I am shocked that nobody has suggested the majority of the score to Home Alone. Obviously, the movie takes place at Christmas but the sound of bells and piano always makes me think of snow and winter. Also, Vangelis' Antarctica is quite good as well.
I am shocked that nobody has suggested the majority of the score to Home Alone.
Shocked? I am absolutely outraged! Pass the smelling salts, TG.
Criswell predicts that people will continue to post titles of films with scenes set in winter, without the music necessarily evoking snow and wintertime.
But I am sounding like Scrooge (what, no mention of that score?), and so will say that the previously-mentioned STEPMOM does have passages which for me evoke snow, wintertime, or just a poignant autumnal memory.
But I am sounding like Scrooge (what, no mention of that score?), and so will say that the previously-mentioned STEPMOM does have passages which for me evoke snow, wintertime, or just a poignant autumnal memory.
Yeah, as I mentioned to Howard in the previously linked snow/STEPMOM thread, that score has always had more autumnal qualities to me.
Then again, I don't really have a warm relationship to snow, which is perhaps rather untypical for a Norwegian. I mean, it's nice around Christmas Eve and stuff, but I've never liked it. I have no particular interest in skiing, winter cabins or outdoorsy winter activities (again untypically Norwegian, I know), and I spend most of my time in the city where it's just a hassle, especially for bike-dependent persons like myself.
So it's difficult for me to pick out cues that capture some of the "jolly or poetic wintertime spirit". The closest is probably Christmas scores, which is a slightly different category altogether.
the obvious one i reach for is Young Sherlock Holmes.
the less obvious is John Scott's The Whistle Blower. i have no memory of the film, not sure if the feel is related to setting, or narrative, or if it's just me.
THE BRAVE ONE: Christmas Morning (Victor Young) THE TWILIGHT ZONE "The Lonely": The Stars (Bernard Herrmann) THE MAGNIFICENT AMBERSONS: Snow Ride (Bernard Herrmann)
I also find the last movement of Respighi's THE FOUNTAINS OF ROME evocative of a winter night.
There’s some very icy music in Shostakovich’s Alone, briefly incorporating the theremin, the first film score to do so. It’s available on Naxos. I bloody LOVE Naxos.
I don’t think the film is particularly set in wintertime (though it may well be) but Rachel Portman’s chilly sounding music for THE HUMAN STAIN would make any cold weather playlist I put together
A great jazz piece that makes me cold whenever I hear it, even here in St. Louis in July, is Jan Garbarek's title track from his ECM album Dansere. Garbarek is from Norway and plays tenor sax. His tone is icy and there is a wintery, desolate feel in the entire piece.
No specific snow music, but a wintry feel with echo and empty rests.
I'm interested in the techniques. Often snow means 'white' orchestration (high strings and flutes, or goosey woodwinds), tinkly percussion, mute brass, flurries and shivery vibrato, and icy clashes of semitone dissonance with jazz intervals of sevenths or such. Melodically Russian, Renaissance or atonal.
