Video Game Composer Receives Dream Award

Hollywood Arts, which provides arts and educational services for homeless and at-risk teenagers and young adults, hosted its first annual Dream Awards honoring top BMI video game composer Tommy Tallarico. The first charitable event of its kind to honor a member of the video game industry, proceeds went directly to Hollywood Arts to complete the renovation of a full-service art center located in Hollywood, Calif.

The dinner and awards ceremony featured the Hollywood Studio Symphony, a 36-piece orchestra that performed music from popular video games; COS Players, actors who dress as players of the games; Video Game Cabinets where guests got to play their favorite games; and an auction that included such items as an audio cameo in “HALO 3” and signed video game paraphernalia from “Guitar Hero 2.”

Tommy Tallarico is a video game industry icon and one of the most successful video game composers in history. His top titles include Disney’s “Aladdin,” “Earthworm Jim,” “Tony Hawk Pro Skater,” “Spider-Man,” “Metroid Prime” and “Advent Rising,” as well as top-selling popular game franchises such as “Madden Football,” “Blitz Football,” “Unreal,” “Pac-Man,” “Knockout Kings,” “Mortal Kombat,” “Twisted Metal” and “Time Crisis.” Tallarico is also the host and producer of The Electric Playground, a popular network show on video games, Co-Creator and Executive Producer of Video Games Live and the Founder and President of the Game Audio Network Guild.

Hollywood Arts is a new nonprofit art center located in the heart of Hollywood whose mission is to use interactions with the arts both therapeutically and to teach life and job-readiness skills that will empower at-risk and homeless teenagers to use their own talents to transition off the streets and change their lives.