Archive for the 'Music' Category

El Cid: Miklos Rozsa

Published
by
Pseudo
on September 4, 2008
in Music
. 4 Comments

The good people at Tadlow Music have done all film music fans a great service - they’ve reconstructed and re-recorded Miklos Rozsa’s outstanding score to the film El Cid.

Short of having the original tracks, which are unfortunately lost, I can’t think of how this set could possibly be any better. This new recording is crisp, dynamic, and duplicates both the tempo and power of the original quite well.

Is it perfect? No, but I’m very familiar with the score, and there are times when I honestly couldn’t tell that I was listening to a new recording. And that’s coming from someone who is extremely picky about re-recordings.

Not only does this 3 CD set provide us with the entire score as heard in the film, it also provides us with 23 minutes that were cut, alternate versions of certain tracks, and a suite of music from another Rozsa score - Double Indemnity. The set also contains video of the recording sessions, interviews with the people behind the scenes, and to top it all off, the packaging and liner notes are both top notch. It’s actually quite overwhelming!

As for the music itself, it’s one of Rozsa’s finest efforts. You’ve got a bit of everything here - a noble, heroic theme for our protagonist, a sumptuous love theme, thrilling battle music - and at the end, Rozsa goes liturgical on us with the inclusion of an organ! It’s a type of music we simply don’t get nowadays - thematic, fully orchestral music that isn’t just a sound effect - it’s an active participant in telling the story, just as much as the script or cinematography.

At $39.95, this set might seem a bit expensive - but when you consider that you’re getting three hours of music, it’s well worth the price.

John Williams at the Hollywood Bowl

Published
by
Pseudo
on August 31, 2008
in Music
. 2 Comments

Very few film composers ever find their way into the public consciousness, but John Williams is a living legend - and at age 76, he’s still going strong.

Nevertheless, he is 76, so I decided it was time to see him in concert, and grabbed a couple of tickets for his performance this year.

It’s a real pleasure to hear his classic film scores played live. Jaws, Raiders of the Lost Ark, Star Wars, Close Encounters… all films I grew up with, and still love, largely because of the brilliant music that accompanies them.

And I became acquainted with a few films I did not grow up with - after the intermission, there was a tribute to director Stanley Donen, who came out on stage at age 84 (!) and reminisced about some of his classic films - Funny Face, Singing In The Rain, Seven Brides For Seven Brothers, and so on. Clips were played on the four giant monitors in the Bowl, and the orchestra played in synch with them.

To cap off the evening, Williams performed a medley of themes from the various George Lucas / Steven Spielberg films he has scored, then emerged for an encore. He gave a mischievous (if deliberate) look over his shoulder as he took to the podium again, and launched into The Imperial March from The Empire Strikes Back.

Two more encores followed - a performance of Marion’s Theme from Indiana Jones and The Kingdom of the Crystal Skull, then the immortal Superman theme.

Yes, the place smells like food and beer. Yes, every piece of music was accompanied by the insistent, maddening chirping of crickets. Even worse, an unforgivably corpulent man was obstructing our view. And those wood benches can be damn painful on the backside after a while.

But overall, the entire experience was a pleasant reminder that while I have been disappointed by crappy sequels and remakes over the years - John Williams has never disappointed me.