History[edit]

During the 1960s, pop music on radio and in both American and British film moved away from refined Tin Pan Alley to more eccentric songwriting and incorporated reverb-drenched rock guitar, symphonic strings, and horns played by groups of properly arranged and rehearsed studio musicians.^[5] The rapid development of multitrack recording in the mid 1960s also drove the ability of producers to create recordings with ever more complex and sonically sophisticated arrangements. Pop arrangers and producers worked orchestral pop into their artists' releases, including George Martin and his strings arrangements with the Beatles, and John Barry for his scores to the James Bond films.^[6] Also in the 1960s, a number of orchestral settings were made for songs written by the Beatles, including symphonic performances of "Yesterday" by orchestras. Some symphonies were specifically founded for playing predominantly popular music, such as the Boston Pops Orchestra.^[4] Nick Perito was one of orchestral pop's most accomplished arrangers, composers, and conductors.^[7]


According to Chris Nickson, the "vital orchestral pop of 1966" was "challenging, rather than vapid, easy listening".^[8] Spin magazine refers to Burt Bacharach and the Beach Boys' Brian Wilson as "gods" of orchestral pop.^[9] In Nickson's opinion, the "apex" of orchestral pop lay in singer Scott Walker, explaining that "in his most fertile period, 1967–70, he created a body of work that was, in its own way, as revolutionary as the Beatles'. He took the ideas of [Henry] Mancini and Bacharach to their logical conclusion, essentially redefining the concept of orchestral pop."^[10]


In the 21st century, few artists explore the genre, with the most notable being English supergroup The Last Shadow Puppets (formed by Arctic Monkeys frontman, Alex Turner and solo artist Miles Kane), and American artist Cody Fry.^[11]