This News Friday 1/30/97
by Lukas Kendall
To recap some of the news that broke this week, Jerry Goldsmith is composing
a new fanfare for the Oscars telecast this year, a 45-second piece that
will be heard during the ceremony (over and over again!). And, the composer
on Lost in Space is none other than Bruce Broughton--this marks
his first major event film since arguably Tombstone five years ago.
I've also got a date y'all will want to know. April 28. This is when
Arista's complete-score restoration of Close Encounters (John Williams)
will be out. The expanded Taxi Driver album will be out in May.
What an expanded Taxi Driver album does to a soundtrack fan's demeanor,
that is something you should see.
An amended version of Edwin Black's "Clones"
article from FSD will run in the Chicago Tribune Sunday Arts
and Entertainment section (Black has been a regularly contributor to the
Tribune). The article mainly discusses Horner's Titanic.
Folks in or near San Jose, check out the San Jose Film Festival next
week (Cinequest, 1/29 - 2/4) for information on Elmer Bernstein's appearance:
http://spyglass1.sjmercury.com/cgi-bin/contests/register.cgi?cinequest
Questions
From: Kevin McDermott <kevin727@yahoo.com>
I tried the message board, but I guess no one knows. Who composed
the fanfare that opened CBS's daily broadcasts of the 1994 Winter Olympics?
I kinda like it.
Our TV sage Andy Dursin didn't know--but notes we won't be hearing again,
since the next 1o years of Olympics will be on NBC.
From: "Liverance, Howard M" <HLIVERANCE@tpa.HealthPlan.com>
Just wondering if anyone can identify the following items:
1. The song playing in the officer's club at the very beginning
of The Thing (1951). I believe a sax is carrying the melody.
2. The piece "performed" by Stan Laurel on his bedspring/harp
in The Flying Deuces.
More Trailers!
From: Stefano, carlito@internetcafe.it
I'm an Italian soundtrack collectors. I'd like to know what's the
music of trailer for the movie of Mary Shelley's Frankenstein. I know that
there's two trailers, one with the music from Verdi's Requiem and the other?
Please tell me the music of second trailer. I've been looking for it by
four years.
Readers, I know there's a cool site out there that has identified a
lot of trailer music, but I'm on deadline with the hardcopy FSM right now--can
anyone give me the URL?
From: Ben Bowman <x95bowman1@wmich.edu>
When I saw a movie recently, there was a trailer for "Great
Expectations" with music I have heard over and over on trailers and
commercials. Is there any way to determine what scores are used as backgrounds
in trailers? This is driving me insane.
From: Ellen Edgerton, ebedgert@mailbox.syr.edu
Everyone keeps asking about the song in the Great Expectations trailer,
which is called "Life in Mono" by the group Mono; what I haven't
seen anyone mention is that the song contains parts of The Ipcress File,
and is credited as such.
Not being familiar with The Ipcress File, I nevertheless listened
to the song and couldn't help thinking something in it sounded vaguely
James Bondlike. Then I took a closer look at the liner notes.
How about this for a quick response?
Titanic Site
Hal Jackson, musical transcriber extraordinaire, has some Titanic sound
clips as well as transcribed score pages on his web site: http://www.cs.odu.edu/~hal.
Check it out!
For those wondering--or rather thanking Crom--where the Titanic/Horner
letters went, I've got a ton of them that I will probably run as a separate
article. That way interested parties can read them, and people sick of
them won't have a day of "Film Score Daily" wasted. This will
be sometime in the next week or two.
Film Music Seminars
Two programs are kicking back in gear. Ron Jones' Emotif University
is beginning another semester of electronic correspondence classes, with
some local seminars taking place for L.A. composers as well. See emotif.com
for information. Specifically, there will be a pizza party for students
at Ron's studio in Burbank on February 6 (Friday) followed by some classes
on February 7 (Saturday).
Emotif's Lee Sanders had some additional info on upcoming classes:
Our new semester begins February 10; we're offering the same classes
as we have previously have, plus new ones from Ron on packaging (EU-402,
Persona Sculpting), composition (EU-403, Composition: My Way), and a new
one from Lee on web sites (EU-302, Creating a Music Promotional Web Site).
We're also adding the sequel to the first Music Business class, which will
continue with some of the stuff the instructor (Joe Gallo) introduced in
the first class. Finally, Mike Mitacek is teaching a class in music arranging
using the Equal Interval System, a method invented and utilized widely
by Industry composers to crank out quick and effective arrangements of
tunes.
Also, an announcement on the next "Film Music Network" night:
The Film Music Network, sponsored by CinemaTrax, presents Film Music
Network Nights, a monthly networking series for professionals in the film
music business. The events take place the first Monday of every month at
7:00 pm at the Beverly Garland Holiday Inn, 4222 Vineland Avenue, Studio
City, CA and feature guest speakers who focus on specific issues and challenges
in the film music business. After these brief presentations, attendees
are encouraged to network. Admission is $10, memberships are available.
Guest speakers for the next event on Monday, February 2, 1998 are orchestrator
Ira Hearshen and music payroll specialist Gary Wasserman. Coming in March
is composer and SCL president Jay Chattaway. To RSVP or receive more information,
call (818) 771-7778. For questions, call (818) 507-4900.
Clunkers Rising
From: "Brian D. Mellies" <dialbri3@earthlink.net>
I just had a thought as I was re-reading your
review of Deep Rising. You wonder why Jerry Goldsmith undertook this
project when he seems to have the pick of the most prestigious projects
Hollywood has to offer. This set off a little bell in my head. I would
love to see an article focusing on scores from "lesser" films
by great composers. After all, Bernard Herrmann had his Vertigo, Psycho,
Citizen Kane, Jane Eyre and... It's Alive!!! How many others undertook
projects of, to be kind, questionable merit?
Goldsmith has traditionally been a workaholic who has chosen projects
just to keep busy (and keep making good $!) year-round, year after year.
Readers, why don't you take up the discussion of famous composers tackling
"questionable" projects in the message
board? It's Alive is a good one, although that film is kind
of interesting--an anecdote I remember from Steven Smith's Herrmann biography
is that Herrmann delighted in his title for one of the murder cues: "The
Milkman Go-eth."
That Long Question
About what is the longest musical work (like the six-hour combined Star
Wars Trilogy scores):
From: "Mark R. Smith"<Mark_R._Smith@nr-ikon.com>
Wagner probably wins the contest for the longest musical score.
He wrote 4 operas (a quartology?) - Das Rheingold, Siegfried, Die Walküre,
and Götterdämmerung that combine into one big 15 hour opera (Der
Ring des Nibelungen). Most people will recognize his music from Excalabur,
Apocalypse Now, and Bugs Bunny.
Kill the wabbit.
From: MLevineMu <MLevineMu@aol.com>
"Kyle" asked if the Williams music for the Star Wars trilogy
was some kind of record-longest work. Perhaps in film (though the 6-hour
Russian War and Peace comes to mind). But, certainly, the classic monster
would be the Wagner Ring cycle which weighs in, with four parts, at 12
hours plus. But for sheer length you've got to go even further back--both
the Iliad and the Odyssey were originally sung or chanted to musical accompaniment.
Each took about ten evenings to perform.
Student Seeking Collaborators/Assistance
From: Steven Burke <burksd@rcm.ac.uk>
I am a post-grad film music student at the Royal College Of Music,
London. At the moment, as well as composing into the wee early hours, I
am researching the use of ethnic music in film scores, particularly set
in India. Just on the off-chance that you might know somebody who is also
interested in this field, it would be great to make contact and share views
and resources. Films that are in the process of being researched by me
are Gandhi (George Fenton), City Of Joy (Ennio Morricone & Richard
Blackford), Charge of the Light Brigade (Max Steiner), and Kama Sutra (research
purposes only!!!).
See, we like to help people here at FSM. I should add that I've been
getting daily questions from aspiring composers: how do I get an agent,
where should I move to, what's a good film scoring program? and so on.
The interest in becoming a film composer is booming, and in additional
to the introductory
column here on the site we are working fast and furious to get you
the kind of information you need.
Those Who Can't Teach, Teach Gym
From: ApinRecord <ApinRecord@aol.com>
Lukas, just a note about
the article I wrote concerning, "opening one's heart" to
the music, that wasn't intended for you, it was just a general comment
to your audience out there.
I find it rather annoying that many of your readers and contributing
writers would expound so much on what they think the musical analysis of
a new release is like. They have elevated themselves to a certified and
highly knowledgable film music critics. Well, I have found that critics
are people who have personally failed in their endeavor to achieve the
accomplishments of those people whom they critique. They know all the right
solutions and see the insurmountable problems on the product they critique,
whether it be movies, music, food, clothes, etc, and they seem to know
all the reasons as to why this and that worked or did not worked, but I've
never heard any critic that become an expert in their field by actually
going out there and do the work that they sound like they know so much
of, and be succesfull.
I've found that these critics are actually souls that have failed
at achieving their dreams, hence, they mostly thrash other people's work,
even if it's good. Not all are like that of course, but many would prefer
to see others fail because it helps them not to feel worse because others
have succeeded and succeeded very well, whereas they have not left very
far at all from accomplishing their aspirations. Therefore, musicologist
are nothing more than failed composers, film critics are failed directors,
restaurant critics are failed chefs, book critics are failed authors, etc.
I must add, there is nothing wrong with analysis of a product or
work of others that are of note. The world of entrepreneurism is a fine
example of breaking down what others have achieved that are superior, and
either match or top it even more. The Japanese have mastered this art,
beautifully. But they do so for the purpose of learning and becoming better
at what they do. I don't see critics having the same intentions. Just a
lot of blah, blah, blah, gab and more gab, but no substance. If they know
how to write the great and perfect music score, then do it themselves.
To an extent I feel this is true: that a lot of us fall into lifelong
jobs of a "lesser" nature compared to what we would love to become.
Mr. Holland's Opus was a movie all about this. But there are some
brilliant critics out there, and I don't care that Pauline Kael never made
a movie, she is a better critic than I'm sure many filmmakers would be.
I think we're all suited to different things; it doesn't help that so much
criticism is poorly done, and that many people writing newspaper movie
reviews are probably frustrated screenwriters, etc.--it's a simple fact
that many of us do not have the talent, or perhaps connections, we need
to become a great creator, and settle for something else.
But Michael Nyman was a music critic. Aaron Copland wrote a book about
music, in which he even addressed film scoring. I dispute the notion that
every critic is a failed something else... is Jim Leyland a bad baseball
manager because he wasn't a very good player? Is Roger Ebert a bad movie
reviewer because his one script became a silly movie (Beyond the Valley
of the Dolls--which I love). Quentin Tarantino was a nerd video store
clerk who probably criticized movies right and left until he became a director
himself.
I think there are a lot of dumb people out there, and it's probably
easy to be a critic as a dumb person than a creative professional. But
give many critics the chance to create themselves--because you can't exactly
go out and say, I'm going to make a movie now--and I'll bet you'd be surprised.
Quick Broughton Item
From: Kevin Deany <deany@lbpc.com>
In response to the gentleman who inquired why Bruce Broughton was
conducting the new "Fantasia" the answer is he isn't. As I recall,
Broughton is scoring only the linking sections of the film. I do recall
reading several years ago here in the Chicago papers that James Levine
and the Chicago Symphony were recording music for the new Fantasia at Medinah
Temple. I don't know if he's conducting all the music or not, but definitely
some of it. (Sorry, I can't remember what the pieces were, but I think
one was Respighi's "Pines of Rome.")
North Recommendations
From: "Shold, Kyle" <KyleS@humongous.com>
I've recently become interested in hearing some of Alex North's
work and I was wondering if you had any recommendations that I could start
off with? I know that Goldsmith has done some new recordings of his work.
Are those good representations? Is Dragonslayer a good album?
Ah! This is a question for Jeff Bond and although he's not available
right now, I'm sure he'll tell you above all: I'M SPARTACUS! Yes, get the
MCA Spartacus CD. Jeff will complain about it not having all of
the music from the movie, but it's just fine for me.
Dragonslayer is a bit of an odd score for a genre movie--at the
time, 1981, many fantasy films had sweeping romantic scores (John Williams's
pictures, Heavy Metal, Clash of the Titans, Dark Crystal--all of
them sensational, mind you) but Dragonslayer is a strange, prickly and
intricate work that interacts with the film in a much colder way. North
was above all a modernist--although in his more jazzy scores he could be
melodic and quite gushy (he wrote "Unchained Melody") and his
action scores are very lurchy compared to John Williams or even Danny Elfman.
Also re: Dragonslayer, the disc is out of print and hard to get.
The album to North's rejected 2001 music (cond. Goldsmith), although
in my view not the best score for Kubrick's picture, is a good album and
has a variety of accessible and more inaccessible of music in its 36-minute
running time.
We'll have more on North hopefully next week from readers, or feel free
to start a North thread on our message board. He was a terrific and influential
composer and had so much to offer.
Film Music on TV this Weekend
Don't forget to check Ellen Edgerton's site for cool scores to this
weekend's movies-on-TV fare: http://columbia.digiweb.com/~ellenbe/fmtvindex.html
Got this joke...
in from my mom: A survey asked women if they would have sex with Bill
Clinton:
10% said they wouldn't
5% said maybe
85% said never again.
Folks, e-mail is a wonderful way to stay in touch with your mom. Remember,
she loves you.
Send your comments: Lukas@filmscoremonthly.com
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