An Introduction to August Henry Gildner
August Henry Gildner is a pianist who mainly posts covers on his YouTube channel. He records his videos from a great angle where you can see the whole keyboard and see the actual notes that he is playing. Gildner’s focus is primarily on covering classical music although you can also find quite a few video game and film soundtrack covers in his library of videos. It seems to me that Gildner tends to cover music that he likes and not strictly what is popular, which I think is a very good approach to take while creating a YouTube presence. Today, instead of taking a look at just one song, I am going to look at two videos that caught my eye.
The first video I listened to while exploring Gildner’s channel was his rendition of the Main Theme from The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim, which is one of my favorite video game soundtracks of all time. This cover is actually a revised version of a cover he did a few years prior to this rendition and I think Gildner did a great job with this one. While listening, I was instantly transported back to when I was first playing Skyrim and I think that Gildner does an excellent job capturing the essence and pure splendor of the Elder Scrolls world in this skillful cover.
The second cover I checked out was Gildner’s cover of the Main Theme from Interstellar. Although Interstellar never quite captivated me the way it did others from a filmography standpoint, I always felt like the soundtrack was outstanding and served as a beautiful score for an ambitious movie. In his cover of the Main Theme from Interstellar, Gildner captures the elegance of Hans Zimmer’s piece, while also wonderfully portraying the senses of exploration and urgency that I feel the original presented.
Overall, August Henry Gildner is an excellent pianist who I am definitely looking to hear more from in the future. His talent and passion for his craft shine through in the videos that he shares on his YouTube channel and each presents both a pleasing listening experience and an opportunity to learn by watching Gildner stroke the keys. You can find a link to August Henry Gildner’s YouTube page here and I have embedded both his Skyrim and Interstellar covers below!
