Cody Fry is ‘Flying’ high with orchestral compositions he’s bringing to Spokane Symphony stage

Although it may take a team of musicians for most to create grandiose and cinematic music featuring full orchestras, Cody Fry accomplishes such a feat with full creative control.

While Fry doesn’t necessarily like to subscribe himself to one genre, singer-songwriters and film scores inspired him to put his own twist on the two styles.

After a run on “American Idol” in 2015, Fry put the combination to the test with his fourth studio album, “Flying,” in 2017.

Fry now finds himself constantly creating songs full of musical diversity from the piano and guitar to full-blown compositions reminiscent of the days of Sinatra.

“I try to focus on the song first,” Fry said. “Creating something meaningful, lyrically, and something that when someone hears won’t just go in one ear and out the other.”

Then, he is able to “dress up” the song with layers of instrumentation and expressive composition to help tell the story behind each tune in scenic fashion.

Although the end result is a vividly picturesque track, Fry usually begins by sitting alone at a piano while writing the lyrics of personal thoughts and circumstances first.

As he works out the melody until he believes the song is “good by itself” (with just the piano accompaniment), some songs take an hour to finish while others take months.

Although Fry believes having such deep control over his creative vision does result in a more personal product, he also tends to listen back to his own work and can’t help but be self-critical.

“On the one hand, I’m like, ‘It’s a good reflection of me,’ but by the same token, it’s a good reflection of the things I need to work on,” Fry said.

Although “nobody may be more surprised” than Fry himself, throughout the 2020s, he has seen his world turn upside-down and dream after dream come true.

During the pandemic, Fry’s song “I Hear a Symphony” went viral on platforms such as TikTok, and charted all over the world, opening the ears of the masses to his unique sound. As the pandemic began to wane, he was nominated for a Grammy with his cover of the Beatles’ “Eleanor Rigby.”

Although such success was more than surprising, Fry was simultaneously unable to play for crowds or fans while seeing these new heights come to fruition.

“It was this weird feeling of like ‘I think something crazy is going on,’ but it wasn’t really happening in my real life because online is not real life,” Fry said with a laugh.

Now, he is able to finally play while crossing off another item on the list of accomplished dreams by playing live with a full symphony orchestra. He first did so in his home-base of Nashville in 2022 and went all out believing he may never be able to do such a grand performance ever again.

Yet, here he is after playing with dozens of symphony orchestras around the country with his next being the Spokane Symphony on Saturday – a show he is especially looking forward to, as he has friends in town and believes those of the Lilac City are some of the nicest people he’s ever met. Morihiko Nakahara is conducting.

“My goal with these shows is to really showcase the orchestra,” Fry said. “For a lot of pop shows you can go and see them and be like ‘I guess I can kind of hear the orchestra back there,’ but this is not that show.”

Fans should also know that Fry is on pace to release multiple albums next year, including a holiday record, but not too much can be said about those just quite yet.