Category: Film

Film Score Friday Top 5: Ranking the “Harry Potter” scores

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So we’ve got a new Potter film out this week (in case you hadn’t heard), which gives us 6 total, just enough to make a Top 5 and not have to include every score.  This list, which will be in actual ranking of quality (whereas normally try to just list and not rank) because, well, let’s face it, in terms of scoring, these films are all over the place. 

#1) John Williams – Prisoner of Azkaban: As I intimated in an earlier post on Williams’ work on the series, I consider this his strongest Potter score, and one of his best in recent memory.  Whereas the two previous (which we’ll get to), felt like merely an extension of his previous work (especially Home Alone in places), the Azkaban score really felt like he was pushing himself and his craft to new and different places.

#2) John Williams – Sorcerer’s Stone: It’s hard to put this score any lower since it established all the major musical themes.  At the same time, though, the sound of Williams’ original score is so far away from what the scores are now (a change started by Williams in the Azkaban score).  But on its own, it is a good score, but not great.  It sounds like much of Williams’ scores for kids films (as mentioned Home Alone, E.T., and others), so I didn’t feel like he was really stretching, as he later did for Azkaban.

#3) Patrick Doyle – Goblet of Fire: I still don’t know fully how I feel about this score.  On the one hand when I listen to it, I think it sounds like rejected cues from Lord of the Rings.  But, Herr Vogler informs me that it actually sounds like most of Doyle’s work, and since I don’t really know his scores, I’m going to go with his opinion on this.  As for the music itself, it is an enjoyable and I especially love the “Hogwarts’ March.”

#4) John Williams/William Ross – Chamber of Secrets: This is a strange one to rank since it really is just reworkings of a lot of material from Sorcerer’s Stone (done by Ross)with some new themes by Williams.  The new themes are good (I discussed the Lockhart/”No Ticket” connection previous), and the music overall still sounds like Williams, which means it works well together.  At the same time, though, there is nothing really to write home about.  I might rank it higher if there were more original material and not just adapting the previous material, but in the end, I still have to put it above…

#5) Nicolas Hooper – Half-Blood Prince: Truth be told, I almost put this at number four.  It shows a lot of improvement over Hooper’s previous effort in Order of the Phoenix.  Herr Vogler said it best when he stated that the problem with Hooper’s score is a lack of cohesion.  There is such a variety of musical styles, sounds, etc. that is feels like the music comes from about three different films.  Prince has a greater amount of cohesion (the Dumbledore material that comes out of “In Noctem” I enjoy), but there are still those odd cues (like “Farewell Aragog,” which I really like, but sounds like a traditional Irish tune, and use of guitar in other cues) that stick out from the rest of the musical world.  But, I really like the the album is set up more in order of appearance in the film than Order, whose album ordering irks me to no end.

Well, that will do it for today.  Go see the film, I hear its good.

Book Review: “Listening to Fellini – Music and Meaning in Black and White” by M. Thomas Van Order

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I’ve done Score/CD reviews before, but now for something a little different: a book review.  I hope this to be the first of many as I make my way through books on the topic of film and film music.  I’ve read books dealing with film music theory (Unheard Melodies, Overtones and Undertones, and others), but this is really this first book that I’ve read that puts theory into practice.

Books dealing solely with theory are difficult to read, in my opinion, because there isn’t as much of a “narrative,” if you will, current to them.  In essence, they read like texts books, and we all know what that is like.  Don’t get me wrong, they are very useful to read, and great resources, but as books that you sit down and read from cover to cover…not so much.  But what Van Order, a professor of Italian at Middlebury College in Vermont, has done in Listening to Fellini is create a book that is not only readable but also highly insightful, along with being a very good academic study of how Fellini uses music in his films.

The scope of this book is limited to the Italian director’s Black and White films with scores by Nina Rota, and this limiting in scope helps focus his project and allow him to dedicate at least 10-15 pages on each of the seven films considered (Lo sceicco bianco, I vitelloni, La strada, Il bidone, Le notti di Cabiria, La dolce vita, and 8 1/2).  I myself have only seen two of the films (La strada and 8 1/2), and both were seen by me over five years and my only strong memory is of the closing scene of 8 1/2 (which features one of, what I now know are,  Rota’s signature circus marches that he wrote for Fellini’s films).  One of the highest compliments that I feel I can pay to this book is that Van Order does a wonderful job describing the film and plot alongside his musical analysis such that I don’t feel that an intimate knowledge of the film is necessary to my understanding of his points (something that I feel when I read much academic film writing).

The text of the book itself is relatively short, only 145 pages, but after that follows nearly 100 pages of appendices in which he breaks down each of the films into a series of sequences and details their aural content and describes the action.  He references these sequences in text, though it is not necessary to look them up, but they do help deepen a reader’s understanding. 

There are two chapters that I would like to highlight, though, as especially insightful:

-Van Order dedicates two chapters to La strada.  The first is his analysis of the music and its editing (the sort of content that make up the book’s focus), the second La strada chapter, though, discusses the English language version of the film, and how the American sound editors not only replaced dialogue, but also changed the music.  Putting cues where they hadn’t been before, using some different music, and remixing the levels.  The main thread of the book is describing how carefully Fellini would edit the sound in his films, the mixing levels, where music goes, and the American editors destroyed that.  Essentially editing the sound as they would a typical Hollywood film.  But Fellini, as Van Order shows, is very careful.  He plays on an audience’s expectations, violates the diegetic/non-diegetic spaces, sometimes creating a meta-diegetic space that exists solely within the filmic environment.  And his use of music goes beyond simple character or idea themes, but rather helps to illustrate on a very subtle level certain aspects of the characters, aspects that the characters themselves (along with audience) only become aware of as the film unfolds and the theme accumulates the meaning.  And by contrasting the two versions of La strada (both available on the Criterion release of the film I believe), he brings his main point into stark relief.

-The second chapter I would like to bring forward is his discussion of La dolce vita.  By far the longest chapter in his book, Van Order discusses in depth the music of the film, its sources (here Fellini/Rota reference Pines of Rome and Threepenny Opera) and how these references and their music as interpreted within Rota’s score operates within the film’s story.  Van Order disscues in exhaustive detail the original sources and how Fellini brings in the ideas and feelings of them and incorprates them into the film.

Van Order’s conclusions also lay out other aspects for future studies, including what he calls “horizontal” study, which would entail seeing how certain repeated musical elements (like Circus Marches) function across his film output.  He also suggests looking at sound itself (effects like trains, etc), and their functions within Fellini’s film world.  In all, it is a very well written and researched look at music in the films of Fellini.  One that avoids becoming burdened by overly technical musical language (the musical examples were transcribed for him by an undergrad assistant whom he credits), and focuses on how music brings out what Fellini was saying in his films.

Film Score Friday Top 5: “Star Wars” Cues Part III – Return of the Jedi

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(Note: I didn’t edit much last night before posting, and I’ve gone back now and cleaned this up a bit.)

Now for the oft delayed, but never forgotten, Part III of our countdown of Star Wars (Original Flava) cues.  Same rules as before.  Let’s go to the tape:

Yub Nub!
Yub Nub!

1) “Yub Nub” aka Ewok Celebraion – I’m not sure exactly what this origianl Ewok celebration music is called on the soundtrack release since what I have has the new ending music, but I much prefer the pre-Lucas revision cue.  In my humble opinion (did you hear me stepping onto the soap box?), of all the changes that Lucas made, this was is the most egregious.  Now I’m not talking about putting young Anakin in place of old crusty Anakin, or even the scenes of the Empire falling, I could care less about those.  I’m talking about getting rid of “Yub Nub.”  I loved that song!  (Props to my friend Scott for cuing me into the image.)

And because I love you all, done by Barber Shop Quartet (with translation!)

2) “Leia’s News/Light of the Force” – Interesting to note that the cue on the CD is actually longer than what is used in the film (either version).  Right after the “Leia’s News” part, there is a pause where in the movie you have the Ewok horns and then the wipe cut to Luke’s torch.  On the CD, the first statement of the “Force Theme” is not what you hear next in the movie, but rather the second time the French Horn comes in is where the cue starts in the film (And yes, I’ve compared both versions).  But the main reason in selecting this cue is, of course, the Funeral Pyre scene (“Light of the Force”).  Through out the course of the trilogy, the “Force Theme” has taken on such a huge meaning: Luke’s Destiny/Fate, religious subtext, and many others.  The first full statement in series (Binary Sunset), has Luke gazing into the distance/space, not knowing what lay ahead, and here, the last statement, is how that is brought to a close: the son “buries” his father, closing the circle.  Not to mention the added meanings when you consider the prequels (Qui-Gon’s funeral, and of course the Immolation Scene in Revenge of the Sith).  But what is so great about the cue is just how subtlety Williams plays it.  In the part that is used, you have the French Horn statement over tremolo strings, with a string bass defining the bass line, expanding the tonal aural space.  And where, in the answer to the horn solo, the original “Binary Sunset” cue soars into space, this time the strings play it down as Luke looks on.  And even as the camera pans up, Williams elects to continue the understated natue as the cue comes to a close and the beginning of “Yub Nub” starts to play (if you’re watching the good version).

3) “Jabba’s Baroque Recital” – Time for another one of my strange associations.  For some reason this music, which is being played in Jabba’s “throne room” when C-3P0 and R2-D2 arrive, always made me think, for some reason, that is was a Sunday morning on Tatooine.  It feels laid back, and calm, like something you’d be playing during Sunday brunch or something.  Regardless, it’s another Williams music track that fills out the diegetic aural space of the Star Wars universe brilliantly, alongside the Cantina Band numbers.

4 & 5) I’m going to cheat massively here and put the entire Battle of Endor sequence for the last two spaces.  On your two-disc set, that is the following cues: Emperor’s Throne Room, The Battle of Endor I, The Lightsaber/Ewok Battle, The Battle of Endor II, and The Battle of Endor III.  As I’ve said many times to Herr Vogler, I think that this sequence (roughly the last 30 minutes of the film) is one of the best examples of audio-visual editing and scoring music to image in film.  The creation of continuity between the three battles (Emperor/Luke/Vader, on Endor, and in space around Endor) is just about perfect.  Also, Williams really brings it all to the score, bringing most of the major themes from the series to a head, and it perfectly fits with the ebb and flow of the battle.  And the Emperor’s music (with the chorus) is among the best music of the series.

So that concludes the original trilogy.  Maybe someday when I’ve stopped crying about it, I’ll do the prequels.  As for next week…suggestions?

Film Score Friday Top 5: “Star Wars” Cues Part II – The Empire Strikes Back

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So yes, originally this post series was supposed to be an easy way for me to get through a packed few weeks…see how well that turned out?  Anyway, just because the reason has passed, doesn’t mean I’m not going to satisfy your curiosity about my appraisal as Mr. Williams’ work.  Same rules apply as before: no “Yoda’s Theme” or “Imperial March,” if the theme is what strikes, it must be referenced within context of a cue.  Also no opening theme music or end credit suites, but the music right after or before respectively are fair game.  Titles used are off the two disc editions.

1) “The Asteroid Field” – I know I keep referencing old memories when talking about things here, but as many have pointed out, music has a strong impact on memory recall.  In reference to this cue, I remember constantly replaying the Asteroid Field level on the Super Nintendo “Super Star Wars: The Empire Strikes Back.”  Not only is the film my favorite of the franchise, but the game had so many get aspects, and this level was my favourite, trying to navigate your way through the field.  One of the reasons I loved it was that it used this cue for the music.  The music also reminds me at times of the second movement of Prokofiev’s Fifth Symphony, especially in the woodwind.

2) “The Rebel Fleet” – There is about a minute here of perfect music, in my opinion.  Pull out disc two of the set and listen from about 57 seconds in until the end credits come in (which we aren’t talking about), the swell of the music as Luke and Leia say goodbye to Lando and Chewie as they gaze out the window at the galaxy that they’re fighting for.  Yes, it’s a “down ending” in that Luke gets his hand chopped out and Han is captured by Boba Fett (thank you Kevin Smith for that analysis), but the music gives one so much hope for the future.

3) “The Clash of Lightsabers” – The first truly great lightsaber duel in the Saga, sure Luke get’s beaten up by Vader hurling stuff at him, sure Vader turns out to be his father…but Williams truly outdoes himself with this cue.  The tremolo strings, harp glissandi andbrass hits starting around 30 seconds in, which is just a great arrangement of Vader’s Theme.  And of course the cue ends as the picture settles back in on Luke and Vader (after showing us Lando, Leia, and Chewie’s escape from Cloud City).

4) “Lando’s Palace” – The main theme for Cloud City is such a peaceful and buoyant piece of writing, complete with Williams’ trademark glockenspiel that gives it all a nice shimmer.  Makes the viewer forget just how dark the whole thing is, but wait…what’s going on here?  And that’s the great part about the sequence and cue, it lures us in with the facade of the Cloud City theme only to rip the rug out from under us.

5) “The Battle of Hoth” – Stand by ion control…The first transport is away, the first transport is away.  It really is too easy to include this epic fifteen minute cue on the list, but it really is great, and lays so much ground work aurally (and visually, and the editing of the two together) for what will be, in my opinion, the pinnacle of the audio-visual editing of the saga…The Battle of Endor, but that’s for next week.  This cue really does so much right, and it shows in that even now, as I’m listening to it, I know exactly what is going on on screen just from listening to the music (the AT-AT walkers are coming into view).  That is a sign that the composer was doing his job: the melding of music to image is so complete that one multiplies the effect of the other (I think Kurosawa said something to that effect).

So that’s it for FSF for this week, tune in next time for Return of the Jedi.

Guess Who’s Back, Back Again…

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We’re sorry, but your call has been forwarded to an automated…

Wait, Wait!  I’m here…I’m here.

Thanks for bearing with me these past few weeks.  I had to teach two Continuing Ed classes back to back.  Which actually leads me to today’s post/question.  The classes I taught are part of the department’s Saturday “Personal Enrichment” classes.  Basically, I get up there are talk about something for five hours to a class interested in learning about whatever topic it is.  I taught one on Beethoven and another on the Beatles on two consecutive Saturdays.  I had wanted to do something on Film Music but ContEd wasn’t sure there would be interest.  I plan on pitching them an idea and I’m hoping for some feed back on a very basic outline I have in my head.

First, remember, I have only five hours, so the first task is deciding what is the purpose of the class.  For me, I think it would be to not only teach people about composers and history, but also how to listento films, which would be the title: [Insert Witty Title Here] – Listening to Films.  So I figure the first hour would be spent covering some basic theoretical ideas (diegetic/non-diegetic, levels within audiotrack), and hopefully using the model that I discussed in my MAMI wrap up, and showing clips to illustrate the points. I would also hopefully bring in some ideas from the works of Chion, Gorbman, and Brown.  The next two hours could be spent doing the basic historical work, tracing developments from the Silent Era to the present (Herr Vogler gave me a good outline that will probably serve me in planning), of course illustrated by more clips.

After an hour for lunch, we come back for the last two hours.  Ideally here, I would like to show a short film or extended clip, somewhere in the range of 30-45 mins, maybe an hour, from which the last hour of class would be a discussion of it, what people heard, etc.  Of course, showing such a long clip may seem like a cop out, but if the point of the class is to teach people how to listen to a film, it seems like a perfectly logical choice.

There seemed to be some interest in such a class from the people in my Beethoven class.  I teased them with some ideas by showing clips from Die Hardand showing how the “Ode to Joy” is associated with the German villains of the film.  So hopefully if ContEd asks me back to teach more, and I can pitch them such a class.  What are your thoughts, oh Blog0sphere readers?

P.S. – I promise a more in-depth post soon.  I’m working on my musical aesthetic analysis of the soundtracks of Shinichiro Watanabe’s animes Cowboy Bebop and Samurai Champloo.

Film Score Friday Top 5: ‘Star Wars’ Cues, Part I – A New Hope

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So, time for another special three week countdown here at the Temp Track.  Partially due to my being busy the next couple weeks, and just plum out of ideas at the time, I’ll be counting down my top 5 cues from each of the original Star Wars films, scored by Mr. John Williams.  A few rules to begin with: 1) I’m discounting the opening title theme just because it is too obvious, but not the music immediately following it; 2) Likewise I’m also nixing the end credit suites, but not the music leading into them; and 3) No individual themes, I’m doing cues, not themes (so no just “Imperial March,” but this does not discount cues involving said themes, of course). 

For the names of the cues, I’m using the track listings from the two disc releases from a few years ago that are still available.  So, let’s go to the tape:

1) “The Hologram/Binary Sunset”:  I’ve got to give it up to this cue, while not the first instance of the Force motif in the film, that occurs in “Imperial Attack,” it is used here to underscore one of the most powerful and iconic images in the film series: Luke gazing at the sunset over Tatooine and contemplating his future.  As mentioned in an earlier post, it is also here where in the “Blue Harvest” episode of Family Guy that Chris Griffin turns to the camera and says “John Williams and the London Symphony Orchestra!”  When I teach a course on film music, you can be sure that I’m going to show that clip.  Oh, we also have appearances in this cue of Leia’s theme and the main theme.

2) “The Dune Sea of Tatooine/Jawa Sandcrawler”:  For starters, I remember from an early age thinking that “The Dune Sea of Tatooine” portion of this cue sounded like Rite of Spring, and while I’ve never done a side-by-side comparison, I’m pretty sure there is more than a little similarity, especially the opening wind solos.  But the Jawa portion is pretty genius, Williams really does capture the nature of the strange scavengers quite well, and it blends quite effectively with the “Dune Sea” portion due to its use of winds (especially the double reeds, not to mention the tuba solos).

3) “Cantina Band” (Both tracks):  These songs might just be the best piece of diegetic music ever written specifically for a film, and really, I kind of like the second one more than the first.  Sure, everyone knows the first one, but how many people really notice the second song that starts playing as Han sits down to talk with Luke and Obi-wan?  Well, I’m sure the readers of this blog do, but how many others?

4) “Ben Kenobi’s Death/Tie Fighter Attack”:  When I hear this cue, I always hear Han yelling to Luke, “Blast the door kid!”  See, back in the early days of CD-Rom tech, Microsoft had a program called Cinemania that was kind of like IMDB before the Internet really became the “The Information Superhighway.”  In this program were a few select clips for a few films, including Star Wars, and the clip from it started towards the end of Obi-Wan and Vader’s duel, and ends right as Han tells Luke to shoot the door controls.  And the cue for the Tie battle I can always hear because it was used over and over in the computer game X-Wing and Super Star Wars for the old Super Nintendo.  Oh, and the music is pretty great too.

5) “The Throne Room”: I always have a weird feeling when watching the end scene of the film because this cue gives me a sense of unease.  I can’t explain it, but after the initial fanfare, I always expect that something is going bad is going to happen because of the pervading minor key, the march feeling, and timpani hits.  Of course, then the music changes to major as Leia gives them their medals, Chewie growls, R2D2 appears all shiny and new, and the universe is saved…at least until The Empire Strikes Back is released three years later.

But you won’t have to wait three years for my top 5 favorite cues from Empire.  Just tune in next Friday.

Like Kuorsawa I make mad films, okay I don’t make films, but if I did they’d have a samurai…

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So one huge thing that came out of my recent trip to New York is a renewed interest in the sound design/auraltrack in the films of Akira Kurosawa.  My initial research came in the Fall 2008 semester for my Asian Aesthetics paper, then I later presented a revised version of that paper at a local AMS meeting, and then revised it again and submitted it to an academic writing competition within the College of Music and won.  In other words, I’ve gotten some good mileage from the paper.  I’ve toyed around with the idea of it as a dissertation topic, but just one among many.  After NYC and the panel on sound design I went to (read more here at The Temp Track), I got started thinking more about it.  On my last full day in New York, I wandered into a bookstore and picked up four books on Kurosawa (three of which I had used in my paper), and I’ve already read two of them (including his wonderful autobiography Something Like an Autobiography).  These books have only increased my interest.  I’ve also watched five more Kurosawa films since I’ve returned, and I could say something on each one of them in terms of sound design.

Kurosawa is so meticulous in crafting how sound and music are used, and unlike most Hollywood productions, he did the bulk of the work himself (something he learned how to do in his days working as an assistant director).  I hope to have viewed all his films by the end of the summer (something which is largely possible, but his four early films made towards the tail end of WWII might prove a bit troublesome to track down, everything else I either own or can be had in the school’s library or ordered from another library in our lending system), so I will know more about his work as a whole.

Just some quick thoughts that are on my mind.

Music and the Moving Image 2009

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AKA 3 Days and 27 Papers Later…

It’s hard summarize a conference, even if it was on the concentrated topic of “Music and the Moving Image.”  So I’ll start in broad terms: it was a good experience for me in many way, I heard many great papers, and listening to other scholars in the field speak has given me confidence in my own research.  And even though my shy nature kept me from asking many questions and talking to everyone there, I was able to force myself to talk to a few and very much enjoyed the brief conversations I did have.  In short, I definitely want to go back next year, and hopefully I can present this time (I did submit for this year, and will do so again for next year).  But even if I’m not presenting, I would still like to go if possible.

Anyway, I’ll discuss briefly two of the 27 papers I heard.  First is Matt Young’s “Who is the Iron Man?: Establishing Identity in Comic Book Films.”  Unfortunately I didn’t take notes on this one, but I remember most of it.  Basically, Mr. Young’s paper dealt with how the identity of the hero is constructed in a superhero film, both in terms of plot and music, but goes on to discuss how the establishment of the heroic identity is frustrated in the recent film Iron Man, directed by Jon Favreau (who is so money and doesn’t even know it…sorry, just had to quote Swingers there).

This establishment is three fold: first a music theme is tied to the hero (usual during the opening credits sequence), the hero states their new identity (the “I’m Batman” moment), and that identity is recognized by the media.  Obviously much discussion was made about the music itself, but he did discuss the other two also, but I’ll only discuss the musical aspect here.  The musical establishment function is undermined from the start, not only is there no opening credit sequence, the film immediately opens in the Afghani desert to the sound of wind.  After the establishing shot, we are greeted to AC/DC’s “Back in Black,” which is exactly not the song one would expect to hear (which would have been Black Sabbath’s “Iron Man,” which had been prominetely featured in the film’s ad campaign).  When, after the lengthy exposition, we finally do have a title card, there is no music, but rather just the sound of metal striking metal, and we hear Jeff Bridge’s character say “Tony Stark,” dialogue bleeding in from the next scene.  Young makes the point that our hearing Stark’s name mentioned over the “Iron Man” title card further weakens the heroic identity, something further achieved by the many denials of the existence of Iron Man by the army and others.

Iron Man himself has no solid musical identity in the film, but rather is accompanied by guitar riffs and other industrial sounds in the soundtrack, while Tony Stark does have a theme (which Young pointed out was taken from the theme song of the old Iron Man cartoon), this theme is even played diegetically as the ring tone on Rhodes mobile phone.  Young further more establishes that all three of the identity establishing motives come at the very end of the film.  First we see the name “Iron Man” printed in the media, then Stark, in the last line of the film, states that “I am Iron Man,” and as the credits begin to roll, we are greeted by our long sought for Black Sabbath song (of which, of course, the opening line is “I am Iron Man,” but Favreau chooses to start the song after that line, and actually edits the snippet we do here so that there are no sung lyrics).  All in all, an interesting reading of the film’s use of music, and one that shows that even when a film’s score isn’t the best, how it functions within it still can be a worthwhile investigation.

The other paper I want to discuss came during a panel that was devoted to sound design in film.  First James Wierzbicki of the University of Michigan discussed design in six early films of Hitchcock (sometimes called the “Thriller” Sextet), and the third paper was from Liz Greene, who actually works in the industry along with teaching, discussed the work of Alan Splet.  But it is Juan Chattah’s paper “Defying Sound Design Convention: A Model for Analysis” that I would like to discuss briefly.

What Chattah has done is lay out a very clear system and terms for talking about sound design, one that I touched on in my post on Diegetic and Non-Diegetic and shifts between them.  But even though people have talked about these shifts and moves in the aural space, what Chattah has done is to lay out a consistent way of speaking about them (and there was discussion afterwards about the very use of terms ‘diegetic’ and ‘non-diegetic,’ which I believe were first applied by Claudia Gorbman in Unheard Melodies, though I’m not sure, but that’s neither here nor there).  In short, Chattah calls the “Diegetic” and “Non-Diegetic” space “Fields” and then within each field you have three separate “planes”: the voice (dialogue), music, and noise.  He then outlined three ways in which sounds can shift or interact between fields and planes.  First is Overlap (in which two elements of the same planes interact between fields, for which he used the final scene of “The Conversation” as an example, a film that came up many times in various papers), second is Replacement (music replaces noise is one example), and then Transference (which can happen as music moves between fields, but also in other ways, noise shifting to music, but a move between fields is necessary…I think).

A very interesting talk, and I’ll have to be on the look out for him publishing the system, it could come in handy down the road.  I also heard two separate papers on the use of Wagner in John Boorman’s Excaliber, sound and music in two films by Michael Hanake, two papers on use of sound and musique concrete in Gus van Sant, and another on Ne0-Surrealism and the MTV aesthetic in Richard Linklater’s Waking Life.

In review, a great conference, and I would recommend if you are at all interested in film and media music to check it out.  The site for the conference is here and you can actually still look at the abstracts for this year’s conference.  Keep a look out on the site, I think the call for papers will go out around September or so.

Michael Giacchino’s ‘Star Trek’

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So now that I’ve thoroughly digested Giacchino’s Star Trek score, and seen the film twice (yes…twice on opening weekend…let the name calling begin), I felt it time to publish some thoughts on Giacchino’s contribution to the Trek film score legacy.

As intimated in my latest Film Score Friday list, my first ear trip through this score was fraught with hesitation.  I wasn’t sure I liked what Mr. Giacchino was doing.  It sounded like a Giacchino score, which is well and good, I have liked everything of his I’ve heard (which is a good chunk of his TV and Film work, but by no means all), and liked it all…but this is Star Trek, which has a distinct flavor to it.  My first time through…I heard more Giacchino and less Trek.  I also didn’t like just how mono-thematic the first part of the score was, mainly because I wasn’t sure I liked the theme.  It sounded flat and didn’t seem to go anywhere, as my friend and fellow blogger Herr Vogler said, his initial impression was that is seemed more like like a counter-melody.

But a funny thing happened after I got through the score…I listened to it again almost immediately, and I really started to like it.  A lot.  I reminded myself that this is going to be a different Trek, the previews had showed us that, so I tried to distance myself from the other scores, and listen to it on its own, and there is a lot of like.  The typical Giacchino playfulness is here, along with his talent for writing heart-wrenching moments (I don’t know of many others who can really make me feel a sense of longing like Giacchino can), though many of those moments reminded me of Lost scores.

Then something else strange happened, I started hearing the other Trek scores.  Little bits of Goldsmith mixed with a heaping cup of Horner.  Certain orchestral colors and harmonies started popping out from the score that made me think of Horner and Goldsmith, and even the 60s TV scores.  And I maybe wrong, but it almost seems like the main theme was derived from Horner in some way, or written so that it could easily be adapted to some of his harmonic language from Trek II and III (this can really be heard in the cue “That New Car Smell,” I love his cue titles!). 

And is it just me, or does the music for Nero sound a lot like the music for Isengard (especially in “Nero Fiddles, Narada Burns”?)  Maybe its just the trombone writing.

If there is a major complaint I have with the score it is actually not with the score itself, but the release.  Really?  Only 39 minutes of music, of which 9’11” is the end credits?  I know that there is a lot more music in the film, can we please stop with the half-hearted chopped up releases and just give us the complete scores that we all want?

Along with the subtle hints at earlier scores is the way he slowly teases the audience with the opening four note original Trek theme motif, the intervals show up a few times in the score, but usually hidden, or at soft levels (the first time in the film itself, I believe, is when we camera shows the shuttle with Kirk in it lifting off from Earth with the Enterprise under construction in the background…now why you build a starship on the ground in Iowa, I have no clue).  And finally, we get the notes in their normal presentation at the very end when they lead into the original theme played during the end credits.

And this is part of a larger game I believe Giacchino is playing with his score.  We get these hints at aspects of the oloder score scattered throughout the film score, and it’s a sort of meta-commentary on the film’s plot of the characters becoming those that we know from the original series/films, so in this sense it is reasonable, dare I say logical, for the score to mirror this aspect of the plot.  In this sense, it also liberates Giacchino from much of the pressure of having to strictly follow the examples of previous scores.

As many have said elsewhere the previous week, the release of a new Star Trekscore is an anticipated event within the film score community.  A pressure Giacchino was keenly aware of.

One last thought, I just really love how Giacchino used the erhu to represent the Vulcans.  Not exactly a far leap to make, but still an inspired piece of instrumental color choice.  But even that color does seem to harken back to aspects to Horner’s scores, especially in the aforementioned “That New Car Smell.”

So, in the end I do give this score a 5/5, putting it right along Goldsmith’s Motion Picture and Horner’s Wrath of Khan in the pantheon of Trek scores.  Keep up the good work, Mr. Giacchino.

P.S. – The movie is also pretty awesome!  It’s fun and enjoyable, and while it may not have the deep philosophy of a previous Star Trek films, it does recapture the kitchy/campy essence of the original series that made so many of the episodes a pleasure.  I do hope that for the planned sequels that Abrams and Co. do start to explore the philosophical element of Trek because it is a large part of what made the franchise have a lasting impact on our culture.

P.P.S. – I promise to get the third part of paper up soon…this past week has been really busy with end of semester stuff.

Film Score Friday Top 5: “Star Trek” film scores

Posted on by filmscore80

Okay, so you may have heard, there is a new Star Trek film opening today, and everybody is all a twitter (that word takes on new meanings these days).  So we have reached the end of our 3 week countdown with this: Film Score Friday Top 5’s Star Trek film scores. 

#1. Star Trek: The Motion Picture by Jerry Goldsmith:  You really shouldn’t be surprised by this, considering that in the last two weeks, both lists have been topped by a cue from this score.  Goldsmith really set the trend of what Trek should should sound like with this Oscar-nominated score.

#2. Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan:  If anything, this might be my favorite of the scores, but I respect Goldsmith’s work on the series too much to put him below Horner.  If anyone has heard Horner’s Battle Beyond the Stars score, it sound like an audition tape for the Trek II gig.  Supposdly, the studio wanted a smaller budget so they went with the relatively unknown Horner…largely due to his Battle score.  Guess it worked.

#3. Star Trek by Michael Giacchino:  I’ll post a more extensive review of this score shortly, but after some initial hesistation upon first listening, I have quickly grown to love this score.  It is quite different than previous Trek scores, but it also references them in many subtle ways.  Besides the obvious when the original theme comes in full force in the end credits, there are colors throughout that sound alot like Goldsmith, and to a larger degree, Horner.  As Herr Vogler points out in his post on the score, Giacchino actually uses one of Horner’s former orchestrators.

#4. Star Trek VI: The Undiscovered Country by Cliff Eidelman:  This score, much like the film, does not get nearly enough credit.  The real fans of Trek and Trek scores certaintly know and appreciate them, but we need to do more to inform the public at large.  From the moody “Overture” to the poignant closing send off material, this is a great score from a composer who was getting his first major work (much like Horner in Khan).

#5. Star Trek: First Contact by Jerry Goldsmith: I was really trying to only have one Goldsmith score on the list, but when one person scored 5 of the previous 10 films (and Horner alos racking up two with parts 2 and 3), it’s hard.  The only other composers left after using Eidelman are Dennis McCarthy (and the less said about Generations overall, the better), and Leonard Rosenmann’s Star Trek IV, which was good, I enjoy it, but…I think First Contact is better.  Yes, the film overall, while lightyears better than the previous installment, feels flat after the opening Borg battle, but listening to Goldsmith’s score on its own makes me appreciate it more than the film.  So I’m putting it in the 5 spot.

Well that’s it, I’ll have to start thinking of new topics that are non Trek related now.  But for now, go see the movie because we want them to make more of them!

Next Week: Top 5 Television Themes that are not from the Star Trek franchise