Six favourite (greatest?) movie scores.

[vandermolen]

1 Poledouris: Conan the Barbarian (not a joke - the comparison with Alexander Nevsky by Prokofiev is valid IMHO)

2 Rosza: Ben Hur (Kitsch in places but great)

3 Prokofiev: Ivan the Terrible (better than Alexander Nevsky I think)

4 Walton: Henry V (difficult to chose between this and Rawsthorne's 'The Cruel Sea' or Sainton's 'Moby Dick')

5 Elmer Bernstein: To Kill a Mockingbird (or The Great Escape)

6 Auric: Beauty and the Beast ( a wonderfully magical and evocative score - his music for 'Dead of Night' is genuinely scary)

Actually I've subverted my own rule by mentioning ten scores - difficult to decide 

[jimmosk]

Ooh, tricky.  These are definitely 'favorite' rather than 'greatest', because I don't feel qualified to opine on the latter topic, and I certainly don't know as many scores as some people.  In coming up with these six I placed the greatest weight not just on how memorable/evocative I find the music, but also on how much material there is -- a film score that has one really great theme but uses and reuses it for most of its length doesn't get too high a rating from me.

John Williams: The Empire Strikes Back
Jerry Goldsmith: Star Trek, The Motion Picture
Dmitri Shostakovich: Pirogov
Patrick Doyle: Henry V
John Williams: Superman
Trevor Jones: The Dark Crystal

runners up:

Ennio Morricone: The Mission
John Williams: Raiders of the Lost Ark
Elmer Bernstein: The Magnificent Seven
Philip Glass: Koyannisqatsi
Yamashiro Shoji: Akira


-J

[ChamberNut]

I can really thank Stanley Kubrick and Wendy (Walter) Carlos for nudging me into the path of classical music.

Here are some of my favorite soundtracks:

A Clockwork Orange
Barry Lyndon
2001: A Space Odyssey
The Shining
The Omen
The Piano
The Pianist

[eyeresist]

I don't know enough about soundtrack music to give a list of six great scores (i mean great as music rather than great as filmscores), but I would have to mention:

Psycho / Hermann
I keep meaning to get the McNulty complete recording, which I heard about 10 years ago.

Star Wars (or Empire Strikes Back) / Williams
Despite Williams' lack of credibility, this remains a spectacular achievement.

House of Frankenstein / Salter & Skinner
This underground hit for Marco Polo/Naxos is like an extended tone poem by Wagner and Hindemith.

[vandermolen]

Thanks for interesting replies - Yes, The Dark Crystal and Psycho are favourites too as is North by Northwest.

[Sergeant Rock]

Favorites (chosen by frequency of play):






Sarge

[71 dB]

Despite Williams' lack of credibility, this remains a spectacular achievement.

Lack of credibility?  John Williams has more Oscar nominations than any other living person (and 5 Oscars won). He has wrote memorable and beloved themes for dozens of classic movies. He has been the leading Hollywood composer for several decades. If that doesn't mean credibility in movie music circles then I don't know what does.

[vandermolen]

Thanks Sarge, the Steiner CD looks especially interesting.  Two more of my favourites:

[Grazioso]

1 Poledouris: Conan the Barbarian (not a joke - the comparison with Alexander Nevsky by Prokofiev is valid IMHO)

I wouldn't ever take that as a joke. It's been one of my favorite film scores for decades: it's imaginative and evocative, filled with memorable themes and moments. It also plays a central role in the film, which is essentially a sort of Wagnerian music drama, where images and music jointly bear the bulk of the storytelling responsibilities, with dialogue relegated to a supporting role.

Two soundtracks that work superbly in context and feature "actual" classical music to powerful effect are:



and



Admittedly, the latter primarily features pop music, but it's selected and employed with exquisite care.

[DavidRoss]

A Clockwork Orange
Barry Lyndon
2001: A Space Odyssey
The Shining
The Omen
The Piano
The Pianist

Yes, Ray--Barry Lyndon came first to mind, followed by 2001, 8½ & The Piano!  The others you listed are all quite good--Kubrick had a better ear for music than any other director I can think of offhand.  I also found the Vangelis soundtrack for Blade Runner to be as haunting as that movie's imagery.  Hmmm...that makes five.  To round it out to six, let me add the movie with the best score I can think of:

Amadeus

[vandermolen]

I wouldn't ever take that as a joke. It's been one of my favorite film scores for decades: it's imaginative and evocative, filled with memorable themes and moments. It also plays a central role in the film, which is essentially a sort of Wagnerian music drama, where images and music jointly bear the bulk of the storytelling responsibilities, with dialogue relegated to a supporting role.

Two soundtracks that work superbly in context and feature "actual" classical music to powerful effect are:



and



Admittedly, the latter primarily features pop music, but it's selected and employed with exquisite care.

Totally agree with your comments on Conan. I seem to recall that Master and Commander used the Tallis Fantasia by Vaughan Williams as a main theme.

[Lethevich]

Was the soundtrack to the sequel, Conan the Destroyer as good? The same composer seems to have been involved.

[Cato]

Dudes!  Where is the #1 Score of all time?






Max Steiner's score is one of the first which accompanies most of a movie.   And the remakes are, as they say in Spanish, el sucko profundo.


In alphabetical order:



Psycho by Bernard Herrmann





by Frederick Hollander






by Jerome Moross




by Vyacheslav Ovchinnikov






by Dmitri Tiomkin  

Miklos Rosza's El Cid and Ben-Hur are also obvious picks!  Along with Jerry Goldsmith's The Omen.

[vandermolen]

I have the Marco Polo King Kong score - it is excellent - must listen again. Am very pleased to see a vote for Ovchinnikov's 'War and Peace':the soviet era movie is the best one by far - I remember my mother taking me to see it, over two separate weeks at the cinema when it first came out. The soundtrack was on LP but not on CD (Ovchinnikov is an interesting composer - his Symphony No 2 for strings deserves a CD release).

[Archaic Torso of Apollo]

Am very pleased to see a vote for Ovchinnikov's 'War and Peace':the soviet era movie is the best one by far - I remember my mother taking me to see it, over two separate weeks at the cinema when it first came out. The soundtrack was on LP but not on CD (Ovchinnikov is an interesting composer - his Symphony No 2 for strings deserves a CD release).

I like very much Ovchinnikov's score for Andrei Rublev: it somehow manages to sound both modern and medieval at the same time.

[Grazioso]

Was the soundtrack to the sequel, Conan the Destroyer as good? The same composer seems to have been involved.

Yes, Poledouris composed that one, too, but like the film, it isn't nearly as good as the original.

Totally agree with your comments on Conan. I seem to recall that Master and Commander used the Tallis Fantasia by Vaughan Williams as a main theme.

It does, as a haunting post-battle elegy. The film also features music by Bach, Boccherini, and Mozart, iirc.

[Lethevich]

Yes, Poledouris composed that one, too, but like the film, it isn't nearly as good as the original.

Dang, one less thing to investigate I suppose. Thanks!

[Cato]

Another group of suggestions: some not too well known.


But not this one:



Music by James Horner.




Music by Angelo Badalamenti







Music by Thomas Newman.






A disaster at the box office, since people were expecting a fairly happy musical: instead, they saw a psycho-drama with Dorothy about to undergo electro-shock therapy at an asylum. 

Music by David Shire: a great score!



Music by John Williams: memorable and appropriate at every turn.  (And one of DePalma's best movies and casts!  Kirk Douglas, John Cassavetes AND Charles Durning!)   

[karlhenning]

Dang, Cato, I remember liking the film of Fried Green Tomatoes (and maybe I read the book first, or maybe it was afterwards), but I have no recollection of the music.  I've got to revive my Netflix soon . . . .

[Cato]

Dang, Cato, I remember liking the film of Fried Green Tomatoes (and maybe I read the book first, or maybe it was afterwards), but I have no recollection of the music.  I've got to revive my Netflix soon . . . .

It has a marvelous Americana-style theme used in the woodwinds, often announced by... the clarinet.