Six favourite (greatest?) movie scores.

[Chrone]

Off the top of my head (my list would likely change completely by tomorrow except #1):

1) Vertigo (I'm the first to bring this up? )
2) The Village (featuring the lovely Hilary Hahn)
3) The Sweet Hereafter (Mychael Danna's neo-Renaissance score)
4) The Truman Show (on the list entirely for "Raising the Sail", which Glass later expanded into the masterful second movement of the Tirol Concerto)
5) North By Northwest ("A Hemiola in Every Pot")

[Chrone]

Whoops, left out #6!

6) Once Upon a Time in the West (Morricone)

[eyeresist]

Addendum:

Starship Troopers, by Basil Polidouris
Due to extended postproduction, Polidouris had time to produce an exceptional score. Unfortunately, the original recording released on Varese had an unnatural soundstage and overly compressed sound, so I'm hoping this will be rerecorded one day. Highlights include the great waltz, and the brain bug sequence.

I also recall being very impressed by the music for Soderburgh's Solaris.

[Bogey]

These have not changed for me over the past two years or so:

1. King Kong: Max Steiner
2. Psycho: Bernard Herrmann
3. The Ten Commandments: (A very young) Elmer Bernstein
4. Alien: Jerry Goldsmith
5. From Russia With Love: John Barry

And for #6 any of these will do:  Franz Waxman's Bride of Frankenstein, John Williams's Minority Report, and Shore's LOTR's.

[Lethevich]

After hearing the Conan soundtrack recommended here, and being very impressed by its expert assimilation of many worthy influences, could anybody recommend anything similar?

I consider this to be distinct in style from more "expertly" scored and executed music such as from the Lord of the Rings, and also from 50s era adventures, which have swashbuckling, brightly recorded scores, but lack the brooding quality that Poledouris brings to Conan.

[DavidRoss]

say shouldn't this thread be in the non-classical area, this isn't pure music, for the sake of music - the form is absolutely dictated by the picture, the picture is decided upon first and what you do, the length of each section is strictly determined by what you see, the picture is the main thing, and the music is supportive of that - as opposed to closing your eyes, putting a on a cd and listening to it and devoting ALL your attention to what you're hearing, your main attention tends to go where your eye is and the story and the music is supplemental to that, so it takes a back seat compared to pure music or music thats done strictly for a cd.

What then should we do with theatrical music, like Mendelssohn's Midsummer Night's Dream, pageant music, like Finlandia, coronation music, marches, ballets, operas, and music dramas? And program music of all sorts, whether "illustrations" of literature, like Strauss, conjuring of the emotional experience, like Sibelius, or programmatic symphonies and concertos, like those of Berlioz?  And what of sacred music, like Bach's oratorios?

[bhodges]

My faves:

Gato Barbieri: Last Tango in Paris
Jerry Goldsmith: Chinatown
Bernard Herrmann: Vertigo
Bernard Herrmann: Psycho
John Williams: Minority Report
Leonard Bernstein: On the Waterfront

--Bruce

[Cato]

My faves:

Gato Barbieri: Last Tango in Paris
Jerry Goldsmith: Chinatown
Bernard Herrmann: Vertigo
Bernard Herrmann: Psycho
John Williams: Minority Report
Leonard Bernstein: On the Waterfront

--Bruce

Herrmann is everywhere of course for this topic!  His Harryhausen scores are wonderful: The Seventh Voyage of Sinbad, Jason and the Argonauts, and Mysterious Island.

Trivia: Nancy Kovack of Jason and the Argonauts is known today as Mrs. Zubin Mehta!

And you can see what attracted old Zubin!

[tjguitar]

I'll just go with 6 that (I think) haven't been mentioned:







and a couple surprisingly enjoyable efforts...

[eyeresist]

What then should we do with theatrical music, like Mendelssohn's Midsummer Night's Dream, pageant music, like Finlandia, coronation music, marches, ballets, operas, and music dramas? And program music of all sorts, whether "illustrations" of literature, like Strauss, conjuring of the emotional experience, like Sibelius, or programmatic symphonies and concertos, like those of Berlioz?  And what of sacred music, like Bach's oratorios?

Ignore James on this subject. He despises soundtrack music and won't be contradicted, despite the obvious examples you have given.

[Archaic Torso of Apollo]

To a certain extent, I have to back up James on this. Whenever I try to listen to a film score as a separate stand-alone piece, it comes off sounding fragmentary and lacking in complexity. Which is perfectly reasonable - it's functional music, not designed to stand alone.

This is why it always strikes me as funny that some people (usually people who hate dissonant modern music) laud film-score composers as the "true successors" to great symphonists and the like. What they're doing is completely different from what Beethoven et al. did. And that's the way it should be.

The only instances I can think of when the comparison makes sense is when the score material is reworked as a stand-alone piece: e.g. Alexander Nevsky. But then it's no longer a film score.

[DavidRoss]

James proposed moving film score discussion to the non-classical side of the forum.  The reason he gave is that movie music is not absolute music.  I asked whether all such music should then be moved and listed a number of examples of purpose driven music generally regarded as "classical."

If movie music fans and detractors wish to discuss the issue then a thread for that purpose might attract the attention of folks interested in pursuing it.

[Sergeant Rock]

The answer to James' question is simple...and Mr. Ross explained it well. I can simplify: film scores are the modern equivalent of incidental music. Beethoven's Egmont and Grieg's Peer Gynt are discussed in the classical section. So should film scores.

Sarge

[Bogey]

Artistic freedom & choice is restricted greatly, and at the mercy of the visual and the directors final say.

Kind of reminds me of Michelangelo and some of commissioned work by Pope Julius II to paint the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel.  Even though his canvas was somewhat restricted, I believe the final art came out pretty well, was more memorable than most "unrestricted art" of the time, and even with any of the restrictions restrictions, should not be classified as anything other than art.

[Cato]

The Weekend Wall Street Journal has an article on Jerry Goldsmith and Chinatown:



http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052970204261704574274152752739772.html

[Bogey]

haha  - now theres a stretch that misses the boat completely, to say the least.

How about when you hear the music out of context, James.  Are you saying that if you heard a piece you enjoyed on a classical station (which occasionally plays film music), did not know it was from a film, and then looked it up later to find it was from a film score that you would write it off as non-classical?

That is, should non-classical music, which you heap all film scores on to, be exposed during blind testing?

[Bogey]

Let me change the above a bit to "easily exposed".

[Bogey]

What are your thoughts when directors choose classical pieces for their movies?  How does that line up with the "paint my numbers"?

[Cato]

Saw the film, don't recall the music that much - as the article highlights many of the typical formalic contrivances of a film  "trumpet solo that floats freely over a cushion of tolling harps and brooding strings, a love theme" - "the tension between the dark romanticism of string-accompanied love theme and the crisp, bristly clatter of pianos and percussion" etc. It's all paint by numbers typical hollywood pastiche and done for mere effect. Nothing to be taken too serously. For the often forgettable barren wasteland of film music, it may be "stand-out" but compared to the real stuff? Nah. And Terry Teachout calling it one of the finest scores of the postwar era is laughable. Then again, finding a great critic/journalist on music is a very rare thing.

Agreed: I offered the article just for discussion.  I think there are better Goldsmith scores: Planet of the Apes, Hoosiers, etc.

[Bogey]

Throw Patton, Star Trek the Motion Picture and Alien ahead of it as well, IMO.