For one night every November, the newest thing at the Go West Film Fest is a movie that is a hundred years old. The house lights drop at the Kress, a western from the silent era flickers onto the screen, and at a keyboard just below it sits Rodney Sauer, watching the film with the rest of us and answering it, moment by moment, in music he is inventing as it plays. Silent film night has become one of our most beloved traditions, and Rodney is the reason. We are glad to say he will be back at the keys this November.
Silent Film Night at a Glance
Who: Rodney Sauer — founder of the Mont Alto Motion Picture Orchestra and a leading expert on music composed for the live accompaniment of silent movies
What: A classic silent western on the big screen with live, improvised piano accompaniment, followed by a conversation about the film's place in western history
When: Every November at the Go West Film Festival — Rodney returns in 2026, November 9–14
Where: Kress Cinema & Lounge, 817 8th Ave, downtown Greeley
Cost: Free, like everything at the festival
Hear more: mont-alto.com and rodneysauer.com
The Man at the Keyboard
Rodney Sauer is a musician, scientist, and graphic designer from Colorado, and an internationally recognized authority on early cinema and its musical scores. His path into that world began with a discovery: in 1994, at the University of Colorado Boulder, he came across a collection of silent-film orchestra music that had belonged to Al Layton, a Colorado theater music director of the 1920s. That trove inspired him to found the Mont Alto Motion Picture Orchestra, and in the three decades since he has become the person festivals call when they want a silent film to feel the way it felt in 1926 — not a curiosity behind glass, but a living show.
He is also one of the genre's significant archivists and a prolific composer in his own right. Over the years Rodney has acquired the orchestra libraries of five historic theaters, keeping copies for performance and donating the originals to CU Boulder's American Music Research Center so the music survives him — and in 2023 he returned to campus as a guest artist, co-teaching a course where students compiled and performed silent film scores from the archives. Beyond the film work, he presents concert-lectures on photoplay music, publishes his own compositions, and keeps Colorado's vintage dance halls supplied with waltzes. The man is busy.
What makes his festival appearances special is the form he works in. Silent film accompaniment is a performance discipline with real stakes: the musician has to know the film, read the room, and commit — there is no hiding at the keyboard for ninety minutes. When Rodney improvises through a chase or lands a gag in perfect time with a stunt, the audience hears a conversation between 1926 and right now. That is not something a recorded soundtrack can do.
What Is the Mont Alto Motion Picture Orchestra?
Mont Alto is a five-piece Colorado chamber ensemble that revives the lost repertoire of the silent film orchestras. In the silent era, theaters did not make music up from scratch — they drew on vast published libraries of "photoplay music," pieces written to match specific moods and situations, and a good music director fitted a piece to every scene. Mont Alto works the same way, compiling scores from those historic libraries using the original techniques. The New York Times' Dave Kehr called the results "often breathtakingly beautiful."
The numbers behind that praise: since 1994 the orchestra has scored more than 150 silent films and recorded over 40 of those scores for DVD, Blu-ray, and television, working with the Criterion Collection, Kino Lorber, Flicker Alley, and the San Francisco Silent Film Festival, among others. If you have ever stayed up for Turner Classic Movies' Silent Sunday Nights, you have probably heard Mont Alto without knowing it — their recordings accompany many of the pre-sound films in that series. The orchestra appears regularly at the Telluride Film Festival, the TCM Classic Film Festival, and silent film festivals from San Francisco to Kansas. When you attend silent film night in Greeley, you are hearing an artist whose work plays Grauman's Egyptian Theater in Hollywood — for free, a few blocks from home.
And yes, the repertoire runs deep in our genre: Mont Alto has scored Buster Keaton's Go West (1925), Tom Mix's Sky High (1922), The Vanishing American (1925) — the first western filmed in Monument Valley — and The General (1926), among others. A festival named Go West could hardly ask for a better-matched collaborator.
How Do You Score a Film That Has No Sound?
Two ways, and Rodney is a master of both. With Mont Alto, he builds a score in advance — studying the film scene by scene and fitting historical photoplay music to each one, the way theater orchestras did a century ago. At our festival, he works the older, wilder way: solo at the keyboard, improvising in real time. Theater pianists of the 1910s and 20s did exactly this in thousands of small-town houses across America, including, once upon a time, in Greeley.
Watching him do it is half the show. The music gallops when the horses do, holds its breath before the draw, and finds something tender when the hero finally gets the girl. Kids in the audience who have never sat through a black-and-white film forget within minutes that no one on screen is speaking. That is the whole secret of silent film, and it takes a live musician to prove it.
Silent Film Night at Go West
Rodney first performed at Go West in 2019, accompanying Ramona (1928) — the sweeping California story filmed in the last years of the silent era — and he has performed at every festival since. Each year he hosts our silent film night: he introduces the picture, accompanies it live, and then leads a conversation about where the film sits in the history of the western. One favorite from those years: Tom Mix soaring across the screen in Sky High (1922), dropping from a biplane into the Grand Canyon while Rodney's keyboard kept pace with every stunt. The talk afterward is as much a draw as the film — silent westerns are where the genre's whole visual language was invented, and there is no better guide to that history than the man who just spent an evening inside it.
If you want the deeper story of how those films shaped everything that came after, our post on what makes a western a western picks up the thread, and our essays and reviews carry it further.
See Him Live This November
Rodney joins us again for the twelfth annual Go West Film Festival, November 9–14, 2026, in downtown Greeley. Which silent western he will bring to life this year is a secret we are keeping until the full schedule lands in September — sign up for our newsletter or follow along here to find out first. Like every screening at the festival, silent film night is free, seating at the Kress is first come, first served, and this is the night that fills up. Come early, stay for the conversation.
In the meantime, you can hear Mont Alto's recorded scores at mont-alto.com and find Rodney's performances and compositions at rodneysauer.com. If silent film night has meant something to you over the years, a donation is what keeps the piano tuned and the festival free — and we can always use more volunteers to usher the busiest night of our week.
Keep Silent Film Night Free — Donate
Frequently Asked Questions
Who is Rodney Sauer?
Rodney Sauer is a Colorado musician, founder of the Mont Alto Motion Picture Orchestra, and an internationally recognized authority on early cinema and its musical scores. He hosts and accompanies the Go West Film Festival's silent film night each November.
When did Rodney Sauer first perform at the Go West Film Fest?
In 2019, when he accompanied Ramona (1928). He has performed at every Go West Film Fest since.
What is the Mont Alto Motion Picture Orchestra?
A five-piece Colorado chamber ensemble founded in 1994 that revives the repertoire of silent film orchestras. Mont Alto has scored more than 150 silent films and recorded over 40 scores for DVD, Blu-ray, and Turner Classic Movies.
What is photoplay music?
Photoplay music is the published library music that silent-era theater orchestras used to accompany films — pieces written for specific moods and situations, fitted to each scene by a music director. Mont Alto compiles its scores from these historic libraries using the original techniques.
Will there be live music at the 2026 silent film night?
Yes. Rodney Sauer returns to host and accompany silent film night at the twelfth annual Go West Film Festival, November 9–14, 2026. The film will be announced with the full schedule in September.
Is silent film night free to attend?
Yes. Like every Go West Film Fest event, silent film night at the Kress Cinema & Lounge is free, with seating first come, first served.
Where can I hear Mont Alto's music?
At mont-alto.com and rodneysauer.com, and on their recorded scores for silent film releases from the Criterion Collection, Kino Lorber, Flicker Alley, and Turner Classic Movies.
A hundred-year-old film, a live piano, and a room full of neighbors in the dark. Some traditions do not need updating. We will save you a seat near the keyboard.