The Partners unveil identity for LSO formed by tracking the conductor’s movement

Date
20 January 2017

The Partners has unveiled a new identity for the London Symphony Orchestra in anticipation of conductor Sir Simon Rattle taking up the role of music director. “Inspired by the original identity by The Partners, a historic marque that represents a conductor, the new brand uses the very same starting point that a concert performance would – the conductor,” explains the agency. “With Sir Simon Rattle at the very heart of the brand, we created a visual language that depicts the conductor’s movements, as he creates and shapes a musical performance, reflecting the emotional power of music through colour, texture and motion.”

The typography is presented in two forms: “one of grand, sweeping gestures used through extended rich, long-phrased passages; and one of fast, dynamic and dramatic gesture."

The Partners asked the conductor to perform excerpts of Elgar’s Variations on an Original Theme, ‘Enigma’, and worked with a multi-disciplinary team to live motion-capture his movements. The recording has been used to create the two custom headline typefaces, an animated film and associated stills.

The films were produced in collaboration with Tobias Gremmler, who turned the motion data into a series of animations that abstract the movement and combine them with the emotional qualities of the music. “Through Tobias’ creative interpretation, the cacophony of the Orchestra at full force becomes an explosive maelstrom of wood, brass and strings. In quiet and smouldering moments, the LSO string section conjures towers of smoke, and the sweeping gestures of Rattle are rendered in wires reminiscent of the strings on the instruments themselves,” says the LSO.

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The Partners: LSO

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The Partners: LSO

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The Partners: LSO

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The Partners: LSO

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The Partners: LSO

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The Partners: LSO

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The Partners: LSO

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The Partners: LSO

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About the Author

Owen Pritchard

Owen joined It’s Nice That as Editor in November of 2015 leading and overseeing all editorial content across online, print and the events programme, before leaving in early 2018.

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