When the Chinese pianist (I have been roundly told off by three readers for referring him as a “Chinaman” recently, which I learn is a derogatory term in some places) Lang Lang was signed to Sony, he was signed not only to make conventional classical music recordings but as a “brand ambassador”. In other words, his activities could stretch across all arms of the Sony behemoth.

We’ve some of that already, with the 3D component of his recital Blu-Ray promoting Sony’s audio-visual hardware. But now comes something of a radical move. A press release arrived recently trumpeting the fact that Lang Lang had recorded the soundtrack to, wait for it, Sony’s latest (and long-awaited by regular gamers, I’m told) PlayStation 3 game, Gran Turismo 5. My question is, what’s the point? I mean, I can see the point for Lang Lang, in that he potentially reaches a vast new audience and presumably gets quite well paid for his troubles.

But what’s the point for the makers of the game? I can answer my own question immediately by pointing to the fact that here I am writing about it and you might now go out and buy the game (I won’t, but that’s principally because I get so addicted to these things that I don’t dare own a games console). That’s not what I mean though. Is there an artistic point?

Gaming fans talk about games as works of art in their own right now, and certainly many of them have budgets to rival Hollywood films (and some of them make more money). So does having an accomplished pianist on the soundtrack to a car racing game make a difference? Apart from anything else, not to sound sniffy (though I suspect this will), would most gamers know the difference between using Lang Lang and using an unknown who can get through the music with a degree of competence?

If we are going to think of games as works of art, then there’s every reason that gamers should have the best – why should they not experience a piece of music to as high a degree as a classical music collector? And let’s not forget that games have their accompanying soundtrack discs and downloads.

But do gamers themselves share that perception? Is the soundtrack an artistic experience to them? What the heck is an artistic experience anyway?

That’s as far down that philosophical track as I can bear to go today. A more fun way of testing these questions is to play the game and, courtesy of our sister magazine Stuff, I just have. I’m not a huge fan of motoring games (round and round the track we go) so I concentrated on the music.

Well, the opening credits work nicely, with our piano star delivering a restless performance of Prokofiev’s Piano Sonata No 7, nicely backing up split-screen images of a car manufacturing production line. Thereafter, although I managed to find a classical music channel on the game’s music player I was never able to make it play while actually racing, so Lang Lang’s sensitive tones kept fading to a heavy drum beat and rock music.
I can’t see quite how solo piano music could possible have matched the sensory experience of pounding tyres along the track, burning rubber, spraying sand, that kind of thing.

Will Lang Lang and Gran Turismo 5 do what previous games have done for, say, Gregorian chant? Or put it another way – will Lang Lang and Prokofiev do for Gran Turismo 5 do what surely no other classical music has yet done for a game, namely, make it more popular? It would be rather cool (I use that word advisedly) if the tail wagged that particular dog.