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Doug Adams

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Everything posted by Doug Adams

  1. No: "And yes, the book follows the complete Extended Scores ... and in the order and structure of the original fully orchestrated compositions (meaning the first fully realized draft before filmmaker conformations)."
  2. Working on bringing the podcast back ... in a different format. Two in the can now, but I'm waiting for a few more before launching so that there are several ready to go right off the bat. An no, it's not video. I hate that too.
  3. That's not the actual cover. I always use temp covers when I write. Not sure why. It helps with mood, I guess. And yes, the book follows the complete Extended Scores ... and in the order and structure of the original fully orchestrated compositions (meaning the first fully realized draft before filmmaker conformations).
  4. I'm sure he's thinking of Howard Hanson, whose Symphony #2 closes Alien.
  5. All lyrics will be provided. But the score will only be analyzed in the form in which it was originally composed by Shore.
  6. Oh, hugely rewarding! Sorry, hope it doesn't sound like I'm griping ... I certainly don't intend to!
  7. Absolutely. I've done liners for albums where I've had to pin down developmental arcs well before the score has even finished being composed. It's often a case of asking the composer, "Well, what do you think might happen?" You have to choose your words incredibly carefully, because you could easily tie yourself to something that makes no sense later. The first Hobbit was particularly tricky. Neither the film nor the score was done when I did the notes. And it was only part one of three, so the initial themes could have gone in almost any direction in future installments. Since I wanted to be able to revisit everything more comprehensively down the line, I tried to avoid naming anything or giving anything more than general structural parameters. But even that was difficult since I had maybe four different sketched out or mocked up versions of the end of the score, and no one knew yet what the final draft would sound like. I wouldn't trade the experience for the world -- and I worked with amazing, supportive people -- but it was a difficult gig! By the way, I'm told that much of the issue with the lead time these days is that CD manufacturing plants are closing down left and right. If you want to press something in semi-large numbers, you basically need to reserve a time months and months in advance ... and that time may or may not be near the actual release window. It's usually not. And woe be he who gets behind schedule and can't deliver materials to the manufacturers on time. You either pay through the nose to adjust the date (which in the case of the niche film score market likely means bye-bye profits) or you get the next available spot, which could -- and likely would -- delay the project by months. As they say: Creativity is easy. Logistics are hard!
  8. Since I wouldn't want other people divulging the details of my contracts, I probably should offer them the same courtesy. That said, my contracts are deadly dull!
  9. That specific language ("the love theme for Aragorn and Arwen") is contractually required to be included. That's why that same wording always appears.
  10. You've heard Shore speaks dozens of times about the importance of instinct in his creative process. It was his instinct to shape the FOTR CR in this manner. That was the same clear-cut answer as it was 10 years ago, it's the same clear-cut answer that it'll be 10 years from now ... though by then, I'll be gumming my mash and yelling at clouds, so I'd advise you to believe me now. I've always had issues with the "Complete Recordings" name -- which was obviously chosen to delineate the sets from the prior album releases -- yet I'd be hard pressed to come up with a better title. The Fellowship of the Ring: It's Like That Other One, But Now In Order and Essentially With All The Music, But Maybe Let's Don't Get Carried Away Splitting Hairs About That Last Part? Catchy ... EDIT: Oh and yeah, I know I have the word "comprehensive" in the subtitle of my book. So I guess I'm a little hypocritical once again!
  11. Sorry, I managed to accidentally break this into two responses. Yes, Shore's process with Fellowship the CR was still reductive. You may not like it, but it was what he wanted. Creative decisions are the *entire* response to your question. This was not a ported over isolated score. No studio politics. Everything was recreated and remastered from scratch. Again, you may not like it, but statements to the contrary are simply inaccurate. For what it's worth, I only had one bit of input into the FOTR CR: I asked them to return the passage where Frodo looks down the road early just after they've run through Farmer Maggot's crops. That was originally missing. I was allowed more input on TTT and ROTK. I'd maybe earned more trust by then. That said, even if I'd been able to push for a number of adds on FOTR, I think we'd still have something very close to what we have today. That was Shore's vision of that release. Quite right. Also worth noting that Shore's process here wasn't all that different than what film composers usually go through. It's just that many of Shore's edits happened while he was standing in front of an orchestra, not sitting at a desk.
  12. Except that this is inaccurate. Themes were written away from picture, not sequences. They were sketched at most -- and generally only insofar as general textures, and thematic appearances went. Final compositions were always written to picture. This was not a JFK situation. Yes, if the picture changed, the composition needed to change with it. And obviously that happened a lot. But draft three was no less authentic than draft one. The music was always made to match the visual.
  13. The thing is, album presentation is like religion or politics -- everyone has their own opinion, and everyone thinks they're right. I don't think you'll ever see the LOTR scores released in the current warehouse manner (complete score here, album presentation here, alternates here, etc.) It's simply not the aesthetic that the above-the-line creative people want. (Watch, now that I've said that, I'll get an email tomorrow: "Hey, guess what the new project is!!") The warehouse approach also doesn't apply to these scores incredibly well because of the nature of their creation. You've all heard the stories of the rewrites, podium edits, etc. That process created dozens and dozens of alternates with differences of literally no more than one or two bars -- sometimes one or two notes. (And I'm taking about interstitial passages, not principal themes.) Releasing those is essentially the equivalent of releasing the film's dailies ... as in every single flubbed line, missed cue, and alternate reading. A few highlights are interesting, absolutely. (I hope that someday everyone can see the alternate opening of ROTK that began with the forging of Anduril. It didn't work, but it was interestingly different.) But speaking as the guy who sifted through all the score alternates to find the gold, you don't want everything. You really don't. It passes from listening to hoarding at a point. I know some people feel that they're entitled to make that decision themselves, but I'm not so sure that's the case. I don't want to go down some George Lucas rabbit hole, but don't artists have the right to shape their work as they see fit? Isn't that what art is? I don't know, maybe art does pass into the hands of the audience at some point, but those arguments generally come up in situations of revisionist history, etc. I don't think that's what is being discussed here. I don't know ... I'm not a philosopher! Howard Shore has often told me that composing is actually a reductive process. You begin with everything, then you slowly remove things to find the art and beauty. His approach to album-creation is *somewhat* similar. Sometimes art is in prudence. But again, that's just one approach. As I say above, there are many ways to skin this cat. And I'll be honest, when these albums were being created and I was asked for my opinion, I can't remember ever asking for anything to be cut back or taken out. I was always advocating for including this passage or that. So maybe I'm more aligned with the collector mindset than I'm willing to admit to myself.
  14. The DVD would have had more interviews and video, which would have left less space for music. The move to CD actually meant more music could be included.
  15. Doug Adams

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    No, there's no good recording of Breil's Intolerance at this time ... which is a shame as, musically speaking, I find it to be his best work for film. EDIT: I should also mention that there actually was original film music that predated Saint-Saëns' charming effort, though some works were more "traditional" (by today's standards) than others. Saint-Saëns is generally remembered because he was the first big, brandname composer to write specifically for film.
  16. Doug Adams

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    Joseph Carl Breil is one of the most fascinating individuals in the history of film music ... a truly original character. He was a trailblazer, but was ultimately undone by his intense work habits, neediness, and bad luck. Obviously, (much) more to say on this later ... D
  17. Those of us who were close to the process don't avoid taking about it because of some deep, dark secret. We're just being polite and deferring to Howard. If he wants to go deeper into his decision-making process, that's his business not ours. In truth, there was no single event that prompted the decision anyway. The nutshell version is that the timing just didn't work out. Shore needed to be focused on composing, and there simply wasn't time to do this while tending to the lengthy recording and rewriting process. In this sense, the DOS doc really says it all. You've all heard how crazy these postproduction schedules were. They really, really were! The official channels aren't playing it up for drama. Even the liner notes were hard to pull off. (And I know, a multi-million dollar film production shouldn't be worried about the dork doing the liner notes anyway ... I'm just saying!) There was one time in mid-October of 2014 when I was having a late dinner with Howard. We kind of hung out until the wee hours chatting, then -- sometime well after midnight -- he politely got up and said, "Well, I need to go compose more Dol Guldur." I responded, "Yeah, I need to write something about it." We both laughed because he was composing music for unfinished scenes and I was trying to analyze unfinished music. We always fixed things up in revisions, but that was how things worked. A lot of the first draft material was pretty speculative. But again, I'm probably telling you things you already know. Oh and yeah ... there was some discussion of Howard working on the song for the third Hobbit film. He actually was involved in a sort of supervisory capacity, and even had a song credit in the album notes for a little while. But he ultimately decided that his work wasn't worthy of a credit, and asked that they not award him one. (This is not implying that he ghostwrote the song or anything. The people credited on the album *are* the people who created this song. He just sort of checked in and leant an ear from time to time.) Again, I think the schedule just didn't allow anything more significant. Too much overlap in schedules. And as for Chicago weather .... the less said the better this time of year. I've been looking for my patio furniture most of the afternoon thank to gale force winds. Blech!
  18. About the production? Isn't it all out there at this point? The DOS documentary did a good job of laying it all out. If you're looking for conspiratorial secrets, I'm afraid none exist. About this music? You're gonna have to wait on that one! (But hopefully not long.)
  19. NDAs all have the same standard language. No security breaches here. (And it's long since expired anyway.) Just a little Throwback Thursday fun.
  20. Chicago (technically Highland Park, since this is the Ravinia Festival we're talking about) has had all three films/scores individually. This will be the first time they've all been presened in a three-night cycle. Hoping to put together a presentation of some kind. If not, perhaps just a good ol' meet-and-greet. We will see. Still a long way off.
  21. Howard moves directly from these pencil sketches to fully orchestrated scores in ink. It's really a two-step process for him (unless you consider engraving a separate step). Part of that is the reality of a film schedule, part of that is just the rate at which he works.
  22. Both books are essentially done. On Impossible Silence, we wrapped up editing last spring and completed music example engraving this summer. We are now finalizing end notes (which is no small task as there are easily a thousand). Layout will go quickly as this book is primarily text. Hobbit is written and assembled in a temp layout (and has been for some time), but won't go to final proofing/layout until the studio gives the go-ahead.
  23. The title (and the lyrics) reference a family tragedy ... not Shore's family, but a family close to them. It's not something that they like to discuss in public, so I'll say no more.
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