'Petra Haden Goes to the Movies' live on Feb. 9

By Randy Lewis

Feb. 6, 2013 12 AM PT

Anyone who missed Petra Haden’s utterly charming performance recently at the Getty Museum with music from her new album, “Petra Goes to the Movies,” has another chance on Saturday at L.A.’s Unitarian Universalist Church.

The singer, who inventively reimagined and arranged instrumental movie music for her own multitracked voice on the album, will be joined by the same choir and handful of instrumentalists who backed her for the Getty Show to help deliver the harmony-rich music live.

At that performance, Haden called it “a dream come true” to sing themes from movies she grew up loving (“Cool Hand Luke,” “Psycho”) as well as more recent films she’s admired (“Social Network”).

Adding to the presentation of the music itself, Haden incorporates witty photos she had taken of herself outfitted like characters from many of the films (“Tootsie,” “A Fistful of Dollars”). The album was released Jan. 22 on Anti-. Pop & Hiss previously premiered her rendition of Bernard Hermann’s haunting “Psycho” music.

The climax of last month’s Getty show was her presentation of John Williams’ theme to the 1978 “Superman” starring Christopher Reeve, which found members of the audience (including her brother-in-law, Jack Black), bouncing in their seats and humming along.

Here’s the official video for that song, and pay special attention to the subtitles, which are every bit as inspired as the musical arrangement. The Unitarian church is located at 2936 W. 8th St., and the show starts at 7 p.m. Tickets are $13.50 to $18.