I agree with Alex on this, though I am guilty of writing for wordless choir (sorry Alex!)

One thing that you can hear with a lot of current film music is a lack of harmonic movement. It is simply states of static harmony with a load of hammering percussion thrown into the mix to disguise the lack of real movement. All those old composers you mention are the essence of powerful, harmonically and developmentally created movement.

Also, there is a huge amount of OVERWRITING. For example, two people are sitting in a room talking quietly. Why does the composer need a huge Richard Strauss orchestra to accompany them?

Simple. He is slavish servant of producers who want to prove their film is "Classy." And that means huge, end of discussion.

Bernard Herrmann totally contradicted this. Psycho - scored for strings alone. Jason and the Argonauts - winds and percussion alone. He even wrote for bassoons alone on one score! How good would the scores by the current hacks who need a syrupy, huge orchestration for everything they do sound if they were forced to write for bassoons only? That is amusing... in fact, hilarious.

Unfortunately, samples are playing into this immensely. It is now simplicity itself to score for a gigantic ensemble that the composers who use the samples could never, ever in a million years get hold of live. And what do they do? Let the sound of the samples dictate absolutely everything. A composer should never compose with samples. It should all be done in the mind, and only performed after the fact with samples. Otherwise, the seductive simplicity creeps into the very formulation of musical ideas, and there is no freedom to think of new ideas.

One composer who is lionized as the perfect example of a hot composer today and undoubtedly makes many of the people right here on this Forum simply drool with envy, states that he figures out what he is doing by listening to samples. I find this pathetic. He ought to take a look at composers like Telemann, who scored thousands of pieces of music with no samples, no live orchestra, no nothing but his brain! Oh, and a scrap of paper or a napkin at a tavern - which is where he wrote a number of his masterpieces.

Where's my drink, damn it!

I think harmonic stasis has really settled in culturally, and i think it's going to be here for a while. Dance music, hip hop, so-called R&B (yes, some of it is good, I admit), a lot of contemporary jazz, and a wide range of contemporary concert music... I think it's just something that the West hasn't really explored very deeply. Now I realize that the music you're describing, Alex, is not necessarily "exploring deeply" -- could be pretty much the opposite. But you probably get the idea. Really, the only two contemporary genres that still seem hooked on harmonic progression are Rock and New Country. So I can't say I have a problem with the harmonic stasis part. It can be used intelligently and to good effect, and I even believe that a composer could devote a lifetime of compositional investigation to it. That composer may not be me, but someone could...

William. That's a pretty wildly exclusive tone you're taking on with regard to "composing with samples". I do it all the time. Though, I've been doing it for so long now that I think I've discovered most of the pitfalls. Also, much of what I write is for smaller ensembles, and is specifcally commissioned by such ensembles, so I'm generally spared temptation to the excesses you're talking about. I'll just say that it's dangerous to prescribe one "proper" method of composing for all people, and we'll leave it at that.

Basically, Alex, I think William is right, though. People become so enamoured with the sheer size of the sound coming from their computers that they can't bear to let it go, even for a few minutes!
...like Gollum and his Prrrrrrecious.

ralf. I always wonder who these mysterious "modern" composers are....???
But you'd be surprised how many of them could push out compositions adhering to the techniques of the maestri at the drop of a hat. Ironically, it is the hyper-educated composer that is the norm today, not the other way around. Hell, I did a Master Class in Prague a few years ago, and it was filled with 23 year-old Doctral students. Knowledge of those techniques is not an issue.

I think, a lot of the time, it's a matter of someone trying to accompany a scene without upsetting the apple cart -- trying to create something that builds the mood without drawing too much attention. I've always felt that this philophy was crap, but that doesn't make me very popular amongst film composers! It's not that I don't understand the reasoning behind such a philosphy, but rather that I don't think we need to assume our audience is so stupid that they can't follow two fully-developed threads at once. People today multitask all the time -- surely they can follow a musical development alongside a theatrical, filmic, or narrative development. That's just my opinion, and I"m sure it will keep me out of work for a long time!


J.

** DELETED **

@hermitage59 said:

There are demos that contradict this, (Holst, etc.) but writing for living doing film is surely more than 'give me a sample base, and i'm doing big and grand, without any gaps between notes.'
Is the current trend the beginning of death for Pizz and Scat, and the deafening roar that is brief silence?
Regards,
Alex.

I read the subject title Pizza and Scat? Whoa - where did that come from. Stac! Yeah - OK. Scat singing and playing Taste (Rory Gallagher) style.

You almost have to seperate out the two writing styles and elements here.
First, the type of Wagnerian/Beethoven style takes a lot of time, skill and knowledge. I certainly don't have enough of those 3 elements to go down that road.

Film scoring style is always subject to time constraints amongst other things - writers don't have the time to write vast works and even if they could or did - it would almost certainly (a) not be wanted by the director and (b) derivative. Listen to any film orchestral score in recent years - mostly derivative, either from a classic or another film writer - which doesn't bother me as long as it's good and it works with the film.

Just had a similar conversation with a new young Hitchcock/Herrmann convert somewhere else. Most of todays commercial writing, whether it's for film/tv or Classic FM is musical wallpaper that does not require any effort from the audience/listener. That doesn't make it bad in my book - but it's not challenging. There again, a lay non musical audience DON'T really want to be challenged intellectually on any level in our society today.

Do the arts mirror society - or does society mirror the arts?

Going back to Holst's day and way before that, there was a lot more time to savour the arts. Everything today is instant and disposable, including music. The biggest selling music in America and probably Europe is Hip Hop. Go figure!

When you talk about sweeping chords and brass swells and a thin melody line etc - this is the lowest common denominator in this film form today and has been for ages. The younger people who wish to write for images have their filmscore heroes from only a few years back - they haven't even seen or heard 95% of what's gone before - so it's no surprise that demos, for instance, will go down that route quite a bit of the time. But directors must want this style of writing a lot of the time - the circle continues.

It doesn't bother me as much as it used to - I'll listen to anything these days.

I did a demo ages ago that really spits stac and pizz - and the placement is totally unreal in terms of what a 'real' orchestra would sound like live - which is what I like personally. I don't want things to sound real all the time. Films aren't real - people in films and camera angles, editing over and under a shoulder etc are NOT real - this is why I cannot understand when writers are using sample libraries they get hung up about REAL!

[:D]

Hi everybody.

In my opinion there is one thing which is very important in this question: The producers (and also directors) are afraid, that some pure situations will not work out emotionaly. That a man and woman having a dialogue at a table will not have a strong emotional size. They do not trust their own pictures and actors (o k, in some TV works they are ricght about the actors, but this is another question).

So they ask for this permanent underscore which you can hear in nearly every production of today. With this music they are on the safe side. They will never get a realy big thing but they will get what they need for a nice little succes on the market.

Of course I can only talk about the scene in germany, because thats the place where I am working. I did two short movies in New York where the working process was much more ambitioned, but I think in the TV business its everywhere more or less the same.

I also agree with Williams, that the sampler (and I know they are one of the greatest gifts we ever got) are a main part of the problem. Everybody who is able to spent some thousand dollar for a good system an a library is abled to do some great sounds which are absolutely great on the first view. He needs no education or even knowledge about what he is doing musically. And I get more and more the feeling that not only everybody is able to do this, no, everybody is doing this.

With this I will not blame any composer, who is learning as an autodidact. I by myself did not studied music. I learned everything by doing, reading and (most important) listening. I will ever accept any music as long as I feel a kind of trueness behind it. A need to write it this way and no other way. But this kind of music seems to be pretty rare in these days.

Best regards, Stephan

Thank you, Paul, for clearing up hermitage59's dyslexia -- I was wondering "scat??? what could he mean??" -- didn't think that Alex was advocating jazz now. "stac" is different: gigastudio stacs samples now for thicer musick.

@gugliel said:

Thank you, Paul, for clearing up hermitage59's dyslexia -- I was wondering "scat??? what could he mean??" -- didn't think that Alex was advocating jazz now. "stac" is different: gigastudio stacs samples now for thicer musick.

Heheh. Go into a restaurant and the waitress tells you -

On the menu today is Pizza - and then you've got to scat!

No tip required. Just get out of my restaurant when you've finished.

[:D]

Yeah, I was also disturbed by the repeated statement of "scat" - I was seriously attempting to compare it with pizzicato and was not successful.

What stephenkanyar said is true and is actually similar to what Bunuel once stated: that film music is used by producers to cover up weak filmmaking. He went on to say that if a film director knows what he is doing there is no need for music at all! (That idea will NOT be popular here obviously.)

JBM I was just thinking that about never composing with samples, and probably shouldn't be so definitive but what the hell. But it seems like a classic example of putting the cart before the horse when you compose actually hearing the (nearly) final sound, instead of imagining it.

"Do the arts mirror society - or does society mirror the arts?" - Paul R

Yes.

Some interesting comments to note here.

I'll come back to this, but the scat was deliberate, and a play on the parody of writing the same type of music, and getting out with the cheque asap. Little thought, and the bills paid.

'Does society mirror art, or is society more intent on looking at itself in the mirror and ignoring the arts, except when it fits their perception of the current fashion?'

Regards,

Alex.

p.s. The new HD is in and working, and when i've retrieved as much as i can from the old one, it's going south from the top of a very tall building!

Theme from superman, hmmm.... as i recall that was definitely Pizz and Scat......not!

"Superman" IS rather static Alex, and an interesting example of percussive and rhythmic effects in music that is almost non-moving harmonically. John Williams keeps using pedal points in that music. Why? The main theme has an eight bar phrase with constant pedal point in a bass/percussion ostinato, and only one bar that changes the harmony. And this is for music about a man flying? It never occured to me before, but is that the best approach? Of course everybody accepts it and never seemed to mind. And it didn't seem to reduce the size of Mr. Williams' fee...

"Hi Mr. Donner, what did you want to talk about?"

"Johnny, this main theme. It's cute, but I just don't know... your use of a constantly repeating pedal point just gets on my nerves. Can't you put a little harmonic movement into it? After all, we got a guy on wires flying all over the f**king place!"

"I never thought of that Mr. Donner, I'll look into it..."


Later that night

"Uh... yeah, hello?"

"Mr Donner, it's Johnny."

"Shit Johnny it's 3 a.m!"

"I know Mr. Donner, I'm sorry, but I'm upset. I just can't do it. I can't figure out a way to get rid of any of this static harmony in the main theme."

"Oh, crap! Well, if that's the way it has to be. I guess we'll just have to go with it and hope nobody notices."

...could also be a little ironic in-joke, considering Superman was just lying on a table, going nowhere, and making cautious, but proud, navigating movements!

J.

Sorry to hijack the thread for silliness.

Concerning the words "epic" used to refer to current film scoring and "Journey" used for the wide-ranging expression of the old masters...

Maybe the most "epic" and greatest "journey" one might bring up in music would be Mahler. Is there anything that takes the listener farther than his 2nd Symphony? The range of emotion and the truly "epic" scope of the entire work, which Mahler explicitly stated was an attempt at creating an entire world, is so far beyond the "epic" sound of Hollywood there is no comparison. Part of this is the extreme contrast and extreme harmonic movement within the different sections of the music as well as the contrasts between the movements. It is the opposite of the homophonic sound of a typical huge Hollywood orchestration that smears a gigantic orchestra over a three staff quickie-score that could be played on a piano and even be boring for the pianist. Try transcribing Mahler's 2nd for piano. Even Lizst would have found that difficult.

In defense of Mr. Williams - although the theme is not overwhelmingly original (although my 4-month old son seems to love being held in the air whilst it is being sung raucously), the first cue in the film proper (think it is something about Krypton) is great.

It has a slow brass fanfare (augmented gradually by strings and wind), which grows by both crescendo and instrumentation throughout to a very effective climax. I think it shows pretty masterful control and restraint. A single cue of about a minute or so that I always enjoy.

So you can't polish a dog turd, but you might just find that he swallowed a diamond ring... [[:|]]

doo-bee-doo-bee-doo.

Bee-baa-ba-naa.

A-shink-a-doo-ba-wee-skiddley-donk.

At last someone is specifically contributing to the discussion of scat. I agree completely with your last point about the skiddley-donk.

Also, I always liked that Superman cue though an attempt has been made here by Alex to mess with my mind and musicologically prejudice me against it. What is his agenda? I would really like to know. Note how he disappears for a time, in order to foment dissension (and perhaps sedition) and further mess with certain emotionally vulnerable people's minds.

William,
How can you suggest such a thing (Bee bop diddly bop)?

I'm away trying to save what i can from a near death hard drive! And write music of course.
But as you're in a mood for dissent, let me continue......
Film music hasn't just started it's slow deterioration. Indeed, when air travel was in it's infancy, a whole raft of movies about handsome uniform clad flying officers, and impossibly well mannered, breathtakingly beautiful stewardesses, were accompanied by music laced with crooning choirs, semi latin beat and brass parts to keep any semi retired trumpeter busy for a while. Scene after scene of breathless innocent romance were interlaced with continuous frames of comet aircraft, luxurious interiors and good food generously dolloped on real plates, all served with a rich sauce of 'glamorous music'. (My how air travel has changed since those days)

And the genre ran for about 5 or 6 years before the dissidents stepped in and introduced the 'devil's music into scores. (The senseless uproar from the conservative set was laughable in its desperate ferocity)
Rock and roll.
No longer the wonderful sight of a perfect woman smiling as if you were the only man in the world, we were inundated with scruffy youths, girls in mini skirts so high you'd think they'd need oxygen, and the same beat on and on. There were some great songs and themes, but Rock too made way for the most dire sound ever to smear disgrace on the music scene and in film.
Disco.
It's gone downhill from there!
And no longer the at least cleverly orchestrated semi symphonic work of the past mixed with music for young 'uns, now we're totally immersed in the endless choirs, simplistic, unimaginative, repetitive harmonic structures, etc, etc,..........

As for messing with minds, and the perceived intent on my part to prejudice you William, totally incidental i can assure you of that! [[:|]]

Still, discussion has its uses, and if a trip to the land of uncertainty provokes thought, spawns ideas, and expands horizons, who am i to stop the flow of progress?

Regards to you all,

Alex!
Arch dissident.

[H]

@hermitage59 said:

William,
Disco.
It's gone downhill from there!
Regards to you all,
Alex!
Arch dissident.
[H]

I thought Celebration by Kool & the Gang was really good.

[:O]ops: [:O]ops: [:O]ops: [:O]ops: [:O]ops: [:O]ops: [:O]ops: [:O]ops: [:O]ops: [:O]ops: [:O]ops: [:O]ops: [:O]ops: [:O]ops: [:O]ops:

I couldn't get that drunk.


[[:|]]

In the 70s I thought music could never sink lower than Disco.

I hadn't heard Rap.

Though it is one step above the unidentifiable "music" (note carefully the quotation marks) played by brain-dead morons who put 1500 watt woofers in their cars and subject everyone within a three-mile radius to the idiotic, inescapable bass gruntings, similar to the low-pitched vibrations emiited by a warthog searching for slop.

These people should be arrested immediately, and subjected to the psychological, brain-conditioning tortures specified lovingly in "Clockwork Orange."

Hello to you all,
this my first post. I'm new to composition (coming from a keyboard background, as an amateur, and having just purchased Solo Strings)

Superman: In fact, Williams just kind of Xerox an old Superman theme, that was written for a serial, if I remember well. I was surprised the very first time I heard it that old score: same pedal effect sequence and same first brass notes. May be Williams was commissioned to go from that.

Epic in movies: Elfman says somewhere Williams brought back that way of scoring. So it’s back in the 70’s, with Tower Inferno, following the use of jazz-funk oriented scoring (Shiffrin). I must admit (I’m going subjective there) epic suits those recent blockbusters well, better than an Isaac Hayes work that would shift me away from the mood. As you say, it’s sort of a trend, but that is logical. What is really new to my hears and has largely spread in a less than a decade is the extensive use of percussion. BIG ones. No Williams, no Goldsmith had this, neither the first Horner or whoever. I assume Zimmer and his Media Ventures team can be held responsible for that. Or, more exactly, directors and producers who ask him to repeat a successful receipt.

But I’m pretty sure there’s a lot of room for non epic scores and this room is well filled nowadays. Listen to the beautifully crafted The Pledge score, from Zimmer and Badelt. No French horns, no vibrato strings, just a guitar (Peirera), some percussions, ONE voice, a few synth pads. Zimmer’s Thin Red line looks toward French Impressionists. Raimi’s A Simple Plan, Elfman’s score, is not brassy at all. Debney in Bourne Identity is doing something very interesting: treated drums and dry brass. Thomas Newman is rarely going Epic, though scoring for the majors (but ok, he’s composing the same score over and over, with the same pizzicatos, same harmonics…) Action packed movies are pretty BIG these days, so they want to sound BIIIIG as well. Same range of emotions, I presume. Furthermore, we should never forget that they most of times have 3 month or so to complete a score (ok, some of the cues are composed from the “shadow men”, Zimmer being one the first to bring their contribution into light, but Zimmer is exceptional in many ways).

Oops, that’s a first and long post… I won’t have much more than that to say, anyway [:O]ops:

litti

That's a good observation that the John Williams Superman is like the old TV show theme, which was very good AND quite similar. Williams has a very ABSORBENT ear.

Who wrote that original theme?

However, I disagree on the percussion. Jerry Goldsmith is the one who started all this heavy, big, Taiko-like percussion though nobody ever seems to recognize him for it. In "Wind and the Lion" he used a huge drum part that was very effective and spectacular, combined with an epic-style score. Ever since, that stylistic innovation has been transmitted and copied.

James Horner is the most unoriginal and plagiaristic composer in the history of Hollywood, so whether or not he used it is of no consequence.