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I think the continual issue of music vs sound design debate has more to do with how film music began. It stemmed from late 19th century Romanticism and a great deal of the composers migrated from classical music forms to film scoring, and as such treated film as modern opera. Hence, the music was very involved at times and exploited all those components of traditional orchestral forms.
We had a good 60 years of this type of scoring and it became the foundation or perhaps yardstick that scores were measured by. But other styles began to creep in as early as the mid 50s where sci fi and horror films began using atonality and texture-based orchestral gestures spawned by the avant garde concert works of the time.
In the '60s/70s, jazz, funk, and even disco score began to permeate the landscape. That and electronic music like Wendy Carlos' Clockwork Orange and Tangerine Dream's Sorcerer.
The '80s scores are littered with Linndrum patterns and DX7 sounds all over the place (Jerry Goldsmith used a lot of these sounds and even John Williams employed a few).
The '90s saw a little bit of a renaissance and gave us quite a few orchestral scores though as Doug Adams' FSM article on '90s Action Scores- What Happened articulated, the manner of scoring had already changed compared to the '70s.
Anyhow, brief historical retrospective aside, it's understandable why this debate ensues- many of us in the say mid 30s to 50 age bracket began their interest in film scores at a time when there were a lot of great orchestral composers around. Most of those Silver Age composers have passed away and have been replaced by composers who don't hail from the orchestral concert ideaological world. As such, their manner of putting music together IS different. Not better or worse, but it most definitely is different than those who preceded them. They fit better into the world of film which has also evolved.
In fact, the more I see how FILM is constructed, the more I understand why they are scored in the manner they are. In seeing this, I also understand that I prefer and connect better with a style of filmmaking and scoring that is from another time. I watched Xmen Days of Future Past and really enjoyed and appreciated Ottman's score. He had the chance to let the music breath because Singer gave him quite a few scenes where the music and visuals got to tell the narrative, not dialogue and sound FX. And the music worked wonderfully. Ottman even presented a beautifully dramatic melodic variation of his Main Theme during the climax of the film with Magneto's speech cross cut with the future fight with the Sentinals (I love parallel action when it's done right and Ottman's music is the glue that binds both past and present together).
I also very much enjoy Bates' Guardians of the Galaxy. It has a salient theme and frankly I was very impressed the the composer was able or given the latitude to present variations of it throughout the score.
So what is the moral of this long winded story?
Well, only that I don't lament the things I don't like or wish they were different. I just select the things I do like- Powell's HTTYD2 is my fave score of 2014 but there more than a few that I also like quite a lot.
I have largely moved away from soundtrack collecting and enjoy listening to 20th century orchestral repertoire like Stravinsky, Shostakovich, Ravel, etc. More interesting to me and I get a lot more out of it. But that's for me. Not my place to diss someone for loving Reznor's film work. Clearly Fincher likes it so live and let live is my motto.
-David
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Posted: |
Jan 3, 2015 - 11:34 AM
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By: |
Solium
(Member)
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Hey, Zooba. If you want to propose two separate Oscars for Best Sound Design using soundscapes and Best Musical Score using genuine, authentic music (which doesn’t always have to be melodic or thematic), then don’t back down from your thesis because you get some flak from the predictable and supposedly avant-garde crowd.
Joan, if I missed your admiration of Social Network, I apologize. But I don't think I misunderstood your larger point. In the quote above you state pretty clearly that "Sound Design using soundscapes" is NOT "genuine, authentic music." That's not a statement of fact, that's a statement of belief or preference. By any meaningful definition of music, the soundscapes we're talking about are absolutely genuine, authentic music.
And it is in this same quote that you reiterate the different and "supposedly" opposed camps that toff back and forth on this unresolvable debate. And in fact refer to the "predictable...avant-garde crowd" - which is itself a good example of pigeon-holing.
EDIT: Joan's posts have been more nuanced in general on this issue, but I think the key points, the points I've highlighted, are the clearest articulations of the divide between these score-loving factions, and so chose them as my starting point. That and I just can't stand it when someone suggests or implies that someone else is not being sincere because the speaker so fundamentally disagrees.
By your definition farting sounds is music. Joan is correct, and it's not just an "opinion".
(1) The art of arranging sounds in time so as to produce a continuous, unified, and evocative composition, as through melody, harmony, rhythm, and timbre.
(2) Vocal or instrumental sounds possessing a degree of melody, harmony, or rhythm.
Note, melody, harmony, rhythm, and I would add themes.
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Posted: |
Jan 3, 2015 - 5:11 PM
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By: |
Thor
(Member)
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I stated the official dictionary definition of music which you just choose to completely ignore. How is that baiting? You just don't like the answer. Anyway I'm done going around in circles.
You said "Note, melody, harmony, rhythm, and I would add themes.". That's what got me off -- your suggestion that anything that didn't have themes, wasn't music. That is so wildly unreasonable, it basically nullifies itself.
As for the original dictionary definition -- without your added (and 100% personal) comment about themes -- I think it's fine for what it is. Where I disagree with you, however, is that this definition doesn't also apply to the type of music you seem to want to exclude.
In any case -- you're usually such a reasonable fellow, solium, that I was surprised by this sudden Dan Hobgood-like rhetoric whereby you conflate preferences with facts.
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Note, melody, harmony, rhythm, and I would add themes.
Elliot Goldenthal has written some pieces of music that don't contain themes, "Tocatta and Dreamscapes" from "Final Fantasy" comes to mind. So I guess that doesn't count as music as well by your definition?
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I think David C. wins - great post, as is Schiffy's above a ways. (Of course, I would say that, as he's nice to me.)
As to Solium, please cite the exact dictionary definition you are either quoting or paraphrasing, so we know what says the dictionary vs. what says Solium. And as to that, please reference part deux of your definition:
2) Vocal or instrumental sounds possessing a degree of melody, harmony, or rhythm.
Note the "OR" - a degree of melody, harmony, OR rhythm. Melody apparently not required even by the definition you cite.
And to reiterate something I said above that may have gotten lost in my blizzard of words - there is no question to me that it is easier to produce an effective (and for some of us even listenable) sound-design score than a well-made traditional score. That's because traditional scores are following lots of complicated compositional techniques that requires all kinds of knowledge and understanding and skill that you don't pick up in a rock band.
But that's not the point of music in films - whether the music is complex or simple, well-crafted or just middling - what matters is whether it works as it's supposed to in the movie, whether it helps. Not because it's what I like to hear, but because on its own terms it does what it needs. (Whether we want to listen to it away from films is truly irrelevant to whether it works in the films, and as this board shows, there are folks who enjoy listening to every kind of film music there is).
As to Gone Girl - it has themes and harmony, and accompaniment and rhythm, as you can hear in the first couple of tracks of the album. (My own familiarity with the score is from Spotify.) A theme is a repeated series of notes. Can be three notes or five, or even just a couple, or it can be fifty. But if it's there, and it is in Gone Girl, the argument against the musical validity of the score is just wrong. There's actually a pretty strong degree of harmonic complexity going on in this score, so this is a particularly bad example to use to dismiss this kind of music.
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Posted: |
Jan 4, 2015 - 1:44 PM
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By: |
Solium
(Member)
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I stated the official dictionary definition of music which you just choose to completely ignore. How is that baiting? You just don't like the answer. Anyway I'm done going around in circles.
You said "Note, melody, harmony, rhythm, and I would add themes.". That's what got me off -- your suggestion that anything that didn't have themes, wasn't music. That is so wildly unreasonable, it basically nullifies itself.
As for the original dictionary definition -- without your added (and 100% personal) comment about themes -- I think it's fine for what it is. Where I disagree with you, however, is that this definition doesn't also apply to the type of music you seem to want to exclude.
In any case -- you're usually such a reasonable fellow, solium, that I was surprised by this sudden Dan Hobgood-like rhetoric whereby you conflate preferences with facts.
Ok, I lied and snuck back into this thread. I think perhaps we are not understanding each other. Glad we are still on talking terms.
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