Errikos, superb rant! Loved it.

Aren't we, each in our own way, reacting to "the decay of cinema", to use the title of Susan Sontag's article written for the NYT in 1996?[1] I've never been a follower of Sontag (Heaven forefend!), but that article caught my close attention recently and I find it insightful and prophetic.

And if it's true that cinema is in decay, then concert orchestral music must already be geriatric with one foot in the grave. Radio and gramophone records started devaluing orchestral concerts quite a while before tv started devaluing cinema.

Sontag used the term "cinephilia" as "the name of the very specific kind of love that cinema inspired", and made the point that no matter the size of our tv screen (and today I'd add no matter the number of 3D surround speakers we have in our 'home theatre'), it's just not the same as the whole cinema experience. "Cinema had apostles. (It was like a religion.) Cinema was a crusade. For cinephiles, the movies encapsulated everything. Cinema was both the book of art and the book of life."[ibid.]

Is it any wonder that interest, ambition and prowess among upcoming, aspiring film composers have waned accordingly? And what does that portend for the qualities of the many 'assistants' now in a film composer's studio and in a film production's music department? I dread to think of it.

Agitato, three points on the entertainment industry in general:

• Preponderance of narcs. Has it not been commonly understood for a very long time that the entertainment industry is a prime outlet for narcissists? And as if we needed that understanding to be corroborated academically, in 2006 a paper described the testing of 200 well known celebrities, using the Narcissistic Personality Inventory, and found that these people scored substantially higher (i.e. are substantially more narcissistic), compared to MBA graduates and the general population.[2] (Indeed Dr Phil McGraw recently mentioned an estimate of about 50% of people in the entertainment industry having Narcissistic Personality Disorder.) But what is perhaps much less well known is the way narcs tend to treat 'underlings' (see also Nietzsche's "untermenschen") as chattels, cattle or objects, without empathy or remorse - when not glowing with carefully faked charm, virtue, grace, politeness, etc, in the glare of limelight.

• "Assistant" syndrome. Back when management consultants were vaunting their 'wisdom' to the corporate world, I recall one piece of advice that struck me as highly valid. It was this:- don't give someone the official job title of "assistant" and then expect them and their boss to act properly and accountably. It's much too vague as a job title and can let in a host of unwelcome and counterproductive thinking and activity. It's better to have some implicit boundaries and responsibilites in the job title, as well as having them spelt out explicitly in the accompanying job definition.

• Narcs & "assistants" together. Narcs loathe and detest boundaries and accountability. A narc boss does not want any inhibitions or prohibitions on his feelings of entitlement to mistreat underlings in whatever ways his toxic volition desires. The narc strives to feel he is at the pristine centre of his idealised (yet actually horribly fragile and vulnerable) universe, with adulation, praise, credit and perks routed to him, whilst blame, discredit and dishonour are routed away to the 'chattels, cattle and objects'. Hence we find in the entertainment industry a great quantity of "assistants", because that suits the narcs' modus operandi. Some of these assistants no doubt are aspiring to become film composers or other kinds of artist in their own right; but they have little or no choice but to work within the current state of affairs (e.g. being treated as 'prey' by narcs), and will be obligated to put up with far more injustices and abuses than we outsiders would deem tolerable.

And so, whilst you call it a "sad" state of affairs, I regard it as a serious, stubbornly endemic sickness. And I believe it will get worse before it stands a chance of getting better - if it's ever going to get better. (E.g. has the Weinstein scandal lead to long-lasting prevention of "casting couch" atrocities? One can only hope so, because Tinseltown continues to keep the realities of its internal affairs cloaked in darkness whilst feeding PR BS to the outside world.)

It seems to me the sum of all the symptoms does not bode well for the film industry as a whole.

[1] "The Decay of Cinema", Susan Sontag, 1996, archive.nytimes.com

[2] "Narcissism and celebrity", S.M. Young & D. Pinsky, 2006, sciencedirect.com

Oh Boy! Errikos you gave me a lot of material to digest there:) Thanks

agitato: Thanks. As far as the craft that goes into making a film - even a totally commercial film without any artistic aspirations - I agree with you. I could not make one for example. There are technical aspects (such as photography, an array of different lenses, etc.) about which I know nothing. However, I do know a couple of things about musical craft, and I assert that the compositional craft that goes into a lot of these A-graders in Hollywood is 22nd rate. I am simply not impressed. It would be the same as saying the script has craft because the writer uses words. Well, both The Last Emperor and Porky's had scripts (and scores!)

Whether modern 'layered' soundtracks are the directors' or the composers' fault I could not tell you. I believe they share in the crime.

Macker: Thanks. The decay of commercial cinema is palpable. As far as Sontag is concerned, all I know is William Defotis' Musical Refutation of S.S.' Against Interpretation that we read at university, but I'm more than a little rusty on the subject. Defotis quotes Adorno as one of his authorities and I hold Adorno in low regard having suffered through his erroneous Philosophy of Modern Music, so what can I tell you?

Finally, why does a Hollywood composer need 'assistants'? Surely not to write music. Doesn't he get paid enough to do the creative work on his own? If it is about time constraints, why didn't the old guard need ghosts too? They had insane deadlines too and no loops in their armoury or aesthetics. Goldsmith composed the music to Chinatown in nine days. Usually people get a couple of months at least. They are getting paid crazy good money for composing background music, not concert works!! Even the no-namers get ~$50,000 for two months' work. Do the math people... Only the very best should have access to such contracts. When one makes in two months what others make in a year (or two), go lose sleep, get sick, I don't care. If it is over $100K, I expect the composter to smile through it too, even during the little sleep they get. Especially when the software does all the work, and we have to suffer through the 'epic' results...

Absolutely agree. Very well stated.

Why does a hollywood composer need assistants?? Exactly!!

Errikos, the last thing I'd want to do is invite you to recall any of the cerebral ghastliness perpetrated by any of the despicable bunch of neo-Hegelian so-called 'philosophers'. (I label them "neo-Hegelian" to include both Hegel and his student Marx, whereas these days the main bunch of philosophical/political imbeciles and troublemakers tend to be labelled as neo-Marxian or even "meta-Marxian". Whatever.) I say let's just ignore them and their absurdities - most especially in the context at hand.

You've highlighted a very pertinent point that I must confess I'd not really taken into account adequately above: the difference between background and concert music and the likely consequences for composers. I'm finding it very difficult to get a handle on that topic, vis-à-vis for example, whether an accomplished concert composer might or might not have more difficulty composing background music, and why. The complication for my understanding here is coloured by the fact that several big name Russian concert composers leapt into the nascent Russian film business and found plenty of work; but, arguably - judging from a few examples to be found in the West today (e.g. King Lear, "Korol Lir", composer: Dmitri Shostakovitch) - didn't do terribly well at it.

Macker: Concert composers working with film is a topic for a big discussion and opinions will vary wildly. On principle, a composer approaches concert and incidental composition very differently. We are talking movements versus cues here. Even allowing for the big narrative arcs and minor thematic development there is just no comparison. The approach to the material itself and the disparity in complexity remain unbridgeable. The closest similarity could be made with the forms of the symphonic poem and opera, of course. Even these comparisons are superficial, as film music - as beautiful and technically superb as it can be and has been, is at heart and soul background and effect music. Little if any dialectics at all. Where this argument only appears to be inadequate is the abundance of so much beautiful incidental music in existence, and so much bad serious music, at the same time. However, this is not a matter of pleasant listening alone, but one of sophistication primarily. Most people would mistake the 'Main Titles' (1'-3' of music?) for the whole score in a discussion such as this one. Well, of course, the 'Main Titles' contain all the inspiration and themes of the movie, more often than not, much like an opera overture. They can be wonderful (The Magnificent Seven, Citizen Kane, Star Wars etc.) But what happens after that? We get to the cues of course, which last for 90'! How good are they really? Yes, we get to the love theme or the heroic climax, but these are another couple of minutes or so, except when they repeat. What about all the rest? By its very nature, for most of the time the soundtrack is rather unassuming, even bare, so as to not vie for our attention which should be fully focused on whatever dialogue is being spoken at the time. And this kind of music is by far the biggest chunk of a soundtrack, and it should be unobtrusive, playing only on our subconscious.

To finally get to your point, I don't believe the great concert composers took film music as seriously as they did their other works, for the aforementioned reasons. They knew their music would be subservient to the film which also has its own soundtrack (dialogue, street noise, explosions etc.). It's not like ballet or opera where music competes with no other sound. As with every rule there are exceptions of course, Prokofiev's Nevsky and Herrmann's Piano concerto from Hangover Square are the first that come to mind. I do concur with one of my teachers who said that there is justice in the music world. Concert composers' film music is not as good as some of the dedicated film composers' or their own concert music, while film composers' concert works, well..........

Maybe Korngold, Rota and a few others can boast in both genres, but then again, exceptions and not really repertory composers.

There was a golden age composer I once read about whose name escapes me at present, who used to throw a party to ritually burn his latest film score. So at least one composer took the money and didn't care much for the music.

"You all danced with the Zevil..." - Errikos

You've outdone yourself with this post Errikos. It is a maniacal yet intelligent rant that is bracing and restorative. I surmise you must be feeling better these days.

Concerning the state of film music I haven't heard a lot of it lately as I mainly watch old movies. Some concert composers have done good film scores, like Vaughn Williams with the music that he later turned into his Seventh Symphony, the "Antarctica," or Shostakovich's "Hamlet" score. But in general they haven't done that well when venturing into film scoring. I remember Stravinski derisively called it "wallpaper" but that was probably because he was pissed off as a result of getting rejected for a job by a producer. It seems that film music is held back not by the aesthetic nature of the medium, but by the commercialism of theatrical films.

Theoretically film and music together could be just as powerful a medium as opera, which of course is essentially a combination of theater with music. But the commercial aspect dominates and dictates how it is used: an example, a somewhat old film that I only recently noticed, was "The Lion in Winter" which has one of John Barry's best music scores. If you listen to the beautifully recorded soundtrack album it is rich, brilliantly orchestrated, simple but intensely powerful music. If you then watch the film it was written for - it is almost NON-EXISTENT! They left out entirely or truncated severely almost all of the music! Just think if this sort of thing had been done to a great opera by Verdi or Puccini, simply because the producers thought their audiences might get a little bored here or there, or needed something "punchier" than the aria already composed. This happens all the time with film scoring, even if the composer is serious about creating something meaningful. The greatest film scores - such as Herrmann's "Vertigo" - are a different form of music than almost any concert music, but are focused creations that are aesthetically integrated into the cinematic scenes as fundamentally as any opera music that is expressive of the story, characters and themes. These film scores are notably rare, because films in which a composer is free to do exactly what he wants, and all of what he does is actually used, are almost never made. Especially now with the ultra-commercialism of every aspect of a film.

I basically think that only with completely independent production, which fortunately is more possible today than ever with advances in technology, can the potential of film music truly be attained in purely artistic works.

Errikos, a very pertinent, eloquent and exquisitely concise exposition; its clarity and conciseness have helped me to consider the matter much further. You're a gifted teacher.

mh-7635, That vignette tells a very powerful and illuminating story. My hat is off to that honest composer, whoever he is or was.

William, you inspired me to search for the Soviet "Hamlet". (I'm a big fan of Shakespeare, having read all his works - except "The Merry Wives of Windsor".) I found a fairly recently posted restored version, which I've now watched all through. Shostakovitch did much better in that than in "King Lear". Also, I found it interesting that Prokofiev, after he'd reconstructed some of his most successful film scores to make them concert pieces, said it took far more time and trouble doing that than composing the original film scores.

What has my curiosity now is the difference between the two main 'styles' or 'modes' of musicianship:- accompanist and soloist. In short, one would expect a musician who is accomplished mainly as an accompanist could be excellent not only as an orchestral player but also - given the training and talent - as an incidental music composer. On the other hand, one would expect that the accomplished soloist type of musician is best suited to become - again, given the training and talent - a concert composer. It's perhaps too simplistic conceptually to have much relevance to real life, but for me it's a clue.

Now at the risk of delving too far into traditional dialectics (as understood and used in ancient Chinese wisdom), the difference between 'leader' and 'follower" is far more paradoxical and deeply nuanced than one might think at first. Here's a quote from Lao Tzu:-

A leader is best

When people barely know he exists,

Not so good when people obey and acclaim him,

Worst when they despise him.

"Fail to honour people,

They fail to honour you."

But of a good leader, who talks little,

When his work is done, his aim fulfilled,

They will all say, 'We did this ourselves'.

Isn't that last line the goal of incidental music composing? The incidental music gives the audience, without them being fully aware of it, support, guidance, nudges, steers and even lengthy narratives, in the domains of feelings, emotions and intuitive understanding - insofar as these strengthen, clarify or otherwise support the dialogue and action on screen as well as the intended plot and its 'lessons'. Then after the viewing, if the audience feels "yes I got it completely", but don't immediately feel any need to know who composed the score, then surely the incidental music composer has been, according to Lao Tzu, "a good leader". In my book that's a great art in its own right, but one that seems beyond so many film composers these days.

After Lao Tzu, a saying in Chinese wisdom was "to lead is to follow". If only Zimdroner and his acolytes would or even could learn that - but now I'm just dreaming.

Now this is called a soundtrack!

Goldsmith is very good. And as Christmas is close let me add this one, which is just beautiful ...

Macker,

Your reply is very intelligent and interesting, but I should refrain from futher comment!

William, thanks. Having read your unedited post I can understand how you feel about this forum and a few of its members. I can only say I do hope you won't disappear from here forever. This forum needs you and your works here - I know I do.

Personally, I'm no longer bothered by the intrinsically soulless and asinine side of social media, this site included. I cut my teeth and did ok on several big sites for several years - Twitter included - back in the early days. But I soon reached the inescapable conclusion that I far, far prefer reality; warts and all. I haven't bothered with any of them for many years now, except this one. I just can't be arsed to play the attention-whoring games - working for replies or likes or followers or whatever, is just not what I'm about. And then VSL aligned its forum format with all the others ....... ghaahh!! What happened to proudly catholic-conservative Vienna? ("catholic" with a small c refers to the deep-rooted everyday culture, not necessarily the formal church-going religion.)

What has always bothered me here is seeing a few toxic, pathogically dishonest and cunning individuals manipulating, gaslighting and preying on others for depraved, ultimately egotistical ends. I'm apt to go into battle with them - and in that, you and I seem to me similarly disposed. But unfortunately - as we both know - social media's moderation techniques don't seem able to cope with the realities of those situations; instead insisting everyone must remain steadfastly superficial, soulless, gullible, algebraically-minded, manipulable mechanoids - which of course tilts the pitch substantially in favour of the toxic predator minority!

What's to be done except "keep calm and carry on", as ever? I'll never surrender and I know you won't either. Pearls won't grow without those pieces of grit. And that's a service, not a sickness, LOL.

..

..

[Tip for moderators and anyone interested in real justice in social media conflicts:– ]

There is a systematic vulnerability that can be spotted, unravelled and analysed methodically in the behaviour of narcs when they react to overt and justified blaming by another. And oh man, do they REACT! Narcs NEVER accept blame! The usually highly energetic reaction pretty much always follows exactly the same format, which is its weakness. So much so indeed that some academics have studied it and given it the acronym: "DARVO", standing for "Deny, Attack, Reverse Victim and Offender".

When you're reasonably experienced in spotting the 'delightful' narc techniques of gaslighting, projection and cunningly inserted lies, and armed with an understanding of the simple DARVO framework, you'll be able to unravel and sort out interpersonal conflicts better than some high-priced lawyers currently can.

Here are a few of the academic papers on DARVO (sorry, I haven't linked them but they're easily found and are free, open access):-

• Deny, Attack, and Reverse Victim and Offender (DARVO): What is the influence on Perceived Perpetrator and and Victim Credibility? S Hersey & JJ Freyd, 2020.
• Perpetrator Responses to Victim Confrontation: DARVO and Victim Self-Blame. Hersey, Zurbriggen & Freyd, 2017.
• Defamation and DARVO. Hersey & Freyd, 2022.

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