GerateWohl
Forumsvar Lagt Inn
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Innlegg
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My two favourite film music books are probably Torn Music and Audissino’s book on John Williams’ music. Even though I have to confess in the latter I never read the chapter about the Dracula score.
And I have a little Reclam book by Peter Moormann called “Klassiker der Filmmusik”, my only film music book in German with a lot of essays on famous scores.
But that’s about it.
The AVATAR score for me was kind of THE LION KING in space, full of that ethnic Kitsch that I dislike so much. Only thing missing were the Elton John songs.
The rest of the score was fine.Starting from the end. To be honest I didn’t really hear about Horner’s death when it happened. I might have even only hear about it, when there was a discussion, who will score the Avatar sequel when he is not around anymore.
I first heard about Horner in a radio show that I caught by accident, called “filmharmonic concert”. It seemed to be a one time thing as I permanently tried to find the radio station and the time, but couldn’t find it anymore. That was in the early 80s. And the host told the story, how young Horner sat in front of the door of director Peter Yates to get the gig and how it payed out with a great symphonic score. They played a track and then I wanted the album. I found it within the next Month in the store window of the little cinema in my area.
And this is in that sense spectacular for me as, like I said, the radio show was a one time occasion that I caught by accident. And I spend a lot of time of my youth in that cinema. But that was the only time that they sold soundtrack records.
Next contact with Horner was the TV premiere of Wolfen, which was praised for it’s visual effects. So, I had to see it. There I already recongized a lot of similarities with Krull in the typical Hornerisms. Then I lost a little bit track of him.
Until Aliens. Aliens wasn’t only the greatest movie of the year. I was blasted away by the score. Really loved it.
Later on I loved it less and less, when I found, that almost all elements of the score that I loved also appeard in scores like Gorky Park, Brainstorm, later Patriot Games and many more. Suddenly it wasn’t so special anymore. Then I didn’t pay much attention to his scores anymore, even when I watched the movies.Next touchpoint for me then was Titanic. Not only because Horner’s score was so great, but because sudddenly movie soundtracks were more than before a topic in the media and public discussions.
And then of course Avatar which was a huge disappointment musically. Same for his Magnificient Seven.
In the past two years I was discovering then a lot of his scores after following some discussions around him on JWFan. In the meantime I have a very little collection of his scores. If I needed to select my five favourits I would probably list A Beautiful Mind, Casper, Braveheart, Iris, Aliens. In no particular order.
Hi Thor,
sad to hear, that things weren’t going too well for you in the past month.
And sorry for your loss.For a few minutes I started writing here something.
But then I thought, I don’t want to depress people and deleted it.I admit, when I read “Italian Soundtracks”, I tend to go by composer, but of course Italians have written music for non-Italian movies, and non-Italians have written music for Italian movies. (I usually go by composer, but of course, that’s but one option.)
I agree, that’s a plausible way to look at it.
By the way, stylistically I find Marianelli’s most italian score is The Boxtrolls, which is one of my favourites of his.For me Dario Marianelli does not really count into that group of composers for italian movies. To be honest, I am not aware on any italian movie that he wrote the score for. Did he actually?
Yeah, in a way I find it fascinating that there exists this seemingly popular parallel soundtrack world.
But my memory of the italian genre movies that I have seen (especially comedy and horror) is, that there is not much in for fans of symphonic movie scores like me. It is more that easy listening genre, like also 80% of Morricone’s scores.Interesting enough, that often music of composers who at their time often worked in kind of a pop ensemble format like Ennio Morricone, Nino Rota or also Astor Piazolla (I know, he’s Argentinian) are today a prefered source for orchestral or classical chamber arrangements of their music.
I am afraid, the only album of a nordic composer that I own are The Bermann Suites of Erik Nordgren.
There is for sure a lot to explore.
Anyone gotten the new Barry box set from Quartet Records, The Polydor Years? How is it?
I don’t have that. But as you mention that I remember that I have that 6-disc boxset THE MUSIC OF JOHN BARRY – THE DEFINITIVE COLLECTION with recordings of the City of Prague Philharmonic Orchestra.
That’s a great box, if you are mainly interested in the essentials. I find, with Barry mainly the themes are interesting. Generally, I am not super interested in Barry’s underscore. Of course there are exceptions.I have to say,the biggest asset from the Tokyo concert for me isn’t the tribute piece but the suite from E.T.
Really like that recording.
But I am slightly annoyed by that publication politics of putting one rare track on a best of album.I have the violin concerto doubled because it’s also contained in the The Legend of John Williams box.
Across the Stars deluxe I have as well. Btw the longest CD I own with slightly over 82 minutes. Live in Berlin of course for the remembrance. The Tokyo deluxe box with the CDs I only bought, because it was available at a black friday sale.
I refused to buy the Vienna disc as the only interesting track for me would have been the ASM version of Devil’s Dance. But that was not enough. I was shortly tempted when there was the version with the bonus tracks from Vienna 2. But it never came out officially in Europe.