Film Music - Original Soundtracks

I'm just listening to John Barry's soundtrack to The Last Valley,which has finally come out on CD.It's a new,expanded recording,and sounds pretty fine to me,although I haven't listened to my LP for eons.
I'd certainly recommend it for JB fans.It's very recognisably JB,but perhaps more sombre-sounding,due,I guess,to the subject matter of the film,which it matches perfectly.Most tracks have a choir and orchestra,heavy on the drums and bells,apart from 2 or 3 purely vocal tracks.
The film,by the way,is IMO rather underrated.It is a quite unusual story,with an exceptionally good performance from Michael Caine,
playing outside of his usual range of characters.
Film fans see it if you get the chance.

In answer to Mick Parry and his TV series thing - I've never seen the programme so wouldn't know what to expect. I can’t and don’t watch any ITV drama series. What sort of music is involved?

On the topic of TV theme soundtracks though, does anyone else out there watch the BBC TV gardening programme Home Front in the Garden?
You might laugh given the content (Fortunate lazy sods having their backyards very expensively remade and remodelled at the TV licence payers expense) but the soundtrack to that programme really is quite good. Anyone notice Tranquility Bass doing Cantamilla the other night? Groovy stuff (check out Amazon.co.uk BTW they're doing the Momo Arabesque CD for £5.99 – a real bargain)

They have a playlist of the sounds used in each programme Here if you’re interested. Nice that the Beeb can still get somethings right theses days.

Time for bed again. Bloody gales……Yawn.

P

[This message was edited by P on SATURDAY 02 February 2002 at 05:07.]

Barrington Pheloung - Hilary & Jackie. Wonderful music and a bonus complete Du Pre/Elgar Cello concerto. His Morse music is fine too.

Air- Virgin Suicides. Their best work IMHO.

Hal Hartley - all his soundtracks are beautiful, minimalist stuff.

Carter Burwell - Fargo. Burwells best score so far. haunting.

Bjork - Selma songs. As stated above, not a true score but a Bjork masterpiece. Peter Stormare sang Thom Yorkes' part better - and he's a terrible singer.

Brian Eno - Apollo. Soundtrack for the TV series.

Regards

Stephen

Steve

My faves are:

Morricone: The Mission- fantastic, though starts to get heavy mid-way through. Start and end are amazing though...

Knopfler: Local Hero- A masterpiece

Zimmer: Hannibal- Maybe full of gimmikry, but I love it, especially the last aria...

Zimmer: Gladiator- nothing more needs to be said...

Various: The Bodyguard- It might be twee, but nevertheless good...

Various: Top Gun- Maybe a sign of my age; a camp classic but also the first CD I went out and bought...I was about 8yrs old!

Jones/Edelman: The Last of the Mohicans

Various: Notting Hill

Various: Eyes Wide Shut

I love the various interpretations of Sakamoto's Merry Christmas Mr. Lawrencethat I've heard, but I haven't listerned to the full soundtrack. However, I am increasingly familiar with his other work, thanks to my girlfriend, but also her mother, furnishing me with some of his Japanese cd's. Current favourite is BTTB. I dont have all his cd's to hand, but maybe one day I'll post more details of these...

For now, cheerio

Dave

Too bad the same can't be said for Woody Allen and David Niven's performance.

Erik

• Trevor Jones - Dark City - not all of the pieces are from Jones, but his soundtrack, along with Hughes Hall's "Sleep Now" (from the trailer) are very dynamic. Screechy tone though.
  
• Trevor Jones - Runaway Train. Great rocking fun of a main theme with a perfectly melodramatic excerpt from Vivaldi's "Gloria". Good luck on finding a copy though.
  
• Michael Convertino - The Hidden. A small gem from a great B-movie.

Cheers

Keith.

While on the subject,I'd like to mention two people who have produced some of the best soundtracks I have heard (along with some fairly ordinary ones).

Bernard Herrman

The big three IMO are Vertigo,North by Northwest and Psycho.I have a 1975 recording of the latter,conducted by the composer,which contains almost an hour of sublime music,the recurring motifs creating a wonderfully atmospheric whole that compares to any piece of classical music you may care to mention.The later Joel McNeely version is probably comparable according to reviews.

Of the other two,Vertigo is good but quite short (37m.odd),N by NW is longer but somewhat bitty.

Danny Elfman

His Mission Impossible score compares very favourably with Psycho,in that it hangs together very well as an album - it also contains elements from the original TV theme,which can't be bad - IMO his best work.

Also excellent are his two Batman soundtracks,although you probably need only one as they are quite similar - atmospherically dark and gloomy.

Of his more lively soundtracks (i.e.like The Simpsons),Beetlejuice is superb - fun,fun,fun all the way.

P.S. Honourable mention to Carter Burwell's Raising Arizona - completely wacky,fits the film like a soft suede glove.

Jonathan

I think that the paradox here is the music of Danny Elfman. The man is in my opinion probably the greatest writer of soundtracks EVER. The problem is that [and sorry Shazbut, in advance] for me his work is so astonishingly well crafted to its purpose, - i.e. mirroring onscreen action, that it is deeply disappointing when heard in isolation. The motifs flit all over the place and are rarely developed into anything that makes for comfortable domestic listening. As an annecdotal aside [and a bit of [sort-of] name dropping!] a close friend who is a noteworthy instrumentalist and jobbing conductor [made first choice once in 'Building A Library'!] has worked with Elfman as his orchestrator on a couple of films, particularly 'Sleepy Hollow', where the music budget was absolutely astronomical, a testimony to the high regard in which he is held, told me that although Elfman cannot read or write a single note of music, he was able to whip out each and every instrumental part for a full orchestra on his synth for my friend to notate without needing any master score to refer to - keeping the whole kaboodle entirely in his head ... all perfectly synchronised etc..... My friend [and he studied under Mackerras, has orchestrated the performing versions of various Dvorak operas etc - just telling you this so you know the calibre of what we're dealing with] virtually fell to his knees overcome with awe & wonder at such a natural talent, and offered for free as a public service to give Elfman lessons in conventional methods - he was met with the response 'Oh, gee - thanks , but I can manage.' And I suppose he probably can. Just wish the end results were more listenable though !

joolz.

quote:

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Originally posted by shazbut:
_Danny Elfman_

Also excellent are his two Batman soundtracks,although you probably need only one as they are quite similar - atmospherically dark and gloomy.

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Elfman is very good, but every time I hear the main Batman theme, I feel strongly that the estate of Irving Berlin should receive a royalty for having "lent" his classic song Let's Face the Music and Dance.

Oh well, steal from the rich I always say.

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And why has no one mentioned Michael Nyman?

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I did. Along with many other specifically composed stuff - although in some cases Michael did do the music BEFORE the film.

I think the coolest made for the film has to be Ascenseur pour L'echafaud - Miles Davis and some session guys hanging out in a room in Paris with Louis Malle jamming along to the film to create the soundtrack.

Which I mentioned before and twice this months already. Hey - anybody NOT bought it yet??

Jonathan

So you did [mention Michael Nyman]. Apologies - especially as I actually read your post with particular interest and agreed with the comment about Gladiator. My short term memory is shot to buggery these days, and I expect I'll soon be in a Home.

As well as Holst, Gladiator reminds me a lot of Conan the Barbarian, which is a fave. Have you heard Conan the Destroyer? Quite similar to Conan the Barbarian, as you'd expect, and almost [but not quite] as good. Basil Poledouris did Robocop as well, which when I first saw it seemed to have an amazing similarity to C the B, especially the main theme - just a couple of notes switched.

What you say about Michael Nyman composing before the movie makes sense - it probably explains the differences between the classic[al] older stuff and more recent things like Gattaca, which have a much more traditional 'soundtrack' feel and if you didn't know it, would not realise was Nyman at all.

Doubtless you know the lovely 1492 by Vangelis, but what are his other soundtracks like? I see from Amazon that he's done quite a lot, and apart from Chariots of Fire [overkilled for me, & could never personally face it again, effective though it is] Any recommendations?

I know that at the time Vangelis blocked the release of the proper Blade Runner soundtrack, thinking for some odd reason that it wasn't worthy of release [first widespread use of sampling technology incidentally .... can't think of the gadget - Fairlight, maybe?] and so Warners, justifiably peeved, rustled up an orchestral, and rather manky version. A vaguely similar sort of thing happened with 2001, when CBS, to cash in on the prevailing mania popped out a version of the 'soundtrack' culled from their classical catalogue, in the hope of fleecing a few punters who hadn't noticed the official MGM version. The 2001 selections took up the first side of the disc, but then on the second side, some genius in A&R put an astonishing thing called A******* - A Space Opera. Blew the '2001 soundtrack' away - a mixture of electronica, choirs & orchestra. But what was it called? And by some miracle, is it available in any form? Me and my pals spent many an evening in darkened bedrooms lit only by red bulbs being astounded by this [it was 1968, remember] I suppose it must have been a pioneering example of 60's musique concrete, but I would dearly love to hear it again......

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Originally posted by throbnorth:
The 2001 selections took up the first side of the disc, but then on the second side, some genius in A&R put an astonishing thing called A******* - A Space Opera. Blew the '2001 soundtrack' away - a mixture of electronica, choirs & orchestra. But what was it called?

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A couple of brain cells have had a little chat and decided that they think they know the answer....Aniara is the word that has emerged.

I too have cast longing looks at the Vangelis array on Amazon. Trouble is all the reviewers are in hyper-gush mode, and the samples are too short to get a good feel. So, does anyhting else come up to Blade Runner standards?

By the way, by your name it rather sounds as though you might have been third hunky barbarian on the left in Conan (or perhaps Red Sonja...)

Oh, and thanks for the info on Aniara. After much Googling, I've discovered more that anyone would ever properly want to know - It was a sci-fi opera by Karl-Birger Blomdahl, written in 1957 from the epic Swedish science fiction poem [??] by Nobel prize winner Harry Martinson, and had the first use of electronic music in an opera. [incidentally, did you know that 'Iris' by Mascagni is the first opera to feature a bicycle onstage? - just thought you'd like to know] Several recordings made over the years, but alas none still available, unless you count an extract on a John Mauceri / Hollywood Bowl Orch disc, 'Music of the Stars' which is otherwise unfortunately infested with John Williams.

In an interestingly cyclic way, my researches also found out that the CBS 2001 thing featured four preludes by Morton Subotnik.

[This message was edited by throbnorth on WEDNESDAY 13 February 2002 at 11:33.]

reg

Dave

Phenomenon - jazzed up PG I have the touch

Loads of Ron Goodwin stuff

Passion - PG

Leon - Eric Serra

and loads more

Dave

I haven't heard Conan the Destroyer - 'tho I quite often play the other one when in a martial mood - and yes, Gladiator is another one used similarly, along with Moricone's various Spagetti Western music. I'll give it a try.

When a spotty young thing I dabbled with Vangelis - and I have ony retained a liking for Bladerunner, and now 1492. If you fancy a good laugh - get hold of a copy of "Soil Festivities" - which kinda typifies what I generally think about his stuff - great ideas, poorly executed.

Aniara sounds interesting. If anyone tracks down a source of this stuff - please let me know.

A friend moved house last year and destroyed his "Pentetuche of the Cosmogomy" (Dave Greenslade) - he said "Thank christ for that, I've been meaning to get rid of that for years." Clearly it was my duty to get him the CD re-release as a housewarming present. Found one as well - so this sort of weird stuff kicks about somewhere.

ANOpax

Thanks - I had forgotten about The Killing Fields. I had a copy on tape, probably in the loft. Must track down another.

Jonathan

Yes, 'Throb' is fine ....

What a shame about Vangelis - that explains why I've only heard 1492 & Blade Runner - I had wistfully hoped that there were a whole raft of goodies for me to explore.