Bernard Herrmann always liked to complain that Hollywood had pigeonholed him as a film composer. "From the time I began working for Hitchcock," he declared, "they decided I was a big suspense man." And anyone who has ever heard his scores for such films as North by Northwest and Vertigo will probably agree with the assessment: if Hitchcock was the master of suspense, Herrmann was undoubtedly its maestro. His score for Psycho remains the work for which he is best known, and audiences tonight have a chance to experience that film's famous shower scene—and its screeching strings—in a whole new way: projected on the big screen at the Sydney Opera House, with live accompaniment provided by the Sydney Lyric Orchestra.

The Australian, 5 January 2010