They started off with FF7 prelude and bombing mission before saying anything. Great intro, got you really pumped. This was followed by a 1-3 medley and at some point, Man with the Machine Gun (which should just not be played by an orchestra but I'll say no more on that).
An absolutely brilliant arrangement of Eyes on Me sung by Susan Calloway (who will be doing voice acting in FF14 if I heard correctly) was joined by a really nice selection of clips from FF8. She also sang Suteki de Na, which was great, and it was actually my first time hearing the song as I've never played X. She also sang Kiss me Goodbye from FFXII, and I felt her voice was more fitting to the song than whoever sang the original on the game ending.
Arnie Roth's arrangement of Clash on the Big Bridge and FFXIII's Blinded by Light (the only non-Uematsu piece, I think) were full of energy too. I hope Arnie's proud of his arrangement of Clash because it's grandiose and I enjoyed it.
Dear Friends was real nice. There was a guitarist for that and a flamenco song from IX whose name I don't remember.
The encore was of course One Winged Angel, and the audience acted as the chorus, chanting 'Se-phi-roth! Se-phi-roth!' It was nice to hear some member of the audience attempt the rest of the latin too, as it was displayed with clips of Advent Children.
Some of the drum parts from the games simply do not belong in an orchestra setting like this in my opinion. It's no good for the performers either and you can tell. Some drum, driving parts simply need a rearrangement, it's always weird when the drum parts teeter on usurping the rest of the orchestra. I'm nit-picking though.
Overall super great concert. Great show!
Unfortunate things: some of the FF fanbase needs to wash more often and not sneak in bottles of alcohol to the orchestra. For the most part, the crowd was really good too though. I saw a red mage and some Rinoa hair-dyes.
Here's Susan's Suteki Da Ne:
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