This News Friday

The July 15 Los Angeles Times Calendar section featured an article by Jon Burlingame about rejected scores, leading off with the recent replacement of Randy Newman with Jerry Goldsmith on Air Force One, and chronicling the practice and its history overall. This may be the first time this topic has been covered in a mainstream newspaper—it certain represents another rare occasion of film scoring (not songs in film) being covered in the mainstream press.

The July 15 edition of Variety included a tribute to the Newman family (Alfred, Lionel, David, Thomas, Maria and others), also with contributions from Jon Burlingame, as part of its special coverage of the Los Angeles music business scene. The Newmans were selected as recipients of the American Music Legends award, whatever that is. Lots of photos—it's neat to see the family resemblance.

I've been told that an article about Randy Newman's music, although not his movie music output, appears in the July '97 issue of Stereophile.

Questions and Answers...

I was asked if Cloud Nine, distributed by Silva Screen, has gone further with its plans to record more Hammer film music, as they had announced several months back. I haven't heard anything to that effect; Cloud Nine founder/producer David Wishart has reportedly been ill as of late—we should all wish him a speedy recovery—and that has no doubt slowed down his label's plans.

Does the DVD of Fly Away Home have an isolated music track...? Uh, anybody? So far DVD's with isolated music are Mars Attacks, Beetlejuice, and the upcoming Witches of Eastwick. Fly Away Home, remember, does not have a commercial soundtrack release—there was only a very hard to get promo send to Academy members. Mark Isham was the composer.

In laserdisc news, the new Fox deluxe edition of Patton (1970) features the complete original soundtrack, ordered as it would be for an album, on the analog tracks while the documentary is playing. The tracks were reconstructed by Nick Redman and sound terrific—there's also a bonus cut of Goldsmith conducting the trumpet overlays with the echoplex. You can hear them screw up and kick the button that turns the echoplex box off and on (it was just a tape delay gizmo). Varese Sarabande's new recording of Patton, Goldsmith conducting, will be out on July 29; this features the trumpets done acoustically, with a very different, concert-hall ambiance compared to the original soundtrack.

There is a CD to Eraser, by Alan Silvestri, on Atlantic Classics—you should be able to find it in stores. By the way, I learned the story behind the main title music in the film which replaced Silvestri's original cue: when the company doing the credits demo'd their main titles to the producers, someone who worked there had a composer friend whip up some music to help "sell" the concept. The producers liked the demo music so much they used it instead of Silvestri's music. Silvestri's original cue was included on the album.

Andre Leonard in Belgium had some information on whether a soundtrack exists to the Japanese animated feature, Ghost in the Shell: "The score of Ghost in the Shell (composer Kenji Kawai) exists as a Japanese import and can be found at Footlight (www.footlight.com)." Word up.

There will not be a commercial release of Christopher Young's music to Murder at 1600, because of the high cost of paying the re-use fees (i.e. their salaries over again) to the Los Angeles session musicians to release the music in another medium. Hey, before you bitch about that union rule, know this: those players rock. They are so amazingly good, you would not believe what they play on first sight. They have built a fighting force of extraordinary magnitude. They deserve our gratitude.

Finally, I have a questions to any readers who might actually follow others types of music. It's okay; in fact it's probably a good thing if you do. There's a new Wu-Tang Clan video out where the rap group is fighting killer bees in this big city; reportedly it ends with an orchestral sample, and I'm wondering if this snippet is actually from Jerry Goldsmith's score to The Swarm. If anybody sees this on MTV—that's a channel where they play popular music accompanied by little 3-minute, impressionistic movies—let me know!

Writing to Composers

Hopefully this will soon be another page on the site: I've been asked, where can I write my favorite composers? You know, to send letters of my devotion, cookies, naked photos, death threats and the like. The answer is: through their agencies. Here are some of the most asked contact addresses:

John Williams, Hans Zimmer, James Newton Howard, Elliot Goldenthal, James Horner
c/o Gorfaine-Schwartz Agency
3301 Barham Blvd Suite 201
Los Angeles CA 90068

Jerry Goldsmith, Danny Elfman, Basil Poledouris, John Barry, Elmer Bernstein
c/o Kraft-Benjamin Agency
345 North Maple Drive Suite 385
Beverly Hills CA 90210

Alan Menken
c/o The Shukat Company
340 W 55th St Suite 1A
New York NY 10019

The above certainly do not represent the entire client lists of these companies; or the entirety of film music agencies. It's just all I feel like typing right now. If you want to write somebody, ask me, I'll look up their contact information in Lone Eagle's Film Composers Guide—a terrific book you can order yourself from 1-800-FILM-BKS, it's nothing but composer filmographies.

Mystery Solved

Lastly, I am proud to have actually found an answer for a question I got that I had no idea about. Scott Clifford wanted to know why certain cues of "The Reluctant Stowaway" (Lost in Space) in GNP/Crescendo's box set of Irwin Allen material did not sound like the actual television recording. The answer is that it is a re- recording, but for elsewhere in the series, not for the album. Mark Banning of Crescendo explains:

"The reason 'The Reluctant Stowaway' may not sound exactly as certain fans remember is due to their simply being alternate takes from later scoring sessions conducted by Lionel Newman. Most if the actual takes used on the show were unfortunately lost or destroyed and were not available. Only eight minutes of the actual original 'Reluctant Stowaway' mixes survived. Fortunately we came across these alternate recordings which made it possible for use to do a fairly sizable suite.

"The way it went was this: In some cases when certain cues from past episodes were needed for subsequent episodes, it wasn't always a case of tracking previous recordings. Sometimes the cues were literally recorded again along with whatever newer material was required for a given show. (For example, when you hear music from Day the Earth Stood Still in various episodes, they are not the literal Bernard Herrmann sessions from the film but rather re-recorded for use in those episodes.) So actually, they are not really re-orchestrations created specifically for a commercial recording per se, but rather, as I indicated, alternate takes from original sessions. This is the only instance in which such alternate recordings of cues were used in the box set."

Mark has our gratitude.

Hey, You!

Send in your questions and comments! My news/answers column will most likely end up a regular Friday/weekend feature. lukas@filmscoremonthly.com