FSM # 26: Great blues scores?
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This is rather urgent.
Can you name any good blues film scores (or movies with plenty of blues songs)?
BLUES BROTHERS, THELMA & LOUISE, something by Ry Cooder, perhaps?
Jones’ IN THE HEAT OF THE NIGHT comes to mind.
Not a big blues fan myself. I think it all sounds the same..
The blues scheme is of course mostly indeed 😉
The blues scale remains the same, but the appeal is in the variations. Love blues, it’s the foundation upon which most of my music interest is built.
One of my top favourite Danny Elfman scores is MIDNIGHT RUN, a delightfully bluesy affair.
I am also not a huge blues fan.
But I like Goldsmith’s CITY HALL a lot, which is kind of a blues score in my book.The blues scale remains the same, but the appeal is in the variations.
There is of courses more than one blues scale 😉 The classic 12 bar blues scheme that is often used and works great if you don’t need a classic verse-chorus structure but there are also some variations as far as I know.
I am not a blues expert but I do like it. THE STAND CD I gave aways years ago but I do have it digitally apparently. Should re-listen to it…
But I like Goldsmith’s CITY HALL a lot, which is kind of a blues score in my book.
I would consider this a blues score as well! One of the later Goldsmith scores I really like.
There is of courses more than one blues scale 😉 The classic 12 bar blues scheme that is often used and works great if you don’t need a classic verse-chorus structure but there are also some variations as far as I know.
Sure, I was thinking primarily of the C-F-G chord structure (or any variation thereof) that you then “ornament” in various ways. It’s about the only thing I can play on a piano, so I’ve had some fun with that over the years.
Listening to “Counting Down the Years” from Hans Zimmer’s CALENDAR GIRL now, and loving it. Featuring Pete Haycock on guitar. Of course, Zimmer is a master bluesman as well — THELMA & LOUISE and DRIVING MISS DAISY being particular classics.
Yes, Counting is an enjoyable track. Co-produced with Zimmer’s old nemesis Jay Rifkin, and co-composed with Nick Glennie-Smith.
The blues, as the roots of jazz, and really all American popular music, shows up often in the work of John Williams, but never more than in The Sugarland Express.
Yes, John Williams is good with da blues. Countless examples, all the way back to his TV days. Here’s “Polly’s Blues” from THE ELEVENTH HOUR (1963):
That’s a great track I was not aware of, thanks. Of course, jazz and the blues are closely related. This is a 12-bar blues, with a number of substitutions that would probably not occur in the rougher folk music of regular blues. Williams can never help himself but to spice it up, as jazzmen are wont to do.
Yes, I think THE SUGARLAND EXPRESS, as you mentioned, or ROSEWOOD (when it’s not gospel) is possibly Williams at his most “pure”, blues-wise. A lot of other times, he likes to spruce things up a bit. It will almost always have jazz inflections.
One of my top favourite Danny Elfman scores is MIDNIGHT RUN, a delightfully bluesy affair.
I rewatched this film on Monday, with a couple of mates who hadn’t seen it before. They liked the film, but wasn’t that enthused with the score. Meanwhile, it continues to be one of my favourites by Elfman, and blues scores in general. There’s no accounting for taste!
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