Consolium 3000

Audio-visual project based on music of computer games

A pizza swallowed a ghost; a plumber who consumed some mushrooms was banging his head against a brick wall looking for money there; an angry Japanese man beat a pretty girl called Sonya. The colleagues who saw it decided to hold a consi(o)lium.

The audio-visual project Consolium 3000 was inspired by 8–16 bit video games. Music of old video games adapted for an electroacoustic orchestra was used, framed by original audio and video pieces. There are themes form the famous 20th century video games “Super Mario”, “Sonic the Hedgehog”, “Contra”, “Streets of Rage”, and “Mortal Kombat”. The fights in 20th century video games will turn into sounds of the 21st century.

The emergence of the first computer games is closely associated with military and space industries, where large forces of scientists, cybernetics specialists and other experts were allocated by diverse countries during the Cold War period. Programmers with a more pacifist mindset made use of the industry’s infrastructure, experimented with the first computers and their components and have created the first games, which became part of mass entertainment culture in the 1970s.

Classics never get old.

Author of the idea, composer-arranger Mykolas Natalevičius

While the violins and cello played, Liu-Keng tore off Khan’s head and threw it onto the cobblestones. The bassoon played and Mario appeared!

Director, video artist Mikas Žukauskas
.