued as pianist Martin Leung was introduced.

Leung gained fame on YouTube for his classical renditions of video games music on the piano, not to mention his blindfolded and speed-playing. His first act was a stunningly beautiful rendition of ten songs through the Final Fantasy series, and he came back later to perform the Mario Bros. theme blindfolded and a speed version of the Super Mario World’s Yoshi’s Island 2 theme that literally looked like someone had hit fast-forward on the man. The audience went nuts.

Classic Nintendo series were well-represented with the orchestra, featuring pieces from Mario, Zelda and Metroid (the second-most requested segment, according to Tallarico). Newer classics such as Warcraft and Halo also had their time, much to the excitement of the boy I sat next to, who halfway through the Halo suite began belting out notes at the top of his lungs. Inwardly, I felt just like that boy as soon as the orchestra went into its Chrono Trigger/Chrono Cross segment (the most-requested, according to Tallarico).

The double encore for the performance that night featured “One-winged Angel” from Final Fantasy 7 (which had cosplayers and fanart on the screen this time — thanks, SquareEnix) and Castlevania with Tallarico on guitar. There need to be more orchestra and guitar pairings in this world.

Among the segments, there were a couple opportunities for members of the audience to come on the stage and “play” for prizes. The first luck audience member got to play Space Invaders on the big screen while the orchestra provided the music. The biggest, and best, catch was that the game was motion-controlled. The player wore a shirt with the ship on the back and had to run across the stage to move his on-screen counterpart, hitting a Jeopardy!-like signaling button to fire. He had six lives and 2 minutes to beat the first stage. He lost.

The second on-stage player was the winner of the Guitar Hero contest before the show. His challenge was to play “Sweet Emotion” off of Guitar Hero: Aerosmith and score 175,000 points on Hard. He demanded to play it on Expert, instead. He also lost, but hearing an orchestrated version of Aerosmith out of the deal wasn’t bad at all.

During intermission, my “class” curiosity got the better of me and I scoped the audience to seejust who was at the show. Maybe it was just me, but the groupings started to become evident. The guys with shirts like me, who occasionally spouted “That’s what she said!” or “Freebird!”? Those were the game nerds. The young adult males in polo shirts who came back from intermission cradling several cans of $4 mini-beer from the concession stand? Those had to be the Halo gamers. The people who were more formally dressed, even to the point of having sweaters around their necks? They were either here because they followed the orchestra or were dragged here by their kids.

Prejudicial? Absolutely. But it doesn’t really matter because from what I saw, everyone was having a good time. Sure, there were nerdy references that likely went over the heads of many, and not everyone was going to know all the games involved, but once the orchestra struck up, it made no difference. The music, no matter how much you knew or cared about the game it was related to, was magnificently played and fully enjoyable in and of itself. As modern games continue to dive more deeply into orchestrated soundtracks, the line between “game music” and “real music” will continue to disappear.

A meet-and-greet with Tallarico, Wall and Leung was held following the performance. All three were very friendly and definitely appear to enjoy what they do. While Wall signed my show soundtrack liner notes, I asked him what the best compliment is he has ever received from a non-gamer.

At first he gave me a sort of generic answer of how people say they never expected video game music to sound like this, but then he paused for a moment.

“There was a parent who told me, ‘I used to be worried about my son playing video games; about the violence, and he’s kind of a geek. But after seeing the concert and the people who came, I don’t worry about him anymore.’,” he said.

That made a lot of sense to me. All a concerned parent can usually pick up about a game such as Halo is that a bunch of people get shot. However, Video Games Live provides an opportunity to single out a couple elements of that game — a moving soundtrack and cinematics — that can help show a parent there can be more to the game than a killing simulation; that the designers had a deeper intent. Combine this with a variety of people in the audience who enjoy the game industry for different reasons and a parent truly could come out feeling that their child is not doomed to life in a basement.

Video Games Live succeeds as a family-friendly show — not just to children, but adults as well. It is a celebration of games and music, not only combined, but individually, such that anyone who attends can find something enjoyable to take home with them. If you’re below driving age and have worried about going to Video Games Live with your parents (no shame, kiddos — we’ve all been there), don’t. It’s an all-inclusive performance.

This article refers to the July 31, 2009 performance of Video Games Live at Artpark in Lewiston, NY. For possible changes to the show and a list of upcoming performances, visit www.videogameslive.com.