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Released on Orion in 1974:

Just seen this. Apparently all Oscar-nominated music from this year will be performed live February 27 at the Royce Hall in LA, three days before the actual Oscar event itself. Johnny will conduct a Book Thief suite, I assume. The whole article: http://variety.com/2014/music/awards/acad-music-contenders-to-take-the-stage-at-royce-hall-1201098466/ Nice move on the Academy's part, this could be quite lovely.

Demons of St Petersburg by Ennio Morricone Stalingrad by Angelo Badalamenti Karol - who later spotted the irony in picking those two particular titles

Maybe they will both be good.

Shield is much better at mid season. Stay with it. It's improved by leaps and bounds.

This post of yours made me want to discover this score. It's fascinating music. I'm now on my 3rd listen in a row and it still intrigues me greatly

The Pianist is a great film. Haven't seen it in years. Wonder if there's a blu.

Ok, damn you. One more....maybe...just maybe one more.

That's where we differ. I hear each chord as one sonority, not two separate halves. They seem more like upper structure chords than polychords, probably due to the omitted thirds and other important intervals. Take chord 4 and 5 (basically the same the chord moved down a whole step - just re-voiced and inverted). I've seen this chord in dozens of other scores and jazz charts (Jerry Fielding and Alex North come to mind) - and to me they're just upper structure Lydian chords. That said, it's just a different way of looking at the same thing. I'm something of a jazzhead, so I'm always going to see relatively consonant polychords like these (compared to say Stravinsky's 'Petrushka' or 'Augurs' chords or Strauss's 'Elektra' chord) as single entities, for better or worse. I agree. When I play them on the piano, it's clear that there's a jazz influence - I'd reserve a polytonal classification for situations where there are clear triads present and juxtaposed. There's enough interlocking in the first few harmonies and lack of any solid tonal identity in either "component", that is, the trumpets or trombones taken individually, for me to hear these as big extended chords. Plus, the horns sort of function as a bridge between the trumpets and trombones by sharing notes from both sections/parts, further eliminating a sense of polytonal juxtaposition. I'd analyze them as extended/added-tone (I tend towards the latter) chords, with respect to the top note, taking that as a sort of melody that is harmonized in a Debussyian kind of way, by seeing what triads can be formed by changing around the voicings. Sooo doing that, I find that... Chord 1 is a Bb minor with an added 4th and 2nd Chord 2 is an F7 with an added 4th Chord 3 is sort of a BM7 without a 3rd Chord 4 is an Ab major with an added 4th Chord 5 is an Ebm7 Chord 6 is a DbM7 major with an added #4th Chord 7 is a G major with added 2nd and 6th Chord 8 is the only one that feels like it could be polytonal in its original voicing, but I'd probably still call it a DbM7 with added augmented 5th, especially since the other parts then resolve it to a clear Db realm Keeping the melody line and bass line (whether that gives an inversion or an added-tone in the bass) both intact, that makes sense to me. Now, analyze that progression as you will... Db with chromatic excursions?

I voted for Book Thief, Gravity, and yes, but that doesn't disguise the fact that there's very little of interest in this year's nominations. It's the first time in a while that none of my personal top 5 were nominated. The Book Thief is probably my least favorite Williams score this decade. Philomena and Saving Mr. Banks seemed pretty generic, and Gravity somehow managed to be both irritatingly sound-driven and overscored at the same time (the last scene was nothing more than a pale imitation of Horner's "Re-Entry and Splashdown"). I'll admit I haven't listened to Her or seen the film yet. Of the scores I've listened to this year, only The Book Thief even overlaps my top 10 and the Oscar nominations. I don't know if it's Academy politics, general Hollywood love of the status quo, or rule technicalities, but this year in particular, the nominating committee fell pretty far short of its duty.

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