Saxbabe

No one has posted in this thread for a while... Even though I am a big JNH fan, I have gotten behind in his output in the last couple of years (also because I haven't seen some of the films he's scored) and was going to ask some advice on which of his recent scores are really worth getting to know? (Post Lady in the Water, and besides The Happening) I just recently have been listening to Lady in the Water again, getting to really know the score, and it keeps climbing higher up in his output for me. I'd like to edit together the last three tracks as they are a full piece unto themselves...and absolutely stunning. It is such a magical score. There are tracks, or there's a theme rather, that when you listen to them, really get to you, like get under your skin - specifically the end of the Prologue and end of The Healing, the repeated note theme over the gently shifting layered string harmonies. :cool: Ooooh! Anyone notice that JNH tends to write more minmalistic-type music for the Shyamalan films? There's definitely a similar stylistic thread running through those scores. Echoes of Phillip Glass and even Arvo Part..when I listen to his scores for Night it makes me wonder what his concert music would sound like, if he wrote any. I wonder if it would be kind of like those scores, or if it would be totally different, perhaps more atonal like JW. I am curious! Anyway - are any of his other scores recently a standout? What is I Am Legend like? (I need to see that film.)

Yay for thread necromancy! Happy B-Day Mr. Barnsbury! -Greta

*waiting for scissorhands to come along* I could do this, but I think he has a better way.

So this is the City of Prague recording? There is an odd note at 1:18 in the strings. Not like a playing mistake, but rather a different note... I know in rerecordings sometimes there are score mistakes and stuff to rectify - if there is a discrepancy in a score you have to make a call, but I'm not sure about that one. The recording seems very good otherwise, and strong (the RSNO version, as enjoyable at is, has a few brass "clams" in the middle!) In any case, I noticed the rerecordings are slightly different than the original in some of the inner lines: Original -> http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4i-e-RAkEGI& Like, the percussive middle section before the firefighter dedication, the low brass in the rerecordings double the woodwinds exactly - in the original their line is simpler, and etc. I guess the score was tweaked for rerecording?

1. Signs 2. Unbreakable 3. The Village 4. The Sixth Sense 5. The Happening 6. Lady in the Water

Did some catching up last week, here's a few: There Will Be Blood Hmm, I liked this more than I expected. The cinematography was outstanding and the story draws you in. Just well-directed and altogether a great character study of two nasties, oil man Daniel Plainview and hypocritical preacher Eli Sunday. The general atmosphere was oppressive, dirty, authentic and the Penderecki-ish string score a great fit for the visuals and overall feel of the movie. Definitely good acting by Daniel Day-Lewis, maybe not his best ever, but good, and jeez, Paul Dano?! It took me a long time to figure out that was him! He should have gotten a Supporting nod for that role. The most WTF ending I have seen in a while, but I appreciated this movie. Pan's Labyrinth Took me a while to get around to this one. And wow, this wasn't anything like what I expected! I didn't know much about it and didn't know about the backstory concerning the Spanish war and the evil stepfather etc. This ended up being rather a sad film. But soooo well-done, the first I have seen by Guillermo del Toro. Gosh, forget Potter, he and Cuaron should do more of their own fantasy-type movies. This is a rare one that I watched and then watched right through again with the director commentary. There was so much impressive stuff in here. The symbolism of color and shape, the acting all-around, the way the characters were drawn. The score was very good, maybe not great but very memorable theme-wise. The film is excellent. I Know Who Killed Me I promise, I was just looking at this out of the corner of my eye because it happened to come on HBO after something decent...this has to be one of the worst movies I've seen in a looooong time. Everything about this was bad, except for the music, which was quite good, as somehow McNeely got roped into scoring this turkey. Lindsey Lohan is trash personified, even when she's wearing clothes, and also not a good actress anymore. I guess the plot was supposed to be clever and Hitchcockian, with all the overuse of the color blue and flashbacks, but it came off as convoluted and dumb. Lame, avoid at all costs. Deserves negative stars.

Okay...might as well add a bit to this..saw it on Friday. Koray is pretty on target, there was much good and bad. But I will say that when I went by Wal*Mart afterwards I found myself looking askance at the Garden Center. ***SPOILER WARNING*** Some parts really were frightening the further they got into the mess, and those moments when obviously the toxin had got a hold of somebody and you were waiting to see what way they'd choose to off themselves. We did finally get a real horror movie from Night, there were fairly gruesome deaths, and I think he was at his directorial best in some of these scenes - the bodies falling off the building, the scene in the street where people keep using the policeman's gun, the soldier's death in the field...the crazy Mrs. Jones was seriously creepy. Best acting in this film by far would go to John Leguziamo for my money, we just didn't get enough of him. I can't help but think the characters of Elliot and Alma were meant to be tongue in cheek at many instances, I think Night was actually going for a good deal of corniness in this movie. I remember he talked about being heavily influenced by Invasion of the Body Snatchers for this one. I know that whether he intended to or not, he got a good deal of laughs from the audience at my screening. Like when the bodies started falling, and the whole scene with the construction workers, which was actually pretty funny. Other funny moments, the greenhouse guy who talks to his plants, Elliot talking to the plastic plant (hilarious!) and the climax when Alma is asking him what to do and he screams "Why can't I just have a SECOND?!" See, I think Elliot and Alma were purposely drawn a bit caricaturish, upper side anal yuppies with "relationship problems" to show how they would crack when their world was turned upside down. And to show they were much braver and more mature than they realized (taking on the little girl). At least that seemed to be what Night was going for. There was a lot of cringworthy dialogue, but the actors did well with what they were given. The dumb soldier character TOTALLY got on my nerves though! I think the whole Mrs. Jones sequence was Night at his best however, I wanted there to be more to that, he made me want to know what her story was...very mysterious, creepy, yet intriguing. The music was really, really good for those scenes as well! It actually makes me wonder if Night wouldn't do better to contract his focus and do an interior drama/mystery/thriller, I think that suits his talents much better. The ending: it was what I expected. But it was kind of flat for some reason. I think it would have actually been more poetic if after walking out Elliot, Alma, the girl would have been affected and just would've walked over to something like, a pond, on the property and just drowned. Horrible, I know. But everything seemed too wrapped up and cliched as it was. The political message came off trite and preachy - I didn't get global warming though, I got environmental pollutants as cause (hence it starting in NYC in Central Park, and spreading over Northeast. Which also fits with Paris being next destination.) The music: Another very good score from JNH and this collaboration. The Main Titles reminded me of Signs the way they meshed with the visuals and timed. There are many nice moments in the score, lots of subtle well-crafted writing. The cello lines often reminded me of The Village. Go see if you want to experience kind of a longer Twilight Zone/Tales from the Darkside sort of film with some fluffy dialogue and science but a few genuine scares and a good score. And only if you really have nothing else to spend 15 bucks on. Ranking for me: 1. Signs 2. Unbreakable 3. The Village 4. The Sixth Sense 5. The Happening 6. Lady in the Water -Greta

It'll be performed in Houston in Spring '09 by the awesome William VerMeulen. You should think about a trip down if you're able, same concert they're doing Celebration Fanfare! I don't know where I'll be so don't know if I'll be there. Someone should record that though.

Hehe, yeah...I ended up getting sucked into Atlantis on TV tonight again...and gah, what a great score that is. So...there is a half-hour feature showing this week on Fox Movie Channel called "The Happening: Taking Fear to a New Level" that shows some behind the scenes from the movie and interviews with the actors as well stuff about Night's style of filmmaking, it's pretty good if you can catch it on. I'm going to see the movie on opening day, and wait (boy it is hard!) to hear the score in film. Looking forward to it from everything you guys have written so far!

The earliest I own: Miklos Rosza's The Red House (1947) On original 78rpm.

2001: A Space Odyssey. I should see this again drunk. Or medicated. Or something. It was fine until they actually got in space. And I liked the ending! But I think a lot of the middle could've been cut. It wasn't too bad though. But one I hated was Rosemary's Baby.

I think Towering Inferno PWNS Munich...but that's just me. The Main Titles, you've got JW doing flying at his best, and the rest of the score is no slouch. Yes, it is obvious what time period the music comes from, but it is quality music and is full of hallmarks of JW writing of that period that I love. It is a very good score. Munich is also good. But Towering Inferno is classic JW and gets the vote for me. And I would love to hear those Main Titles live someday.

I think this hasn't been posted.....

I love contemporary music, and yeah, there is a TON of good stuff out there right now, especially if you are a film music lover because the two worlds are kind of cross-pollinating each other. Yes, I echo this list! It seems a lot of us like a lot of the same composers, which isn't a suprise...very funny story, I became good friends with Peio (scissorhands) not from hanging out here together, but from randomly running into each other on another music service where we both have totally random nicknames....we noticed we had the same film and contemporary composers on our lists, which was rare to find, we started talking and then, it dawned on him and he was like, "OMG!! Do you know who this is?!? From JWFAN!". It was hilarious!! So yeah, all those mentioned pretty much I like, John Adams is waaay up there for me, and I guess my favorite...after that I am totally into Micheal Torke (yay Miguel!) and Richard Danielpour. LOVE their music! The mention of Ellen Zwilich made me think of Jennifer Higdon and Joan Tower, definitely check them out if you like the above....both of their Concertos for Orchestra are excellent. That covers Americans... Yes, gorgeous stuff! Cool to see others that like him. There are sooo many good Finnish composers right now. Love this trio: Esa-Pekka Salonen, Kaija Saariaho, Magnus Lindberg. My favorite being the first. Salonen is also the long-time conductor of the LA Philharmonic but is leaving soon to focus on composing. I think his music is the most attractive of the three, colorful melodies and dance rhythms, huge orchestration. He was a proponent of Goldsmith's concert music as a conductor and admired him as a composer...and in a couple of his own pieces some rather Goldsmithian action writing shows up! His Symphony No. 1 had a premiere in Houston last year and he was there and spoke but I wasn't able to go. I heard it was great! What would you recommend by him? I'm not familiar with his music yet.

OMG smnol!!! I miss smnol...good times...

Hmmm, Sibelius might qualify...if you count Kullervo and the Lemminkainen Legends...they sure look like symphonies to me. I should've! It is a fascinating piece, and what a blast to play. I was lucky enough to get to play movements 1, 2 and 5 during high school, needless to say that was a great group for our age! The piece seems to have a lot of inspirations, there's a few other cool nods I noticed before besides the RvW: In Lothlorien (the beginning of the dance-like theme), he quotes the beginning of the theme in the middle of 1st mvmt of Bartok Concerto for Orchestra...and the last mvmt Hobbits, I always thought the grand stately theme was quite Elgar-ish. There's also a nice Wagner Flying Dutchman bit in the Khazad-Dum climax of mvmt 4! A really interesting influence I ran across by total happenstance, was from a live LA Phil iTunes concert of contemporary music by Arvo Part and Dutch composer Louis Andriessen. I was listening to Andriessen's landmark 70s piece De Staat, and lo and behold if I didn't find the end of Lothlorien, the pulsing notes that create dissonant harmonies and then fade away - it's very influenced by the beginning of that piece. And later in it there are other ideas which show up in some of his other writing, especially one bit De Meij used in his new 3rd Symphony. It makes sense - De Meij would've been a young music student in NL right when Andriessen was first popular and wrote the piece. I made clips as it was such an interesting random find... the Lothlorien bit and the other one that is quite De Meij-ish actual clips from: Lothlorien, Planet Earth And his 3rd Symphony has intentional quotes of Holst's Jupiter purposely in the last half, he explained in the pre-concert talk at the premiere that he was being a little devilish with that! That one he did write for orchestra first, but has already made into a wind version and I found it has been released on CD...it sounds awesome, maybe better than the original for orchestra, I will definitely have to get this CD... Sound clips here, scroll down to where it says "World Premiere" We could almost have a "band music" thread as many of us are running around here! There some amazing pieces being written for winds and some really awesome professional groups out there like Tokyo Kosei and Dallas Wind Symphony, and the military bands in the various countries, I plan to keep playing in a community ensemble somewhere after school, it's just too much fun. There are more and more popping up everywhere, two interesting ones here in Texas that devote a lot of playing to film music, Mark and John went to see one of them recently, the Austin Wind Symphony (link) and there is another cool one around Dallas called the Metropolitan Winds that has released a JW CD (link) and even had Bruce Broughton down as a guest for one of their concerts where they did Silverado Very cool!

Wow, shaping up to be a great conference again...I would certainly go if there was any way possible I could! Scott, Broughton, Doyle and McNeely is a fine lineup. I am guessing Townson and McNeely might discuss their Varese rerecordings? That would be very interesting. Wish I had a couple grand extra....sunny Spain in July...sigh!

Yeah I prefer Berglund, Maazel/Vienna, and Blomstedt...and then Ashkenazy...it's probably more the Philharmonia's playing that impresses me more than his conducting though...

Thanks for clearing that up, I was confused about the actual "fanfare" instrumentation...actually my friend plays fluegel in his band. And he is in the Gelders Fanfare Orkest. I heard a recording of one of their WMC performances where they played Stephen Mellilo's "In A Cause Called Glorious" and it was sooooo good...I wish we had more wind groups like that here outside of colleges!

Well, yes, that is deeply wrong, because that's not even a "brass band" composition, that's for full wind ensemble...and was originally composed and conceived for such. De Meij didn't even write the orchestral arrangement himself. The LSO performs it beautifully, but it is hard for me to not feel like the orchestral version sounds wrong somehow, especially in the nature sounds of Lothlorien, the strings really stick out to me. There are a lot of great compositions being written for brass band, De Meij has written several, the coolest I've heard being his "Extreme Make-over", a metamorphosis on themes of Tchaikovsky. The recording I have is played by the Black Dyke band, and they are phenomenal! In America, our high level "brass bands" take the form of marching drum corps that compete in the DCI circuit, made up of outstanding brass and percussion players across the country of ages 17-22. Besides performing fiendishly hard arrangements they march at lightning speed whilst playing, it is very fun to watch and the amount of work they put into it is mindboggling. One of my classmates at college was in one, and they basically give up their lives for a whole summer to do it, touring around the country performing and competing. I think the European movement for brass and wind bands is really cool, all these community bands and the chance to just get out and play, and even compete in contests, a great way to keep up your playing past school. A friend of mine in the Netherlands, in college studying computers, plays for fun in a "fanfare band" (which is apparently a Dutch invention of a brass band augmented with saxophones). I've heard some of their recordings from the World Music Contest in Kerkrade, and the musicianship is very high level, and so is the dedication exhibited in these community bands.

Yes, I forgot Ashkenazy...extraordinary pianist....as conductor, less, though I do really like his Sibelius cycle with the Philharmonia. And I can't believe I forgot Andre Previn!! Amazing pianist...but underrated as a conductor, also a very fine composer. BTW speaking of dual activities, Itzhak Perlman has gotten more into conducting recently, has anyone seen him in that capacity?

My best listening is probably the middle of the day, but... A few weeks ago, I had something good happen and decided to celebrate that evening with a bottle of wine out by the pool...when the stars came out and much of the bottle was gone, I decided to fire up the iPod and listen to the CE3K SE. Wow.

No, James Newton Howard and Waterworld. King Kong is very good for the amount of time he had, but Waterworld is just stunning. Still one of the best scores he's ever written...

I thought perhaps you meant "conductor AND pianist" as several conductors are also great concert pianists as well....my favorite in that category would be Leonard Bernstein. Others still living: Christoph Eschenbach, Daniel Barenboim. And JW of course! Let's see, living conductors, these five are my favorites: Simon Rattle Esa-Pekka Salonen Claudio Abbado Riccardo Chailly Charles Mackerras Non-living, too many to name, but Herbert von Karajan, Eugene Ormandy, Fritz Reiner come to mind. Pianists: Jean-Yves Thibaudet Yefim Bronfman Martha Argerich ...just to name a few

That sounds like a fun concert! And thanks for the compliments on our ensemble, we also recorded a CD this spring but that will take a while to be made. Right now, we are focusing on conducting symposium, which I am taking part in, where we conduct something and are critiqued, which takes place this weekend. I am a bit nervous, but excited! The piece I am doing is the 2nd mvmt "Horkstow Grange" from Grainger's Lincolnshire Posy, so gorgeous, but kind of challenging to conduct. It feels a lot different to be on the other side!