Cleopatra Mail Bag Part Two

Compiled by Lukas Kendall

Continued from yesterday's column....

From: "Paul W. Conway" <pconway@nyc.rr.com>

Bravo to Mr. Robert Townson!

I, too, was distressed by Mr. Lintgen's comments, but having long ago grown tired of replying to (in Mr. Townson's on-the-money description) "myopic" folks like Mr. Lintgen, let his comments go, so to speak.

"Ice cold" ???? Bullshit!

As for the Academy Awards, I know I am not the only life-long movie fan to have grown up believing the Oscars to be the end-all of acknowledgment and true legitimacy in the film world. A tough lesson which many of us have learned (and apparently many of us still refuse to accept) is that the Oscars (like ALL entertainment awards) are politically and popularly awarded. Otherwise, whether their individual performances, directorial achievements, or film compositions were worthy of Oscar wins, how does one explain Dorothy Malone, Marisa Tomei, Kim Basinger, Mel Gibson, Kevin Costner, Vangelis, Giorgio Moroder...as Oscar winners when compared to their peer nominees, when too many to mention never won or were even nominated.

Would that we had an Alex North today rather than Media Ventures...etc.

From: Susan Hamel <shjbinmi@mywebconnect.com>

Of all of North's scores, this is my favorite. For some to say the man is not emotional is bunk! Certainly the music from "The Agony and the Ecstasy" is emotional. True, parts of "Cleopatra" are removed and not that easy to identify with, but neither is Bach. North is complex, and very deep. Yet there are elements that touch and beg to be engaged by the listener. Listen to disc two (using head phones is best). I just want to add my thanks to the wonderful job that was done in bringing this score to life. And I am also a big Rozsa fan, but though I like my meat and potatoes the taste of gourmet food is welcome too.

From: Scott Kirby <swkirby116@aol.com>

I'm with Mr. Townson all the way. I love Alex North's music. "Ice cold?" Lacking emotion? Not hardly. I think "Antony, Wait..." from the Cleopatra score is one of the most tender and heart-breaking pieces of music I have ever heard. It's one of the reasons I've been looking forward to the CD release of this score. "Ben Hur" is a fine score, but I personally think it's over-rated and would take "Spartacus" or "Cleopatra" over it anyday, and yes, listen to them on a regular basis.

More to the point, not ever film composer is for everybody. I like the original "King Kong" but most everything else Max Steiner composed, including "Gone with the Wind" fails to move me at all. Does that mean he's a lousy composer, or that I have bad taste in music, or simply that Steiner just isn't my cup of tea? ("The Big Sleep" is pretty good, too.)

Mr. Lintgen needs to take a step back., and listen to the "Love Theme from Spartacus." If he cannot warm to Mr. North's music, it seems to me the curse is his, not Alex North's.

From: "Michael Karoly" <karoly11@hotmail.com>

I recently bought CLEOPATRA, and I must say that I'm impressed. To be honest, North's scores don't jump out at me as being emotional, or anything for that matter. His scores, for me, are ones that get better with every listen. CLEOPATRA is a good example of this: on first listen, I was overwhelmed with the sheer amount of music and the complexities of instrumentation and orchestration. I was tired after hearing the whole score once! However, on second and third listen, I became more "involved" in the score and began to appreciate it more. The same thing happened to me with DRAGONSLAYER.

North obviously had a lot of talent and a good ear for music. I would agree with the notion that he wrote some very complex and challenging music. I don't really know how to compare listening to BEN-HUR and CLEOPATRA- while they deal with the same genre, they were composed by two different composers who both did a great job. I don't like North because I feel I have to- if I don't like a score or a composer, I offer no apologies for it. I feel that North's approach to the scores I've heard are interesting and enjoyable intellectually and aurally, and CLEOPATRA is no exception. It's just too bad that the film was awful.

From: "De Ruysscher, Kris" <Kris.De.Ruysscher@eu.sappi.com>

I usually stay away from these kinds of discussions: I find them a waste of electricity. But if we're going to compare apples with Flemish tapestries, I get angry.

Define cold. And while you're at it, define warm, lush, sweeping, haunting and tender as well;

Explain: "The Stockhausen of filmmusic." What the hell has Stockhausen, probably the warmest composer of his generation, got to do with Alex North, let alone Cleopatra?! In fact, what has Spartacus got to do with Cleopatra? The similarity of period? The Ancient-Rome Symphony Orchestra?. And while you're at it, tell me why in comments on scores one inevitably comes across Stravinsky, Prokofiev, Holst, Copland, Vaughan-Williams, all with their respective -esques [ostinatos, strings, et al].

It's been asked before if you really need to have a degree in music to appreciate filmmusic. No, you don't. But please, don't feel complied to expose your lack of knowledge like this, it's embarrassing. Don't hide behind some commonplace reflections [I have the impression Stockhausen makes YOU look intelligent the same way North makes ME look knowledgeable]. This goes for all "filmmusiccriticism" by the way.

I do have a degree in music and I find it stunning and saddening that instead of promoting this fine art, some of us are demoting it to the level of pre-presidential mudslinging. Is it due to the fanaticism of the collector? In that case, music becomes a tangible, economic and marketable good. And we all know how much of the actual -disastrous- situation in "the business" is already dictated by the good sense of what the market wants. They're death to creativity, composers, and quality. And this is what we're supposed to be judging, the quality of the creative output from a composer for a certain film.

In all objectivity, Cleopatra is a masterpiece of contemporary scoring by an honest and intelligent composer.

From: Sean Nethery, vramin@pcisys.net

Though I was taken aback by the stridency of Mr. Lintgen's comments about Alex North, and was quite impressed with Mr. Townson's response, I hesitated to dip my toes in these rough waters. I mean, what a bore ... either you want to listen to CLEOPATRA or you don't. So buy it or don't. Who cares? (Of course, Mr. Townson does and should care -- he's banking on his taste, here, God bless him. And I bought my copy right away [to go with the other 150 Varese CDs I've got], so I guess he's got my vote.)

But there's an underlying issue that is, I think, worth raising, since most of what's written in the film score community is opinion. Why does anyone, in expressing their own opinions, feel compelled to speak for the thoughts and actions of others?

Mr. Lintgen expresses his opinions with rock-solid certainty. That's his right, whether or not others agree with either his premise or his conclusion. But why assume he knows what others "really" think?: "[North] is technically brilliant, and the critics love him, but not many people are going to listen to his music. They will rave about him so that they appear to be sophisticated listeners, but how often do they really listen? The few people who do write to you in support of Cleopatra will more likely listen to Ben Hur when they are alone with their sound systems."

Which critics, exactly? How many people is not many? Who is raving about North while not really listening? And to whom are they raving so that they appear to be "sophisticated" (a term not usually bandied about in film score circles)?

And, finally, how on Earth does Mr. Lintgen know all this? Well, he doesn't, of course. It seems to me he's mistaken his own taste for a consensus. The letter column is proving him wrong.

How much more useful in such a discussion for each of us to simply express our opinions and wrestle with those of others, rather than telling people that you know what they think and do.

From: al_foster@t-online.de (Al Foster)

I have to say I was eagerly awaiting the CLEOPATRA CD, not only because of the long running time, but also because I hoped the sound quality would as least be as good and vibrant as that of the LP. But to my rather unpleasant surprise the CD sounds somewhat muffled, "compressed," "digitally cleaned," you-name-it. OK, maybe the material wasn't as good as it was in 1963 when they made the LP, but still it takes away some of the impact.

Yes, yes, I know, nitpicking when you should be on your knees for this complete score presentation. (I am, of course!) Any comment from the "digital crew"? Anybody of FSM, maybe...?

Oh come on...the CD sounds great! The recording is 38 years old and it's a new mix from many multiple overlays -- what do you want?

From: "Lester Sullivan" <lsulliva@xula.edu>

You could file this under "allegedly cold music for allegedly hot pizza." The magnificent new set of music for Cleopatra has kept Alex North on many minds lately. Would I be correct in thinking that the latest TV ads for Domino's pizza paraphrase some of his music? In the ads, just before surf guitar music similar to "Miserlou" by Dick Dale & His Deltones from Pulp Fiction, there is a brief passage that appears to be reorchestrated from but otherwise almost identical, note for note, to a fanfare toward the start of North's unused "Main Title" for 2001. If I'm right, then the Domino's music is a paraphrase of a paraphrase, since North sought in his piece to "update" but closely parallel the opening "sunrise" music from Richard Strauss's tone poem Thus Spoke Zarathustra, which North thought was merely intended as temp track by director Stanley Kubrick. We now know that Kubrick never intended to use any of North's music. Wouldn't it be a kick in the head if North's update were to become as much an overused cliché as the 1960's or '70's rock version of the Zarathustra music? In the Domino's ad, the segue from the North bit to the surf music is very similar in effect to the segue from the Strauss sunrise fanfare to the rock in the '60's or '70's version of the music actually employed in 2001. The Strauss is now beyond copyright and, because of its use by Kubrick, world famous. The North isn't but is still supposedly protected by law. Some of the most recent correspondence on the FSM web site claims that only some of North's scores, such as Cleopatra and 2001 are "cold," whereas others, such as Spartacus and Streetcar Named Desire, are not. If North's music is so cold and "inaccessible" (code for "doesn't communicate all of its meaning on the first listen") why is it that otherwise clueless contemporary composers feel the need to keep ripping it off?

From: Blcinnamon@aol.com

I fortunately own the CD of Dragonslayer as well as the unused 2001, Spartacus and The Dead. I usually think of North as rather distant until I sit down and listen then I find it otherwise. Dragonslayer has tremendous, sumptuous musical color and mood, it might not contain the heroic - good feelings that we are looking for in the orchestral score but it is deeply feeling in the tangible artistry of the instruments working together and in counterpoint. Likewise, I think that 2001 is a supreme work even though I think North was striving for a modernist - abstract sensation. Besides this being a excellent recording and a perfect commemoration from Goldsmith to his best friend it is the score Kubrick should have used.

A newer generation of Horner (of recent years) and Zimmer trained ears is perhaps musically dumbed down to the point that it's attention span cannot grasp the excellence of North's craftsmanship.

From: "thom tierney" <thomtierney@earthlink.net>

The best argument to refute Mr. Lintgen's misguided attitude is the music of Alex North itself. Ice cold indeed! North's score to "A Streetcar Named Desire" is drenched in passion and emotion as befits Tennessee Williams' beautiful play. North's tender and compassionate music aids and abets us (along with Vivien Leigh's astonishing performance) in understanding the psychological torment of Blanche. If Mr. Lintgen is unmoved by this heartbreaking score, I fear he may be the one who is "ice cold." There are other North scores, too. The love theme from "Spartacus" alone negates Mr. Lintgen's argument or "The Tack Room" cue from North's score to "The Rainmaker." And am I alone in thinking that North's score to "The Long Hot Summer" is one of the most sensual (along with John Barry's "Body Heat") film scores ever written? Hardly the compositions of an ice cold pen. And speaking of "Long Hot Summer," the next time FSM raids the Fox vaults for a CD release, please "The Long Hot Summer"! It would be your first Alex North release and about time!

From: Arthur Lintgen <ablintgen@home.com>

I read Mr Townson's response to my brief observations on Cleopatra with amazement. My comments were in no way meant to be insulting to Alex North, or any one who likes his music. I went out of my way to say that. I believe my piece opens by referring to Cleopatra as a "monumental" score. That is a peculiar sort of criticism. If Mr. Townson did not fly off the handle so quickly, he would have realized that the point of the piece was to try to explain why a genius of North's calibre never received the popularity and notoriety of his contemporaries despite universal critical acclaim. There is no question that there is a disconnect there. And if Mr. Townson really thinks that North's music is as popular or accessible as Steiner, Waxman, Korngold, Newman, Herrmann or Rozsa , well, he has a right to his opinion. I respectfully disagree. Just compare the accessiblity, popularity, and emotional involvement of Cleopatra and Ben Hur without getting into the musical merits of the two scores. The Unchained Melody is an excellent but isolated abberration in North's output. It is North's curse that his music is SO GOOD, but he never did achieve the popularity he deserved. This is not criticism, Mr. Townson, but I think there is a reason for the phenomenon, and I attempted to state it. That is what musical analysis is all about. The lifetime achievement reward was richly deserved - no doubt about it, but it would have beeen far better if one or more of his scores was individually awarded. You know as well as I that the Lifetime Awards are frequently denigrated as awards for people who never got an Oscar. That is why I attempted to put down the Academy. You are surely aware that they have not distinguished themselves over the years for their Oscar nominations and winners in the music section. Again, my criticism was directed at the Academy, not North. They do love to self congratulate themselves, and you know it. My comments were also not meant to criticize the Cleopatra cd. It is without a doubt one of the finest and most dedicated releases of film music ever made. Clearly a labor of love. But my brief piece was obviously not meant to to be a review of the cd, which I own and cherish. So, thank you for your magnificent reissue of an important work, but your comments seem like a defensive over reaction that misses the point of the piece.

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