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Posted: |
Jul 12, 2014 - 9:36 PM
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By: |
manderley
(Member)
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"The Rescue of Demetrius" was originally written for "The Hunchback of Notre Dame", then it was re-worked for "Prince of Foxes" and re-worked again for "The Robe."
The "Alleleuia" heard in the finale of "The Robe" was written by Ernest Toch at Newman's request and heard first in "The Hunchback of Notre Dame". It was again heard at the end of "The Song of Bernadette" and borrowed for a scene in the latter part of Tiomkin's "It's A Wonderful Life" before Newman re-worked it for "The Robe."
I recall that some of the music in "The Greatest Story Ever Told" had originally been written for "The Robe", but I don't recall it being the "Alleleuia".
Ron, Ernest Toch "composing" the Alleluia for the end of Hunchback has been discussed here before and I don't know if we will ever know the answer. I think John Morgan had some good background on it.
Some people said the Alleluia was in Toch's hand writing. Some suggested that Newman might have given Toch a rough sketch of it and then said to Toch: "here, do something with this."
Any comments from anyone?
As I've posted several times before, Hugo Friedhofer told me directly that Toch wrote the HUNCHBACK "Alleluia".
Since Hugo knew Alfred as a career intimate for most of his working life and worked with him often and appeared to love him dearly, I had no reason to suspect that Hugo would want to say this to stab Newman in the back or harm his reputation. Hugo said it to me as if it were factual and common knowledge in those days and as if I was just too young to be aware of it.
Films have always been a collaborative art, and in most cases in the Golden Age, the credits on a film for the work in any department usually went to the person who made the most contributions in that area---the composer, the cameraman, the art director, the editor, often the director, etc---no matter how many other contributors there were. Uncredited contributors were a way of simplifying the main title credits to 45-90 seconds or less (instead of 6-12 minutes of end titles) to save the audience's patience for the plot. Most viewers really only wanted to see the star names anyway.
The industry people of that day who might have had an interest in the names of others working on a film either could figure it out based on their analysis of the creativity of the contribution (if they knew the an artist's work well) or simply by general industry scuttlebutt or factual information passed around within the guilds or unions.
Historically, the number of uncredited creative artists on films is endless, and will never be totally ascertained. Even in my own career I have contributed to films of others without credit, and examples of films of mine to which others have contributed moments without credit. It was rarely a negative; it was generally a way of getting the job done, on time, on budget, and with the least amount of hassles possible.
When we talk about these credit situations Herbert Stothart's name often comes up. Stothart sometimes wrote 10-12 scores a year in his hey-day, in addition to conducting scores for himself, for the musicals, and for other composers. Reviewing the cue sheets of his films, there are often additional contributors to his scores listed, just as with other composers, but the total timings of his own credited cues are always in the majority. Kaper's scores at MGM, Waxman's, Amfitheatrof's, Snell's, Ward's and others are the same---and sometimes it is Stothart who has contributed to a Kaper or Waxman or some other score without credit.
Some filmmusic fans hate Stothart scores and damn him, others enjoy Stothart scores and praise him. I'm certainly ambivalent toward Stothart. If you held a knife to my throat and asked me my favorite, I'd probably say Alfred Newman. But.....can't we all admit.....looking at the evidence EVEN for a favorite.....that many, many single-credited Alfred Newman scores also contain contributions from the likes of Friedhofer, Toch, Harline, Raksin, Buttolph, Mockridge, brother Lionel and more.
The multi-composer music department was the mode-of-the-day, and it was often, "Hugo.....
I'm still busy writing cue 4-2 and won't finish today, can you write cue 4-3 for me? Here's how it fits together with the end of my cue," or "Darryl wants to meet with me about the music budget for 1947, Cyril, can you finish this cue I'm working on?".....etc, etc, etc.
Uncredited contributions were the nature-of-the-beast in the tinsel-laden and fantastical movie factories of the old days. If you don't understand and accept this, it will eat away at you.
But it also makes for great guessing games to keep us interested today. 
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Posted: |
Jul 12, 2014 - 10:36 PM
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By: |
PFK
(Member)
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"The Rescue of Demetrius" was originally written for "The Hunchback of Notre Dame", then it was re-worked for "Prince of Foxes" and re-worked again for "The Robe."
The "Alleleuia" heard in the finale of "The Robe" was written by Ernest Toch at Newman's request and heard first in "The Hunchback of Notre Dame". It was again heard at the end of "The Song of Bernadette" and borrowed for a scene in the latter part of Tiomkin's "It's A Wonderful Life" before Newman re-worked it for "The Robe."
I recall that some of the music in "The Greatest Story Ever Told" had originally been written for "The Robe", but I don't recall it being the "Alleleuia".
Ron, Ernest Toch "composing" the Alleluia for the end of Hunchback has been discussed here before and I don't know if we will ever know the answer. I think John Morgan had some good background on it.
Some people said the Alleluia was in Toch's hand writing. Some suggested that Newman might have given Toch a rough sketch of it and then said to Toch: "here, do something with this."
Any comments from anyone?
As I've posted several times before, Hugo Friedhofer told me directly that Toch wrote the HUNCHBACK "Alleluia".
Since Hugo knew Alfred as a career intimate for most of his working life and worked with him often and appeared to love him dearly, I had no reason to suspect that Hugo would want to say this to stab Newman in the back or harm his reputation. Hugo said it to me as if it were factual and common knowledge in those days and as if I was just too young to be aware of it.
Films have always been a collaborative art, and in most cases in the Golden Age, the credits on a film for the work in any department usually went to the person who made the most contributions in that area---the composer, the cameraman, the art director, the editor, often the director, etc---no matter how many other contributors there were. Uncredited contributors were a way of simplifying the main title credits to 45-90 seconds or less (instead of 6-12 minutes of end titles) to save the audience's patience for the plot. Most viewers really only wanted to see the star names anyway.
The industry people of that day who might have had an interest in the names of others working on a film either could figure it out based on their analysis of the creativity of the contribution (if they knew the an artist's work well) or simply by general industry scuttlebutt or factual information passed around within the guilds or unions.
Historically, the number of uncredited creative artists on films is endless, and will never be totally ascertained. Even in my own career I have contributed to films of others without credit, and examples of films of mine to which others have contributed moments without credit. It was rarely a negative; it was generally a way of getting the job done, on time, on budget, and with the least amount of hassles possible.
When we talk about these credit situations Herbert Stothart's name often comes up. Stothart sometimes wrote 10-12 scores a year in his hey-day, in addition to conducting scores for himself, for the musicals, and for other composers. Reviewing the cue sheets of his films, there are often additional contributors to his scores listed, just as with other composers, but the total timings of his own credited cues are always in the majority. Kaper's scores at MGM, Waxman's, Amfitheatrof's, Snell's, Ward's and others are the same---and sometimes it is Stothart who has contributed to a Kaper or Waxman or some other score without credit.
Some filmmusic fans hate Stothart scores and damn him, others enjoy Stothart scores and praise him. I'm certainly ambivalent toward Stothart. If you held a knife to my throat and asked me my favorite, I'd probably say Alfred Newman. But.....can't we all admit.....looking at the evidence EVEN for a favorite.....that many, many single-credited Alfred Newman scores also contain contributions from the likes of Friedhofer, Toch, Harline, Raksin, Buttolph, Mockridge, brother Lionel and more.
The multi-composer music department was the mode-of-the-day, and it was often, "Hugo.....
I'm still busy writing cue 4-2 and won't finish today, can you write cue 4-3 for me? Here's how it fits together with the end of my cue," or "Darryl wants to meet with me about the music budget for 1947, Cyril, can you finish this cue I'm working on?".....etc, etc, etc.
Uncredited contributions were the nature-of-the-beast in the tinsel-laden and fantastical movie factories of the old days. If you don't understand and accept this, it will eat away at you.
But it also makes for great guessing games to keep us interested today.
Thanks Manderley for the very interesting comments ......... as always!
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Yes, Manderley -- and we'll try to remember them this time.
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"The Rescue of Demetrius" to be particularly exciting cuts (little did I know at the time that the rescue music was borrowed from Newman's previous score to THE HUNCHBACK OF NOTRE DAME).
Thank you for the info. I didn't know until today: this cue has always baffled me. It's a very brilliant and exciting cue but it sounds like it does not belong there. I assumed it was a matter of temp track -- and i don't even know if temp tracks existed at that time. I don't have the Varèse edition and i'm pretty sure the liner notes of the Lalaland edition don't mention this borrowing affair. Did the Varèse liner notes mention it?
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Posted: |
Jul 13, 2014 - 12:31 PM
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By: |
manderley
(Member)
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As I've posted several times before, Hugo Friedhofer told me directly that Toch wrote the HUNCHBACK "Alleluia".
And William Rosar reported that he had seem manuscript evidence to the same effect. I recall that part of the issue was that Newman was insecure about choral writing at that time. In later years, of course, he came to depend on Ken Darby as his right-hand man for choral matters.
Interesting commentary, Rozsaphile.
I don't believe we've ever seen any evidence that Newman was a strong egotist, throwing his weight around, and disallowing other composer creations. In fact, he seems to have been a champion of other composers---Friedhofer, Herrmann, etc---although, on the other hand, we do know that Friedhofer made important contributions to Newman's scores for THE PRISONER OF ZENDA and THE MARK OF ZORRO without apparent credit.
Today, now that we know about Toch and the "Alleluia" contribution, I wonder why it is rarely, if ever, officially acknowledged on liner notes and cue listings for the various scores in which it is involved.
I also wonder where the royalties go......
Is there a legal difference in filmmusic between a "ghost writer" who composes something for money, and CONTRACTUALLY AGREES that he will never be acknowledged or credited, and a "ghost writer" who composes something for money, and just never EXPECTS to be credited or acknowledged?
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Agreed, and this is probably the best explanation of why it didn't win.
Yet Franz Waxman either didn't know this was the reason when he resigned the Academy, or knew it and regardless thought it the best score of the year.
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Posted: |
Jul 14, 2014 - 9:20 AM
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By: |
Ron Pulliam
(Member)
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From "filmus-l", Nov. 27, 1993:
By the way, for those who may not know, the "Hallelujah"
finale of THE ROBE is originally from HUNCHBACK, was
later reused in SONG OF BERNADETTE, and can even be
heard in IT'S A WONDERFUL LIFE (!) (where it was
tracked). In fact, this piece was ghost-written
by Ernst Toch, who wrote several pieces of which
this was the only one Newman used in the score.
Toch's sketches are in the Newman collection at USC.
Toch originally got involved on the HUNCHBACK score
because he was familiar with Renaissance music
(e.g. the "Ave Maria" by Victoria being an example,
which is heard in the HUNCHBACK main title--this
piece was originally to be the HUNCHBACK end title,
in an arrangement by Robert Russell Bennett: the
Hallelujah by Toch was used instead--it was
actually composed for the scene where Quasimodo
rescues Esmeralda from the gallows).
Bill Rosar
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Posted: |
Jul 14, 2014 - 10:44 AM
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By: |
PFK
(Member)
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From "filmus-l", Nov. 27, 1993:
By the way, for those who may not know, the "Hallelujah"
finale of THE ROBE is originally from HUNCHBACK, was
later reused in SONG OF BERNADETTE, and can even be
heard in IT'S A WONDERFUL LIFE (!) (where it was
tracked). In fact, this piece was ghost-written
by Ernst Toch, who wrote several pieces of which
this was the only one Newman used in the score.
Toch's sketches are in the Newman collection at USC.
Toch originally got involved on the HUNCHBACK score
because he was familiar with Renaissance music
(e.g. the "Ave Maria" by Victoria being an example,
which is heard in the HUNCHBACK main title--this
piece was originally to be the HUNCHBACK end title,
in an arrangement by Robert Russell Bennett: the
Hallelujah by Toch was used instead--it was
actually composed for the scene where Quasimodo
rescues Esmeralda from the gallows).
Bill Rosar
I read this also on filmus-l maybe 15 years ago.
Even then people suggested that Newman wrote a rough sketch and told Toch to complete it, thus it's in Toch's hand writing.
Friedhofer may have heard it was Toch by a co-worker, who heard from someone, who heard from someone etc. Things change person to person to person etc.
I don't think we will ever know for sure.
Still, I'm 99% convinced Toch wrote it.
Ah .......... but that 1% !!!!!
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Posted: |
Jul 14, 2014 - 12:08 PM
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By: |
JSDouglas
(Member)
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Thank you for the info. I didn't know until today: this cue has always baffled me. It's a very brilliant and exciting cue but it sounds like it does not belong there. I assumed it was a matter of temp track -- and i don't even know if temp tracks existed at that time. I don't have the Varèse edition and i'm pretty sure the liner notes of the Lalaland edition don't mention this borrowing affair. Did the Varèse liner notes mention it?
I don't remember reading about the use of the HUNCHBACK music anywhere, but I do remember making the connection myself when I viewed the older film. The more one digs into golden age film scoring practices, the more we see how composers had to manage the writing of lengthy full-orchestral music by either re-using existing material or using ghost writers to help take up the slack. Temp music tracks became more of an issue later on for composers, but the studio system in Alfred Newman's day let temp music be what it was (music used to provide a temporary score for preview screenings) and original scoring be the desired product (even though it often was replaced or futzed with).
As Manderley and others have remarked on this thread, the Newman's, Steiner's and others back in the day had to do what they had to do to get the job done. They presumed nobody would have the ability to cross check a composition used in a 1939 film with one being heard in 1953. They felt that most of this music would be ephemeral and forgotten apart from popular themes or songs.
I've sometimes wondered about music Max Steiner resurrected from his RKO days and re-used for Warner Bros. films. He did it a lot (the Main Titles for THE LOST PATROL vs CASABLANCA as an example) but who really owned the composition? RKO? Warners? My suspicion is that if nobody noticed or said anything there was no problem on either side. I have heard that Erich Wolfgang Korngold had his contract stipulate that he could re-use any of his music in concert works if he desired and that this was a unique contract for a composer in Hollywood where music was a commodity owned outright by the studios.
While I'm enjoying the direction the discussion in this thread has travelled, it must be annoying Thor no end that we can't quite stay on the topic of the music as music. Sorry, Thor - the music of THE ROBE remains its own avatar for us fans and if we are not discussing its sterling qualities, believe me, we're hearing it in our heads as we comment...or maybe that's just me.
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