FSM Forum: Talking Thomas
...continued from FSM
Forum Issue 2
Doug Adams: Alright, let's have
the Finding Nemo discussion.
Al Kaplan: Oh no.
Jon Kaplan: There are themes
in that, we just don't like them.
DA: For the record here, for
those out there that didn't read the year end articles last year, I was
a big fan of Thomas Newman's Finding
Nemo. I think it's one of his better scores. The Kaplans do not
like Finding Nemo. I don't
know if you're both exactly in the same place with it, but… Al? Al's
making faces.
AK: What? I saw it recently. I
thought the score was very colorful. Interesting.
DA: But you don't own it on
disc and wouldn't want it on disc necessarily?
JK: We have it, don't we?
AK: Well, I think we have it
but, no, I don't listen to it.
DA: That's a score that I feel
is unified by its instrumental colors, but not its themes. That's a
very Newman way of doing it.
JK: Color kind of is a theme.
It depends on what you mean.
DA: Well, klangfarbenmelodie. [Doug clearly says it first…]
JK: Klangfarbenmelodie, yeah…
Are you going to put DA and JK with a colon saying that together?
DA: No, I'm going to credit
that to me.
JK: F--- you! Just because you
got the K out first!
DA: [Laughs] Well, at least we both
pronounced it correctly.
JK: Say that I said "tone color
melody" and…
DA: No, I'll write it. I'll
even write our discussion about it.
AK: [Mutters "Klangfarbenmelodie" softly the background.]
DA: Alright, let's say that's a
valid way to make a unifying point of a score.
JK: I think you can. Color?
Certainly.
DA: What is it that you
dislike, or that doesn't particularly appeal to you about Finding Nemo?
JK: Oh… It's boring.
DA: Really?
AK: That's not enough.
JK: The color doesn't sustain
my interest for the whole album. I like it in doses. I know you like
the use of the electronics and the overdubs and the intentionally fake
pizzicato…
DA: And harp.
JK: …yeah, playing things more
stilted on purpose, things that you couldn't get with a live player,
but I don't know. It just makes me want to hit myself sometimes.
DA: I don't know this for a
fact, but I might enjoy more avant-garde concert styles than you do.
JK: Well… You might, but I
don't find Nemo particularly
avant-garde.
DA: No, but I think it has
aspirations towards that kind of unstructured shape -- or a less
rigorously structured shape that you would find in the concert hall. I
find Newman, even when he's doing something like this with all its pop
references, to be closely related to those types of postmodern / sound
design things.
JK: I'm not the biggest fan of
improvisation, I'll say that.
DA: Really? Al, I'm not really
sure where you stand on jazz.
AK: I like jazz.
JK: I like jazz too, but not
improvisation.
DA: Improvisation is the
essence of jazz!
AK: It's the backbone, you
idiot!
JK: No s---, but it has its
limits for me when it's not in a jazz context. Newman sets out his
color and he starts the improvisation over it, and it goes too far. Too
long.
AK: You mean specific to Finding Nemo?
JK: Specific to that score.
More so in that score than in most of his others. Here's a little
sidetrack, but one of the things I despise about Thomas Newman is that
he writes terrific themes,
and he never uses them. You get basically one statement of the great
theme on an album and in the movie, and he does not develop the theme.
Very rarely does he develop the theme. Angels in America, case in point:
it's in it twice. It's like wasting things. I even get pissed off if
John Williams has a theme and uses it 20 times but doesn't do the one
kind of version that I want him to do.
With Thomas Newman there are so many great themes that he's written
that are in his scores once or one-and-a-half times. He writes a theme
but doesn't incorporate it in the rest of the score. He just uses some
other idea -- some accompaniment ideas with improvisation instead. I
think that it's a waste. I think that he could have players improvising
based more closely on his melody. I don't know why, specifically, he
does that. Maybe it's to avoid
that kind of literal thematic approach. He doesn't want a melody
pervading the score. Do you find that ever?
DA: I don't know that I have
the same frustration with it that you do, but I think that's definitely
accurate. It's there.
JK: I'll go through some
scores, just for the sake of the people who won't know what I'm talking
about. [Looks at some CDs.] Angels
in America it's in it one time, the main title. I haven't seen
the whole miniseries, but on the album there's only one other version
of it. Whispers in the Dark,
the love theme might be in it twice. Red
Corner, the "Shen Yuelin" track. How to Make an American Quilt…
DA: …the oboe thing.
JK: It's the track that was
used on previews that we didn't even know was from American Quilt because it's only in
it once.
DA: It's a beautiful theme.
That's one of my favorites. The most popular Thomas Newman scores
return to their main themes more often. Little Women and Shawshank.
JK: Oscar and Lucinda it's not in there
that much.
DA: Yeah, just the opening.
AK: In Shawshank that end title theme is
used very sparingly.
DA: Yeah, but I don't know if
that's what he considers his main theme.
AK: Right.
DA: The percussive electronic
thing and the prison…
JK: I think Shawshank is one of his best,
despite its popularity… whatever that means. That sold me on Thomas
Newman, actually.
DA: Shawshank did?
JK: Shawshank.
DA: You know, I didn't know
much Thomas Newman at all until I did the article on The Player, and then on research
just went out and got all the Thomas Newman stuff I could find. And
that's where I came across Shawshank
and Little Women and things
like that.
JK: Well, what specifically
sold me actually, on the movie and the score, was the first overhead
shot you see of the prison.
AK: That polytonal string stuff?
JK: Yes.
DA: Oh yes, absolutely. That's
one of the best Thomas Newman pieces.
JK: It's incredible. I think
it's the best thing he's ever written.
DA: It's so evocative.
Everything is in these vertical shapes. It feels like prison bars to
me. It's tremendous.
JK: [Jon sings the upper string line.]
You're going to notate what we're singing, right?
DA: Yes.
JK: It hit me over the head. I
was watching that on a lousy screen in a lecture hall building for the
first time. In Binghamton.
DA: It's an incredible piece.
And that's something that not enough people do: He writes something
emotional that's contrapuntal rather than big thick harmonies. That
brings us back to what we were talking about last night, doesn't it?
These composers that just can't orchestrate without doing giant thick
harmonies.
JK: Filling in every tone
possible.
DA: Filling in every tone for
about eight octaves, every third is in there, even if you're way below
the bass clef.
AK: And there's one composer
in particular?
JK: I want to talk about how
Doug dislikes Van Helsing… [to be continued…]
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