Evan wrote some things I thought were some of the best statements about film music I've ever heard. About how in a way it is not the same artform as music at all, at least as we normally think of it. That is why a piece of junk can be absolutely perfect for a film, and a symphonic masterpiece can be pathetically bad.

Of course that doesn't mean one should attempt pieces of junk! (Though many do.) And it is not always the case anyway. Herrmann is the greatest film composer and partly because he integrated the exact artistic process necessary to film music into his most basic artistic conceptions - into his very feelings. And if you want to hear a great concert piece, listen to the suite from Vertigo. Or the Overture to North by Northwest. Or the Death Hunt from On Dangerous Ground (one of his lesser known masterpieces). or the astounding original Intro with twelve flutes, nine horns, nine trombones, violas, basses and pecussion to Torn Curtain. Or etc. etc. all of them make magnificent concert music. And uncannily, they were absolutely perfect for the films they were in

However I am shocked that Evan hates Handel. My God! How can a human even conceive such things? Handel is the greatest of them all, along with Bach and Beethoven. I'm glad people have mentioned him, especially in light of orchestration. Have you heard the original instrumentation of the Fireworks music? A huge oboe ensemble, nine trumpets, nine horns, timpani (all considered "warlike" instruments then). It is an awe-inspiring sound. Just one of his many masterpieces.

Also, concerning commercialism - I agree with Groove concerning Bach and that immediately ocurred to me after hearing Paul talking about the distinction between Handel's commercialism and Bach's artistic purity. For example, his cantatas - it is only because he had a gig at church and HAD to write a cantata each week (!) that he composed so many great ones. It was everyday work to him. Though Paul is right in one sense - in Bach, you hear an intense spirituality that is unshakeable and profound and self-justifying, unlike the more worldly, urbane "cool dude" Handel.

Another point on this thread I think is very important is what JBM mentioned concerning music not being downplayed in relation to dance. I agree that it must be of equal value and a composer must uphold that philosophy to the point of death. And it is somewhat similar to the position of film music being considered "lowly" and secondary. Max Steiner said that if music is not supposed to be heard in a film, then why write it?

Hey guys, ... the thing about Handel is, .. and it's just me here I understand that, ... I don't like that square music. Like someone said, it's a "taste" thing. I prefer a small degree of Mozart, etc. but, like the quote on my website says, "If Mozart was such a genius how come he couldn't write like Stravinsky?" lol.

And as far as calling Lalo or Raksin, why not just call me? Is there some reason I need to lean on those guys? I am my own artist, confident in my own rites. Would you tell Stravinsky to call Copland? Come on guys. Show a little respect. My music isn't that bad, and I think it ought to support my own merits as an individual. My father also would not have been too fond of being asked to call Lalo or Hancock to ask them if Handel is an important part of my father's artistry. It's none of their business.

It's funny how you guys assume that I am an ordinary person. It is conceivable that I have an understanding of music that is unique to my own artistry. It ought not surprise anyone that I have very individual philosophies. Mostly I'd be curious if I were you.

Should Bernard Herrmann be around today, I would have been very inquisitive with him, and certainly wouldn't invalidate his viewpoints.

I suppose I do not have the oeuvre to grant society that kind of respect ... but I vow to you guys ... I am trying, and I think I can do it. I wish to create the most powerful film music since Herrmann. Any fan of herrmann should know how valiant such a journey is, even if it carries with it a tortured perspective and terrible social habits, such as was the case with Hermmann himself.

Herrmann died right around when I was born. Not sure if I believe in it, but before I heard any Herrmann, I was already composing like him, to the point that my teacher who knew Herrmann personally said, "you sound just like my friend Benny." He later told me he never said that to any of his 100s of students, and that he stands by it. I have since changed my artistry to be more my own, but had he not made the comment I might have completely became Herrmann. Well my wife suggested once that I am the reincarnation. She believes in such things. I don't know. I don't think so. I don't believe in that kind of stuff. But I do get his music awfully well. There is an article coming in FILM SCORE MONTHLY aptly titled "The Next Herrmann?", about my scoring career. So it's not all just personal fluff.

I've said before I love my music. It sounds kind of narcissistic and sick, but I really like making the kind of music that I think is the most enjoyable and of the highest form. I really don't think of myself that way though. i don't look in the mirror and think, "my what a handsome lad." I am grateful for what I have, but I am not in love with myself.

And I don't love Handel. Sorry guys. Too easy. Too perfect. Too predictable. Too formulaic. FOR ME. It doesn't stimulate my mind. As a composer I listen to music at the compositional level. I am sure it is pleasurable to hear Handel. It might stir your soul. But my mind is what leads me and in the case of Handel it's like doing addition and subtraction all day. I'd prefer orbital mechanics or space time continuum. It's way more stimulating. All that organization just does nothing for me.

Finally, don't worry about it. That's how I feel. I'm not nuts. Just a taste thing. I respect others who like Handel. I understand why they would.

Cheers. Sorry to be so controversial, but that's liek the theme of my life. Rebel with too much cause.

Evan Evans

Evan,

Since I already know where you stand on Handel it doesn't make much sense to have you reiterate it in a phone call. It's true I don't hold in you in the same regard as those two major talents (Schifrin and Raksin) if only due to unfamiliararity with your work. Certainly your demo here doesn't hint at any virtuosity but you may have the greatest music ever written waiting for all the world to hear. Since we know and respect these two great men I thought it would be inciteful to ask them because I think they would dismiss the notion as pedestrian and uninformed. By way of example, if anyone ever said that your father was a hack I would argue identically i.e. "Well you make not like his music for whatever reason but the man is a great master on the instrument and rare is the soul who could not learn from him." That's my point. Bill Evans under absolutely no criteria of evaluation could ever be categorized as a hack. It's simply not true objectively speaking.


I suppose it's only a coincidence that my evaluation of Handel as a composer is summed up by Beethoven in his continuous praise and even borrowings from him. I consider Beethoven's mind to be perhaps the greatest musical mind ever in any musical form. Only Bach's maybe the exception but he did not work with as many parameters as Beethoven. I'm guessing he listened at the compositional level as well - don't we all? This is the mind you are suggesting really doesn't understand what great music is: an impossible contradiction. You can argue that you possess a keener mind than Beethoven but you'll have to back it up with a few Mona Lisa's and David's of your own. You probably have the same chance of outdoing those works (in their respective mediums) as you do the surpassing the 5th and 9th, or even the 1st Symphonies of Beethoven.

Prove us wrong bro. Let's face it: your father was one of the greatest musicians of the last century why not you in this one.

[:)]

Dave Connor

@evanevans said:

"If Mozart was such a genius how come he couldn't write like Stravinsky?" lol Evan Evans

.

"He was the despair of my youth and the consolation of my old age" Igor Stravinsky on Mozart.

In his books with Robert Craft, Stravinsky confessed that he found Mozart and Bach's compositional technique incomprehensible. He felt he could recognize Beethoven's approach and thought process clearly.

Dave Connor

@PaulR said:

After Bach died, he wasn't really rediscovered until many years later, Mathis. But that was the same for most Baroque era composers. Turned out to be some dinosaur. The eighteenth century sure was an era of fashion changes.

Paul, I´m not talking about the time after his death, I´m talking about his livetime. We assume that he was adored, but he wasn´t. People let him do, because he was kind of weird guy and obviously a genius and had lots of children, so they still kept him in charge so that he can feed them. But for their taste they would have preferred a much simpler music and would have hired another guy.
He was kind of a late guy. I would compare him with someone who nowadays composes strictly serialized music.

I absolutely agree that it´s not about attempting to write bad music. But the higher form is the film, and the films which are produced nowadays demand for a certain type of music. The films are onedimensional flat pieces of boring stories. They demand for this onedimensional heroic type of music. A multidimensional virtuosic type of music simply wouldn´t fit.
We as composers cannot change nothing about it. It´s the film. We can just hope to get hired for an outstanding film which needs outstanding music.

I certainly don´t want to back up Evans self-praise, but I don´t like Händel, too... [:D]

Bests,
- M

To quote Orson Welles: "What are the three most important things in a film? The script, the script and the script."

It´s the story, stupid.
That´s why the music of Mr. Glass worked in "The hours".

Concerning Bach I recently read some contemporaneous accounts (from aristocrats and nobles) of absolute astonishment at the man's gifts. His reputation went far and wide (I've read this over and over from many sources)

Mozart underwent a full blown creative crises when he encountered Bach's Well Tempered Clavier. He re-evaluated his own writing which then became informed by Bach's methods (polyphony/fugue et.al.) This is all too obvious in Mozart's later symphonies.

No doubt these two composers will soon be christened "hacks" by one of the titans here on the forum.

Dave Connor

@evanevans said:

"If Mozart was such a genius how come he couldn't write like Stravinsky?" lol Evan Evans

.

"He was the despair of my youth and the consolation of my old age" Igor Stravinsky on Mozart.That's wonderful, thanks Dave. I love how Stravinsky said that.

I actually am a secret admirer of Mozart, my quote has always been just for fun. [:)]

Evan Evans

@mathis said:

I certainly don´t want to back up Evans self-praise, but I don´t like Händel, too... [:D]

LOL. oh my. I got a big laugh out of that one. Thanks M. And you spelled Handel with the umlaut so that no one could EVER mistake you. LOL.

EEE

@mathis said:

To quote Orson Welles: "What are the three most important things in a film? The script, the script and the script."

It´s the story, stupid.
That´s why the music of Mr. Glass worked in "The hours".

Uh. Mathis. That's interesting, but I REALLY disagree with you. I even teach this to other film composers.

Here's a way of looking at it:
1) Is a composer who writes incredibly fresh melodies and lines but orchestrates in alrady existing ways, really a COMPOSER?
2) Is a songwriter who writes great lyrics to the same old progression with strummed acoustic guitar, really a great SONGWRITER?
3) Is a movie with a great story but horrid execution really a great MOVIE?

Answers:
1) John Williams. NO.
2) Bob Dylan. NO.
3) The Phantom Menace. NOT BY A LOOOOOONG SHOT.

If a song with ONLY great lyrics is not really a great song, than what is it? It's a poem. Good songs also have great music.

A movie with ONLY a great story was best left as a book.
Are movies with great stories great movies?
Are books with great stories gaurunteed to be a good movie?
Great screenplays emprically all that's necessary for a movie to be great?

I for one have never recieved a script. They try to give them to me. Goodness they try. I always say:

"I've never written a score to a book. And I'm not sure how I'd get an orchestra into the living room of a reader. PLEASE, send me the movie when it is ready and then I will begin writing the score."

The story has got nothing to do with a great film. Nada. It's all about the filmmaking. Stories are best left in books. In fact teh most poorly executed movies are usually those trying to just tell a story. Movies can and do more than that. I know of many films that succeed and have NO story at all. Some of them even with no score.

But I understand this was ORSON WELLES who said this. I disagree with him. But I know what he is trying to say. But it's not like he didn't know how to use a camera as well.

EEE

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@evanevans said:

If a song with ONLY great lyrics is not really a great song, than what is it? It's a poem. Good songs also have great music.

A movie with ONLY a great story was best left as a book.
Are movies with great stories great movies?
Are books with great stories gaurunteed to be a good movie?
Great screenplays emprically all that's necessary for a movie to be great?


The story has got nothing to do with a great film. Nada. It's all about the filmmaking. Stories are best left in books. In fact teh most poorly executed movies are usually those trying to just tell a story. Movies can and do more than that. I know of many films that succeed and have NO story at all. Some of them even with no score.


EEE

Evan is absolutely right when he says this. We tend to see a film dislocated in its parts: story, dialogue, plots, actors, filmmaking, sound and music. that is not a cinematic experience: it is the sum of them all that makes a great film and gives us great pleasures and joy watching it. And that is why there is not that much great films. It is a very difficult artistic expression that needs to be envision as a whole but with the demanding artistry of every of its parts.

Reading a script - even Welles "Citizen Kane" (I have a copy at home)- is a boring thing that says nothing of the quality of the film, its emotional impact, the sheer pleasure of its filmmaking. Listening to its music alone has the same effect. -Sorry Mr Hermann!

I'll make my point with the music but it applies to every parts of a film.

Great film music has nothing to do with superb orchestrations or fantastic themes, not even with impeccable renditions. It has to do with the dialogue the music has with the other parts of a film.

The role of music in film is not the "orchestra in the pit". On the contrary film music plays the same part the chorus does in a greek tragedy or an Aristophane's comedy. It is either a commentary on the scene, a pause in the action, it act as the untold answer or the question. It gives us tools to comprehend the evolution of what is at stake or question the philosophical ideas the film is dealing with. It is this dialogue that makes a great music in a great film. Unfortunately most of the film music are only the contemporary extension of the much needed piano player in the silent film era. One of the role of the piano player at that time was to play over the sound of the projector. There is no dialogue only monologues and...noise.

So how does a chorus works? In various ways.

By contrast: in a battle scene the piano player is always playing the fanfare of the cavalry! That is just noise over noise, making the action bigger, faster, more violent. It is only underlying with a big felt marker what we already know or feel. Replace the fanfare by a "love song" or a lullaby or an "adagio for strings" and immediately the scene reach a great emotional and intellectual impact. The music gives us tools to question the morality of war, the implacable destiny of death. Put a "pop song" and we see the battle scene in all its absurdity. An old folk tune played by a simple instrument (a recorder, an accordion, etc.) and we feel the despair of the "ordinary man". These examples can be found in so many great films and always procure great emotions and sheer intellectual joy! ( See Terence Malik's "The Thin Red Line", Kusturica "Time of the gipsys")

Repetitions. Since film music is all about theme and not about its development (in a classical way) the repetition of it -the leitmotiv- is often used to reveal a moral or philosophical idea. George Delerue's endlessly repeated theme in "Contempt" of Jean-Luc Goddard, gives us a clue on the main character; despite his claiming he'll never have the will to change himself and regain the love of his wife. The whistle melody we hear constantly in Fritz Lang "M" tells us that no mater what we do, danger is always there and , the most frightening, it lies within ourself.

By its absence. Sometime not to put music where we would expect it is the best contribution music can have. In "Torn Curtain" of the great Hitchcock, the absence of any music in the scene where Paul Newman is painfully trying to kill the agent with the door of a stove in a farm house, an electrical iron cord and so on tells us how difficult it really is to kill someone, even if our own life is in danger. The silence makes the scene looks like a laboratory analysis with the crude and terrific yet real sounds of the fight. We are assisting, powerless, to a murder, and like Newman we feel as rats taken in their last corner. No music would have give us this emotion.

I could go on with the use of period or repertoire music for social or political resonances but what I want to say was only that good film music has nothing to do with good music and should always be hear in context with all the other parts of a film. As I said it is the sum of all those parts that makes such a great impact on us, emotionally and intellectually.

For me, listening to a cd of film music is like hearing just one channel of a group conversation.

Ciao.

I did a bad copy-paste and the end of my text was missing from the previous post.

Sorry.

By its absence. Sometime not to put music where we would expect it is the best contribution music can have. In "Torn Curtain" of the great Hitchcock, the absence of any music in the scene where Paul Newman is painfully trying to kill the agent with the door of a stove in a farm house, an electrical iron cord and so on tells us how difficult it really is to kill someone, even if our own life is in danger. The silence makes the scene looks like a laboratory analysis with the crude and terrific yet real sounds of the fight. We are assisting, powerless, to a murder, and like Newman we feel as rats taken in their last corner. No music would have give us this emotion.

I could go on with the use of period or repertoire music for social or political resonances but what I want to say was only that good film music has nothing to do with good music and should always be hear in context with all the other parts of a film. As I said it is the sum of all those parts that makes an great impact on us, emotionally and intellectually.

For me, listening to a cd of film music is like hearing just one channel of a group conversation.

Ciao.

@evanevans said:

"If Mozart was such a genius how come he couldn't write like Stravinsky?" lol Evan Evans

.

"He was the despair of my youth and the consolation of my old age" Igor Stravinsky on Mozart.That's wonderful, thanks Dave. I love how Stravinsky said that.

I actually am a secret admirer of Mozart, my quote has always been just for fun. [:)]

Evan Evans

Evan,

My composition teacher Harold (Hal) Johnson gave me that quote. I'm glad it's here for all to see.

Dave Connor

@dpcon said:

My composition teacher Harold (Hal) Johnson gave me that quote. I'm glad it's here for all to see.

Love it.

Just so gosh darn well said. A few carefully selected words. Astonishing. He must have been as good of a speaker as he was a composer. I could just relish the lyricism of syllables. And on top of that to have such poignant meaning, and such deep meaning. WOW.

Evan Evans

@PaulR said:

I realised thats what you originally meant. Weird? Of course he was weird! Like Beethovan and Mozart and all the others were normal, right?

Ah, don´t take me wrong, I love Bach. For me it was just curious to hear that he was an oldfashoned guy. Normally we´re used to learn that all these unforgotten composers were renewers and at some forefront and relovutionary and bla, bla, bla. Actually I didn´t want to make a long story out of it.

Let´s forget about the "story" thing. Basically we all think the same. I used a wrong word, "story". Maybe "subject" would have been better.
But nevertheless film is a narrative medium, and one should be aware in every stage of the production process, what the fuck you want to tell.
I learned in my job as a sound editor /designer that you totally rely on the script how creativly you can use sound. You need subjective shots, actors who are listening and of course (film) time. Especially the first two things have to be in the script, they have to be part of the concept, the subject, otherwise they won´t gonna be shot. I know that the key to great sound design lies in the script. And I´m totally sure that it´s the same for music. The film has to be open to music. The film has to be made for music, it has to need music. Then you not only can do, you have to do something outstanding.
Hm, since 99% percent of the films produced are narrative films with a story, I maybe keep up with my statement. I watch a movie because the story interests me, that comes first. I don´t buy a ticket for just great cinematography when the story sucks. And I don´t want to believe I´m the only one.
Story is not only words, b.t.w.

Evan,

Try this one. Robert Craft questioning Stravinsky on the merits of Richard Strauss' music.

Craft: Do you admit Strauss?

Stravinsky: I admit him to whatever purgatory punishes triumphant banality.

Is that a riot?

Dave Connor

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