Recognizable film composers

[William]

I am writing this because I just noticed a film score I'd never heard before and yet knew instantly was Miklos Rozsa - "Criss Cross." I know this is a glaring admission of film noir illiteracy, but I had never seen "Criss Cross." And yet, the first second it came on, I knew Miklos Rozsa was the composer. How many composers could you say that of? It is obviously a wonderful trait, and yet how many composers have actually achieved this?

Somehow, in musical terms, one knows instantly that a certain composer has composed the score. I'm wondering what the very knowledgeable people who are on this forum think are the composers who are instantly recognizable?

[evan evans]

Jerry Goldsmith (odd meters, orchestrations, use of open melodic intervals, etc)
John Williams (often has stupid irish crap in his melodies LOL )
Bernard Herrmann (Worked a very tight variation based motif style)
Ennio Morricone (Has signature cues he writes in every film that match other films in structure)
Elliot Goldenthal (Has distinctive sophisticated orcehstration style, and always writes using triadic harmony based structures)

I'm sure there's more but that's all I can think of ATM.

Evan Evans (has distinctive use of polytonality and solid orchestration) [;)]

[DG]

@evanevans said:

Jerry Goldsmith (odd meters, orchestrations, use of open melodic intervals, etc)
John Williams (often has stupid irish crap in his melodies LOL )
Bernard Herrmann (Worked a very tight variation based motif style)
Ennio Morricone (Has signature cues he writes in every film that match other films in structure)
Elliot Goldenthal (Has distinctive sophisticated orcehstration style, and always writes using triadic harmony based structures)

I'm sure there's more but that's all I can think of ATM.

Evan Evans (has distinctive use of polytonality and solid orchestration) [;)]

Hans Zimmer; 3 chords, boring orchestration, 80s analogue synth sound, yaaaaaaaaaaaawn......

DG

[Dietz]

Why are you dissing other forum-members ...? ;-]

/Dietz

[DG]

@Dietz said:

Why are you dissing other forum-members ...? ;-]

/Dietz

Who's dissing whom? Aren't we taking about recognisable compositional traits in film composers?

DG

[Carter]

@DG said:

Hans Zimmer; 3 chords, boring orchestration, 80s analogue synth sound, yaaaaaaaaaaaawn......

DG

and of course you know the entire discography of Zimmer to say that ?

Zimmer is a self-educated composer, he started with 100 % synthetic music, for example with Rain Man --> that "won" an oscar nomination, unforgettable theme... after he continued with a more orchestral style with house of the spirits, the lion king, beyond rangoon, as good as it gets and ... hannibal and the thin red line ( if you think there are 3 chords and 8às analogue synth sound in that OSTs you must have drunk) gladiator that every composers after copyied the "solo new age female voice" style, also prince of egypt (The Mummy by Jerry Goldsmith is very close to the style of prince of egypt) i can't tell you the whole discography of Zimmer, he did so many scores in the 90s... but I can admit that you don't like the "Peacemaker/Crimson tide" style, that revolutionized the action musics style (personnally i love that style), but what i try to say is that it's not the only thing Zimmer is able to do, he is very versatile(and very fan of wagner/mahler)

Unfortunately, the "elite" (the guys that have studyied 10 years in a music school ) hates Zimmer because he didn't followed that way of learning, and that he had a great success in the film music "industry", anyway i'm happy to love both the "classical composers" and the "modern film music" composer s like Zimmer ( it's the guy that makes me love film music ! ),

[PaulR]

@DG said:

Hans Zimmer; 3 chords, boring orchestration, 80s analogue synth sound, yaaaaaaaaaaaawn......

DG

and of course you know the entire discography of Zimmer to say that ?



Don't worry about all that John.

The question is 'can you instantly recognize a film score writer when hearing a piece of music that you have not heard before?'

Doesn't necessarily matter if you like the composer's music or not.

[Galleddrim]

@PaulR said:

The question is 'can you instantly recognize a film score writer when hearing a piece of music that you have not heard before?'

Doesn't necessarily matter if you like the composer's music or not.

James Horner. Usually within the first couple phrases. [8-)]
The one exception to this was Four Feathers, which took me a whole ten minutes to realize I was listening to a James Horner score.

~Chris

[William]

The problem with recognizing James Horner is you're usually recognizing one of the countless classical, romantic and modern composers he's ripped off.

I agree on these other composers (especially Herrmann - the ultimate: three - maybe two - notes and you know it's him) and would add:

Danny Elfman - another self-taught guy who is really good and one of the few Americans after John Williams to have a distinctively different sound

Preisner - he has adapted Herrmann's use of motifs in an original, even more minimal way with an extreme, sometimes blatant expressiveness

Georges de la Rue - his music for Truffaut's films has a recognizable combination of simple motifs and understated light quality

Nino Rota - his melodies and crazy, humorous combinations of pop with orchestral sounds as in Fellini have never been equalled

Ennio Morricone - though the spaghetti westerns are only part of his output their sound is totally original, even weird in a sense

Max Steiner - his music almost screams at you STEINER! STEINER! STEINER!

Erich Korngold - another instantaneously obvious one with his luxuriant romanticism

Elmer Bernstein - with his somewhat Coplandesque vigor, but somehow different (and maybe even better)

Alex North - his way of handling the orchestra has a certain transparent quality to it no one else has - i.e. "Spartacus" or the original "2001" score

Maurice Jarre - his chromatic harmonies and melodic emphasis

John Barry - the combination of great, extended melody-writing and a simple yet strong orchestration, with a lot of use of short motifs somewhat similar to Herrmann

[PaulR]

@William said:

John Barry - the combination of great, extended melody-writing and a simple yet strong orchestration, with a lot of use of short motifs somewhat similar to Herrmann

John Barry is instantly recognizable. Distinct string sound and string writing and low burring brass and great flute lines. Including bass flutes! [H]

[nicks]

Thomas Newman - his music has a very distinctive style. Always possible to recognize him - usually at the first repetition of a motif. And there's always at least one repetition. At least one... [[:|]]

[PolarBear]

James Newton Howard, not always from the first notes, but the orchestrations in his compositions have an unique sound to me... Apart from others named already.

[dpcon]

Miklos Rozsa is probably the most recognizable of the old school guys because he loves canon. I don't know how he got away with it all the time but he did, and created a signature sound in doing so. Once while watching Ben Hur I decided to listen with head phones and was floored by the detail in his music - astonishing really because you tend not to hear it on a basic level. No doubt his musical integrity demanded it.

On the subject of educated musicians not liking the music of untrained musicians: I understand why if it shows through. If not who cares? Elfman is not trained in the traditional sense but very well liked but many schooled composers. Zimmer has done some very good work and some really dreadful stuff as well. Maybe he should take a night class.

Dave Connor

[William]

Rosza in fact was accused of writing the same score over and over again. Though this is unfair, since his earlier ones were quite different. But it is true the later ones started to sound rather similar. He definitely had the technique down.

"How are you doing today Miklos?"

"Oh, fine, fine. Just dashed off two scores this afternoon. What's for dinner?"

[dpcon]

William,

Can't argue a bit with any of that.

DC

[dpcon]

Evan,

On Jerry Goldsmith: no one ever loved the Major 7th interval more or used it in so many different ways with surprisingly different emotional and kinetic effect.

Dave Connor

[evan evans]

Dave,

I hear ya, but I have to majorly disagree. Bernard Herrmann based almost his entire harmonic language on the major 7th. He combined it with dimished 5ths, augmented 5ths, minor 3rds, major 3rds, etc. But always he had the major 7th in there.

Evan Evans

[Guy Sigsworth]

A couple of questions to get you going:

1. Do you think there can be great scores for terrible movies?

2. What are everyone's favourite examples of "suberbly inappropriate" film music? I mean music that's absolutely the opposite of what you'd expect if you saw the images in silence and guessed what the music might sound like (for example, Johann Strauss's "The Blue Danube" accompanying spaceships in "2001: A Space Oddysey")...


Laters

Guy

[William]

Those are interesting questions, Guy.

I've mentioned one great score for at least a bad movie (maybe not terrible) - "Obsession," a really lame story but one of the most astoundingly beautiful scores of Herrmann. The score has all the drama, tragedy and emotion that the movie wanted but couldn't accomplish.

I think that the Blue Danube was oddly appropriate in "2001" but Alex North's rejected score was a thousand times better.

One example of a grotesquely bad score I remember is the one to "4-D Man" - yes, a rather obscure sci-fi film, but it was memorable because of its bad music - it had an extremely LOUD big band jazzy score that would suddenly intrude into the scenes of scientists in a lab, or a man being afflicted by pain because he had partly gone into the 4rth dimension. The effect was more than just taking you out of the film, it caused everyone in the room to laugh hilariously each time the cats started up their jam session.

[james_b]

I'll cast a vote for David Newman's 'The Phantom.' The movie was a yawner, but I really enjoyed the score. Nothing worth an Oscar or anything, but it was an energetic and fun piece of music, performed by the London Metropolitan, that far outpaced the actual movie.