Fighting perfectionism turning pop songs into classical music

Josep Castanyer Alonso is a pro cellist in the Stockholm Royal Philharmonica, who is turning annoying pop songs into classical fugues, ON THE PIANO.

Robin Danehav and Isak Friberg followed him for 6 months when he was composing his version of "Never gonna give you up" for his Youtube channel.

Josep Castayner Alonso is born in Barcelona and started playing piano and cello at a very young age. He then finished high school two years early to go to Cologne in Germany for music school and to become a professional cellist. At 21 years old he achieved the unimaginable thing of getting a full time position employment as a cellist at the Royal Stockholm Philharmonic Orchestra, being the youngest person in the entire line up.

This was all he ever dreamed of, but when it happen so early, it created the feeling of “what now?”.

So he started composing classical versions of annoying pop songs like Barbie Girl and the Angry Birds theme, on the piano.

This film explores his perfectionism, digital stage fright and the performance anxiety that comes with this whole thing.

Making this film has taught me a lot about the world of classical music. A world I was aware that it existed, but not much more. We’ve seen the inside of Stockholm Concert Hall, this giant blue mysterious building in central Stockholm that have this “cultural elite only” feeling to it.

It’s been super fun to make and I think the story is valuable and interesting to anyone, regardless if you are in to classical music or not.