'The Last Airbender' concert helps craft new era for animated franchise

By Danielle Broadway LOS ANGELES (Reuters) -Fans sang along on Sunday in Los Angeles to celebrate the 20th anniversary orchestra concert of “Avatar: The Last Airbender,” which features music from the popular 2005 animated Nickelodeon series. "It's really cool to get a younger generation in to see an orchestra concert and get 'em to see something that they're excited about because they know and love Avatar,” conductor Emily Marshall told Reuters at the Dolby Theatre. The 2025 "Avatar: The Last Airbender" tour takes place in over 80 cities across the globe and is based on the story of a boy named Aang, the last Airbender and the world's protector called the Avatar, who journeys to restore balance despite a war dominated by the Fire Nation. Marshall believes it was important to have a team so dedicated to ensuring the show was authentic for fans. "It is really special that the whole original creative team of "Avatar" was involved in the creation of our show here," she said. Original composer for the show, Jeremy Zuckerman, never imagined that he would go from knowing very little about scoring music to composing for an award-winning franchise. However, the course of his life changed in 2005 when he began working on the music for the show with co-creators Michael Dante DiMartino and Bryan Konietzko.  "It's so satisfying finally seeing these pieces performed by humans, because originally all the orchestra was samples," Zuckerman said. The live performance offers fans a chance to hear Asian instruments like the Erhu, a Chinese stringed instrument, and the Taiko drums from Japan. Some of the concert music features the "Agni Kai" battle music and the campy song "Secret Tunnel."  DiMartino and Konietzko spent two years creating a live-action adaptation of the first “Avatar” series for Netflix until parting ways with the studio in 2020, explaining that “creative differences” caused them to depart the project. The live-action show debuted in 2024 under the leadership of Albert Kim for the first season. Jabbar Raisani and Christine Boylan will be directing the next two seasons after Kim stepped down in 2024. In 2021, the "Avatar" co-creators announced that they were teaming up with Nickelodeon again to form their own production company and division of Nickelodeon called Avatar Studios that will continue the world-building of the original show with new projects. "The two main things that we've got in the pipeline and hopefully coming out in the next year or two is the big feature film starring Aang and his friends. They're a little bit older now. The animation is looking incredible and I can't wait until it shows in theaters and everybody can enjoy it," DiMartino said at the Dolby. "Then we have ‘Seven Havens,’ which is about a girl named Avatar Pavi, who is the Avatar after Korra. She's an Earthbender. So, a lot of mystery around the show and it's also gorgeous kind of new style," he added. Zuckerman, who also composed the music for the sequel "The Legend of Korra", will return for the upcoming film "The Legend of Aang: The Last Airbender” and the series "Avatar: Seven Havens."  (Reporting by Danielle Broadway and Sarah Wemy; Editing by Saad Sayeed)

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