I became a huge fan of his after Chariots of Fire. I grabbed that LP , and then snagged Opera Sauvage and then Blade Runner shortly thereafter. Amazing stuff.
The last CD I got of his was to Alexander which I love the Drums of Gaugamela.
I absolutely love INVISIBLE CONNECTIONS, though it's perhaps not his most accessible album.
That one is definitely "out there." I prefer the ones right before/after it, Soil Festivities (one of his best, IMO) and Mask. I also love Direct, most of the '70s albums, and the last one, Juno to Jupiter.
We've received many requests, inquiring about Friday's private ceremony in Paris. Here's what we can share.
As the hall opened and guests entered, an unreleased piece of Vangelis music was playing. It was ambient music without melody, very solemn and ethereal. A screen showed a photograph of Vangelis.
The Salle de la Coupole is a beautiful serene hall under a majestic dome. In the back, a set of stairs lead up to an apse, its walls and ceiling painted with a blueish night's sky over ancient buildings and a Greek temple on a rocky hill.
When guests were seated, the casket was carried in to the hypnotic tones of The Bounty's opening music.
Vangelis' life was then celebrated and remembered in a heartfelt and respectful ceremony. He was surrounded by loving friends and family. Cretan singer Loudovikos Ton Anogeion sang a poem he wrote for the occasion, accompanied on mandolin. There were beautiful words in French, Greek and English, spoken from the heart by a variety of his friends. Hopefully more about that later.
Then long time collaborator and friend of Vangelis, Frederick Rousseau announced that it was Vangelis' turn to speak, albeit not in words but in his preferred language: Music. A selection of 25 minutes of his work was played over the speakers: Theme From Bitter Moon, an unreleased track from the score for Alexander (from the scene late in movie, where Alexander dies), Prelude, Blade Runner Love Theme, One Alone, Light and Shadow, Eternal Alexander and Tears in Rain.
After the farewell, while guests left the hall, a second unreleased piece of ambient music by Vangelis played in the background, very heavenly, that felt as if you were among the stars.
We are pleased to report that the private event took place without the tabloid press impeding on the grieving and everyone was free to properly pay their respects.
A commemorative CD created especially for the occasion (artwork below) titled "Vangelis In Memoriam" was handed out to guests attending the reception after the ceremony. It contains two tracks, both taken from earlier albums: "El Greco" (the first track from the 2007 score album) and "Message" (from the 1988 album "Direct").
Impossible to ever forget sitting at the theatre and the early scene in COF when Liddle joins in on the village race. The music was astonishing and set the tone for what was to come both visually and aurally. Years later this site would debate the wisdom of electronic scoring for a period piece. That never occurred to me that evening and has never come close to having me doubt with each of many subsequent viewings. The eyes and ears don't lie and sometimes that's all that matters.
For me it was Blade Runner - it remains the most intense cinema experience of my life. Today it's impossible to explain its impact in 1982. When the film opens onto the Hades landscape and that Vangelis music blasts out and soars, my jaw dropped. "Oh my God" I muttered. This was Cinema.
Cue me spending months looking for that advertised Polydor album like some damn fool crusade, lol.
Impossible to ever forget sitting at the theatre and the early scene in COF when Liddle joins in on the village race. The music was astonishing and set the tone for what was to come both visually and aurally.
That cue was actually an arrangement of a cue Vangelis composed for Frederic Rossif's Opera Sauvage, called "Hymn".
He got a lot of mileage out of that piece, as it was also used later in a Gallo Wine wine ad...
Years later this site would debate the wisdom of electronic scoring for a period piece. That never occurred to me that evening and has never come close to having me doubt with each of many subsequent viewings. The eyes and ears don't lie and sometimes that's all that matters.
My attitude is, if it works, it works. Technically speaking, using a symphony orchestra for Spartacus or Ben-Hur is no less anachronistic than using a Yamaha CS80 for a film set in the 1920s.
My attitude is, if it works, it works. Technically speaking, using a symphony orchestra for Spartacus or Ben-Hur is no less anachronistic than using a Yamaha CS80 for a film set in the 1920s.
Wide vistas, larger than life characters, "casts of thousands"... There's no other way to succesfully convey the epicness of such films except using a symphony orchestra. Anachronistic or not, that's the sound those films need to move their audience - and the moviegoers are not musicologists caring for a historically accurate sound. The same principle, of course, applies to smaller, more intimate films like "Chariots of Fire", that's why the synth sound was effective.
Thank you, Paul. Now I want to go back to that scene & music with its filmic arrangement. This was one helluva sports film that captured individual athletic motivation and its timelessness.
It is interesting, too, that Vangelis reused previously composed stuff and had his music transferred elsewhere a la COF's original theme inserted beautifully inside M. Jarre's otherwise The Year Of Living Dangerously.
According to Elsewhere.com, "...the intention [from their sources] is to fully preserve Vangelis' legacy, which means that the intention is to eventually share as much as possible of his creations with the world. That would include his unreleased music, but also paintings or other art. But patience will be needed for that. Much needs to be organized, and the mourning over his passing is still fresh." http://elsew.com/data/latest.htm
According to Elsewhere.com, "...the intention [from their sources] is to fully preserve Vangelis' legacy, which means that the intention is to eventually share as much as possible of his creations with the world. That would include his unreleased music, but also paintings or other art. But patience will be needed for that. Much needs to be organized, and the mourning over his passing is still fresh." http://elsew.com/data/latest.htm
Meh. Both BLADE RUNNER and CHARIOTS OF FIRE are represented enough as is. But I hope this statement alludes to an opening to completely unreleased Vangelis efforts, or those that only have a track or two on compilations etc. You know -- MISSING, THE BOUNTY, BITTER MOON, that kind of stuff. I would especially like his work for Jacques Costeau to get a release -- it's smack there in the gorgeous 90s work that is my favourite of his. The "Indonesia" theme, for example, is drop-dead gorgeous, and sounds like an outtake from OCEANIC. Ok, it's a bit repetitive, but the soundtrack as a whole has a lot of variety.
Personally I would be most interested in the MEDUSA score (1967) !! But it will be interesting to see if a release of tax write-offs like ACE UP MY SLEEVE are even possible.
Meh. Both BLADE RUNNER and CHARIOTS OF FIRE are represented enough as is. But I hope this statement alludes to an opening to completely unreleased Vangelis efforts, or those that only have a track or two on compilations etc. You know -- MISSING, THE BOUNTY, BITTER MOON, that kind of stuff. I would especially like his work for Jacques Costeau to get a release -- it's smack there in the gorgeous 90s work that is my favourite of his. The "Indonesia" theme, for example, is drop-dead gorgeous, and sounds like an outtake from OCEANIC. Ok, it's a bit repetitive, but the soundtrack as a whole has a lot of variety.
I agree, I think the option for completely unreleased scores is what has my interest, such as the aforementioned The Bounty...
How is Chariots of Fire "represented enough"? The actual film score has never been released and what we have is a concept album made up mostly of new recordings.
Actually, while we're on the subject of completely unreleased music, while I love The Bounty and Missing, and I recognize that the full scores have never been officially released, I think the first completely unreleased Vangelis score that I would welcome is Cavafy.
