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Hi everybody (especially the usual suspects...),
here's a link (Magnificent witchery.
Ah!, what a wisdom...what a cruelty not to be there!...
Please, be patient: the veritable magic starts at 2:00 circa...
Having been called smug (by a self-declared elitist), a pseudo-intellectual (by a true intellectual), a narcissist (by a modest man - I think he referred to himself as of a dying breed or other), and a poor disputer (without having been corrected in any way mind you) in that other thead, I decided to take my business here.
I actually own this video through my Batman Begins + The Dark Knight boxed set. As soon as I became privy to such transcedental musical insights, I threw my Beethoven's 9th Symphony: The Making Of and R. Wagner: The Lord of The Ring Speaks DVDs to the trash. They were rendered obsolete and also took a few valuable cms. of library space - they were duly replaced by special editions of Ineption and Glarpeggiator. The best part of this interview is where Hans relates his quest for a sound that everybody would hate. Sorry Hans, apparently only a few of us do. If it makes any difference to you, those few of us really bloody hate it!!
In any case, I think the real gem is the following video. Anyone that aspires to true greatness, everyone that dares follow the pawsteps of the great guru to the dizziest heights of musical attainment, just has to partake of this superhuman, Akashic awareness and understanding of tertian harmony from the Zen master himself:
@William said:
Actually I liked the idea of the characterization of the Joker with just those distorted dissonances on the electric cello. I didn't notice that in the film though.
I reckon it's like when a man is silent. There are, at least, two possible answers:
1. that man pays attention to what he says and when he speaks he doesn't say banalities;
2. that man has nothing or very little to say.
In his case, I'd opt for the latter...Extreme banality is his realm.
@William said:
I admire people who point out extreme banality. Usually it is embraced enthusiastically.
...I'd be honoured to be part of the "Usual Suspects"!
By the way, I have a foolish idea. Why don't we compose a short "sketch" about the Joker, something just one minute (or less) long and post them, to demonstrate that "he" is just a "Signor Nessuno"?
What do you (all) think about that? This wouldn't be a contest and there would be no winner.
Perhaps it is a silly idea. Please, let me know.
[...] ...I'd be honoured to be part of the "Usual Suspects"! [...]
... the Usual Suspects 😉 are a bunch of highly esteemed VSL forum members - who just tend to have the heat of the discussion going to their heads, sometimes. [6] That's why HAL is keeping watch now (... I should get an Emoticon for that, hehehe).
Miki, did you have a look at the link I gave? I think it would be hard to beat that one... Remember everyone, the guy in my video makes over $2,000,000 a movie...
In any case, I don't even have to compose a sketch for the Joker, I can tell you now I would write something like the 1st minute of Metastaseis. That way, I would also be capturing the dementia, the graphic grin, the instability and unpredictability of the character (no cadence), etc., instead of simply providing a static tone...
Best wishes,
Keyser Soze.
[...] ...I'd be honoured to be part of the "Usual Suspects"! [...]
... the Usual Suspects 😉 are a bunch of highly esteemed VSL forum members - who just tend to have the heat of the discussion going to their heads, sometimes. 
That's why HAL is keeping watch now (... I should get an Emoticon for that, hehehe).
I thought they were a group of vsl forum "habitual users" who set themselves against pseudo-composers, musical triviality and cinematic sub-culture and one-finger "libraries"...
@Errikos said:
Miki, did you have a look at the link I gave? I think it would be hard to beat that one... Remember everyone, the guy in my video makes over $2,000,000 a movie...
In any case, I don't even have to compose a sketch for the Joker, I can tell you now I would write something like the 1st minute of Metastaseis. That way, I would also be capturing the dementia, the graphic grin, the instability and unpredictability of the character (no cadence), etc., instead of simply providing a static tone...
Best wishes,
Keyser Soze.
I meant exactly that. Music, proper music. Musica colta, as we say in Italian. I'd probably "revisit" Gesualdo da Venosa.
The idiocy of that "music theory" clip -by "him"- is the most unspeakably absurd...
@Errikos said:
Remember everyone, the guy in my video makes over $2,000,000 a movie...
...and a man like Charles Edward Ives had to become an insurer to give his children a future,,,
"I cannot feed my children with dissonances..."
HZ should profoundly meditate about his freakish stupidity.
By the way, does he know what, zum bei spiel, forma sonata / fuga or fugato/ sinfonia (Bach Zeit) and so on and on and on...all mean?
I'm sure he ignores everything.
Yes it's also important to know that Ives had to hire an orchestra personally, with the money from his insurance job, to perform his music. Not only the commercial establishment, but the classical music establishment, ignored him as much as was possible.
btw, Herrmann was a big fan of Ives and met with him very respectfully. A rare ocurrence for Herrmann. If he had been on this Forum, he would have shut down every single thread he contributed to. Trust me on that. He was the most extremely hostile bastard toward anything he disapproved of. Another reason I daily bow in the direction of my Herrmann CDs and LPs.
@William said:
Yes it's also important to know that Ives had to hire an orchestra personally, with the money from his insurance job, to perform his music. Not only the commercial establishment, but the classical music establishment, ignored him as much as was possible.
btw, Herrmann was a big fan of Ives and met with him very respectfully. A rare ocurrence for Herrmann. If he had been on this Forum, he would have shut down every single thread he contributed to. Trust me on that. He was the most extremely hostile *** toward anything he disapproved of. Another reason I daily bow in the direction of my Herrmann CDs and LPs.
You're just right, mate! Had Herrmann been around, the other one (HZ) would be a barman somewhere...
Full respect for barmen!
Talking about a great soundtracks' composer, this morning I turned my turntable on and played (after a few years) some music by Juergen Knieper, who scored some Wim Wenders' movies. Simple, essential and great music, especially for "The american friend". Unthinkable nowadays such beautiful semplicity. Now, every single feature or tv film or anything else, sounds just exactly as you expect: virtual, false, usual, same.
This corruption started a few years ago. Nevertheless, no musically illiterate b++++++, years ago, would have entered the world of film music.
I can just think of one (late) exception: Vangelis. But, at least, he had a personal style.
In the 40s studio era for example, one had to be an all around musical hand - being able to do an arrangement, flesh out a three stave manuscript, conduct a studio orchestra with a click track, compose new cues to existing scores, and after learning the ropes, finally get to do your own music. Not that I wish I had been a part of that era, since it was too controlled by the studios. But the music departments were staffed by incredibly talented people, many of them expatriots from Europe who were forced out by the war - traumatically for them, but to the great benefit of Hollywood. In that time hack work meant imitating Rachmaninoff, Tchaikovsky and Liszt. Now think about what is required merely to imitate those composers! It is a certain level of musical attainment that is actually quite impressive in itself. And that is the lowest level of composing one hears from the time. When you start talking about the greater achievements, in originality such as of course Herrmann but also Korngold, Tiomkin, Steiner, Rosza, Waxman - it is astounding, the general level of musicianship that existed.
Whom do you have to imitate today? Dwell on that question a few moments...
Scary. What we are talking about, pure and simple, is devolution. And people like Vibrato can accuse me of being an old fart talking about his past - BUT IT ISN'T MY PAST. I was never a part of any system like that. I am simply aware of it, which anyone can be simply by listening to a few recordings and watching some old movies. And it is disturbing to think of the difference in quality.
However, one does come across independent films with great music every now and then, so that is encouraging. That is the one area where film today gives some real opportunity that on occasion is actually greater than the studio era. Of course I don't know if you'll ever make a living on independent film scoring.
Concerning insults, everytime I've tried to "call a spade a spade" about contemporary sondtracks and their way of being "composed", I've been (on many fora) attacked in any ways and called many names. When I claimed I really believe in "freedom of speech" and criticism is there to be used, to create a positive confrontation of ideas, there were no answers...
I've spent all my life studying (and I still do it) music and all its aspects: history, composition and conducting. Graduating years ago! I'm not a kid and I'm not an amateur. Am I allowed to speak frankly and give to my ideas some life?
Criticism is often "disturbing" just for those who cannot "read" things and dream about being the next HZ (and many others!) with the "one finger" stuff ready. Forget paper, pencil and a piano. Those were from the beginning and still are my main instruments, as well as for other people, I hope. The orchestra is "imagined" first on paper, then - why not?- since some new means are there, I record my music via computer and orchestral libraries. Still having to cope with frustration though, because what I imagine and write down is often far from what I can obtain with virtual instruments.
HZ's success generated the opposite: people assembling powerful computers in order to create "montages", absurdities of no meaning, because the way of "thinking" music is just killed. We're supposed to be the "optical race", always connected to some magnetic field...A foolish way of living. In addition to this, there's no creation in business, being the two terms -creation and business- incompatible nowadays. Maybe years ago, that was still possible, with very different people around though.
I'm listening to Alex North's 2001 (Dietz, are you around?) which was refused by Kubrick...
Other men, other times, other music (for movies, but still classy!)...
Hi Miki Mart,
yes, I'm around. 😉
[...] Gossip and off-topic threads will be tolerated to a certain amount in this forum, as long as I don't get the feeling that things are getting out of hand. Don't tell me about "freedom of speech" then, because I represent absolute power here [;)] ... after all, this is a private forum. Let's make it a friendly web-hangout for brothers & sisters in mind. [...]
I think that's as clear as it can get.
Kind regards,
