rob and I went to see Bear McCreary’s “Themes and Variations” tour at the 9:30 Club, and man – we wish we had dragged the rest of the band with us! People will often ask what ilyAIMY’s musical influences are – or they try to guess. I think one thing we never think to respond with is “film & tv music.” We’re all movie geeks and have an appreciation for soundtracks. I think we all bring a “cinematic” aesthetic to our instrumental music – telling a story with sounds, not just the lyrics.
I hesitate to call Bear one of my “musical idols,” because he has Regular Guy Vibes. In interviews & behind the scenes stuff, he seems very relatable, down to earth and similarly geeky about what he loves – and this vibe also came across in his banter at the live show. Let’s just say I’ve been inspired by and appreciated his music since his first project – Battlestar Galactica in the early 2000s. That score cemented my love for the show – it was like nothing I’d heard before, and took the story to a new level. I arranged a few of the BSG pieces for multi-layered cello (you can listen to them here), and also for my string quartet. One of these even became our wedding processional! Bear says he was a 23-year-old kid when he got the BSG job and had no idea what he was doing, and a constant fear that he would be fired. Well, he must have done something right! It’s been fun to watch his career flourish over the years: he’s scored The Walking Dead, Black Sails, Godzilla, the He-Man reboot, the recent Lord of the Rings series, and much more. He’s also done some video game music he’s quite well known for, although that hasn’t been part of my world. Recently, he did a concept rock album called The Singularity, featuring Serj Tankian and Slash.
I was thrilled to see that Bear was bringing his tour to DC. I think rob saw the announcement separately at the same time and bought tickets before even asking me…good husband! So, we headed down to the 9:30 not quite sure what to expect, but knowing it would probably be a great mix of all his work. Our old bones now prefer seated shows, but we’ll relent to a standing show when it’s something worthwhile. We snagged a good balcony spot just after doors opened, and then had to wait an hour for the show to begin. We enjoyed the house music that was all film soundtracks: Conan the Destroyer, Star Wars, Star Trek, Indiana Jones and even The Mission! I assume Bear curated this playlist as I know he’s cited those as influences.
The opening act, Morgan Sorne, floored us! He is also part of Bear’s band, but they gave him a featured set to open the show. He does live vocal looping with Ableton and creates really hypnotic soundscapes. He has an absolutely unholy vocal range and control.

I didn’t take any videos at the show, but will post one of his older videos here that really impressed me:
Then Morgan’s rig was moved to the back of the stage and Bear came out with a 7-piece band.

They played a fiery 2-hour set that was a great sampling of his works, including several rock/metal songs from The Singularity. Musically, Bear stayed in the background for much of it and let his bandmates shine. And wow, they did! Band was super-tight with stellar playing, including multi-part vocal harmonies:
- Paul Cartwright, electric violin (he’s been Bear’s go-to fiddler since BSG)
- Brendan McCreary, lead vocals & acoustic guitar (Bear’s brother – absolutely incredible rock vocalist)
- Omer Ben-Zvi, lead guitar (blazing! He’s played on a lot of Bear’s stuff)
- Pete Griffin, bass (super solid and it was his birthday; we all sang to him!)
- the aforementioned Morgan Sorne: vocals, percussion
- Gene Hoglan, drums (he was rock solid, in a super-smooth way that didn’t seem to have much body movement during the performance. Not one of those flailing drummers, but that reads as having a lot of control. We looked him up and saw he was the drummer for Dethklok!! And some other thrash-metal bands.)
Bear of course busted out the hurdy gurdy for a few songs, which the audience went wild for.

The gurdy had to be retuned in the middle of the show, so he handed it off to his guitar tech and “vamped” for awhile with some stories about the God of War soundtrack. Forcing his guitar tech to learn about the hurdy gurdy kind of reminded me about working at House of Musical Traditions – we’ve all got to pick up bits of knowledge and sometimes pretend we’re experts on weird instruments!
I was a little surprised to see Bear playing so much guitar in the show – I know him as more of a pianist. I did some digging and discovered that up until 2023, he didn’t play much guitar at all! He wrote a blog post about how after he released The Singularity, he had a dream to bring it to the stage with a rock band, and he really wanted to be playing guitar in that band – so he took lessons over the next year and learned! Damn…continuing to impress me!

I can appreciate all the hard work that must have gone into developing and learning the arrangements for all the music that was performed, and the overall production of the show. Some pre-recorded tracks were used – which did fill things out a bit with some orchestral layers, or a bagpipe in needed places – but rob and I thought they could have gotten by without those and it still would have sounded amazing.

rob asked me what my favorite of the night was. Of course, I loved all the BSG stuff: they played Wander My Friends, Prelude To War, and All Along the Watchtower…but I remembered what a surprise the He-Man theme was! In Bear’s pantheon of work, we’d both forgotten about that one and how good it was. Bear said when Kevin Smith called him, he said he’d do the music on one condition: that he could make it sound like Conan the Barbarian scored by Metallica. And yeah, that’s exactly what it sounds like!!
They also performed the first song Bear ever wrote, as a 16-year-old in a band that won a prize at the state fair. They used the original recording as the intro and then kicked in with the full band, clearly developing it past what 16-year-old Bear had the capability of. He has a pride in his career arc while not being pretentious about it, which I like to see.
Another observation: this was possibly the most respectful audience – particularly for a rock show – that I can remember! Everyone was paying rapt attention and there was virtually no talking during songs. I mean…when does that ever happen these days?! I think that also speaks to the quality of the music and how it attracts people who respect the artistry of the performers.
So yeah – thoroughly enjoyable show, and a real treat to see this artist live that I’ve been following for about 20 years. Not every composer is a good performer, or a good ensemble leader – but Bear fits the bill for an all-around amazing musician. And being a player & listener myself who floats between many genres, I appreciate that he’s equally facile with metal, Celtic, orchestral and more.

I told myself I wasn’t going to be one of those people who has their phone out taking video during the show, but I was able to do it unobtrusively, and I couldn’t resist capturing some of my favorites. I think the audio came out decently well (and kudos to the sound crew at the 9:30 – sound is always good at this venue), so I thought I’d post some things here:
A bit of the Black Sails Theme, featuring Hurdy Gurdy
Wander My Friends, from Battlestar Galactica. With Brendan McCreary singing the Gaelic lyrics! This is one I’ve arranged for strings, and rob and I also used it as our wedding processional, played by Music By Anthem quartet!
Prelude to War, from Battlestar Galactica. This is one of the most epic pieces from the show – soundtrack to a big space battle and the leadup to it. I have a dream to arrange this for strings and play it with Mark Rooney & crew on Taiko. The string parts are verrrrry ambitious though, so we’ll see…
All Along the Watchtower, from Battlestar Galactica. When the song happens in the show, it’s a climactic moment with a huge plot reveal. Very cool use of music as a plot device, and a killer version of this song.
A bit of Godzilla – Bear’s version of the Blue Oyster Cult song, used in his score for 2019’s Godzilla, King of the Monsters. Fun fact: didja know ilyAIMY once opened for Blue Oyster Cult??