Reply To: FSM # 9: How do you react when people “offend” you?
Being “offended” when people find out about my music taste has really been never an issue for me, not even back in school. On the contrary, I’m happy to indulge and involve anyone in a discussion about film and film music. On the other hand, I am never pushing a discussion into that direction either. So when we go out and “mingle” with other couples, I just let the conversation go where it goes. It just depends on whether someone is interested in it or not. I don’t go on about “my” subjects if I think there’s no interest on the other side.
My interest in film music and classical music grew more or less parallel, and I just always “stuck to my guns”. When I was in high-school, I had some friends, and we were always discussing and exchanging new albums. Including film scores by Jerry Goldsmith, classical music recordings, pop, jazz… we went to concerts in those days by Sir Neville Mariner, Herbert von Karajan, as well as Falco, Huey Lewis and the News.
Sure, lots of kids where into the “popular” rock/band type music, but lots of them were also very interested if someone had a different taste. I know I sometimes taped music for other people just because they found it very good. I remember there was a girl I really liked, and she was very happy when I made her a cassette tape of “A PATCH OF BLUE”. So I don’t have a lot of memories when people “offended” me.
As far as Hans Zimmer is concerned: his film music concerts are more like “pop/rock” concerts. Nothing wrong with that, and yes, they are popular, but on the other hand, they may well confirm the more elitist classical music snobs why film music should be kept out of concert and philharmonic halls. 🙂
Anyway, it’s true though, when I started to become very interested in film music, it was an uphill battle… hardly anyone seemed to notice or care. There was hardly any information on film music beyond that which the LP liner notes provided. I “convinced” lots of people in my near surroundings of the wonders of Jerry Goldsmith and Ennio Morricone, but there was little information to be found. Even classical music magazines like Gramophone and FonoForum or Classicstoday.com have reviewed film score releases.