David Coscina

It looks like a cool idea. I just hope they give us some money shots of whatever the thing is. I don't want it to be a fart cloud like on LOST. That would not be cool.

I think the problem lies in the distinction between well written music and alternate genres to symphonic scoring. To my mind, things like Tangerine Dream's Thief, or Elliot Goldenthal's HEAT or Dave Grusin's Fabulous Baker Boys are examples of atypical or alternatives to traditional symphonic scoring that worked. And that's just a couple. I think Mark Isham's Point Break isn't strictly symphonic (more like mid ensemble with electronics) also works very well. It's a matter of whether the author of whatever score is deftly applying the music to narrative. There are so many marginal scores that are that not because they aren't traditionally symphonic but because they just do nothing to add anything to the film. That's the criteria I use when assessing a score. Does it work with the film? Does it adhere in of itself to an architecture that matches or compliments the narrative arc of the movie? Does it provide atmosphere at least for a world the characters inhabit? I would rather hear a Hans Zimmer electronic score than an orchestral one to be honest. He's much more confident and adept at that medium. I say this for like, 70% of composers working in the industry today because it's clear that only 30% of them know how to write for a symphonic orchestra. The rest fumble about and make it sound bad, or boring. But it's not just about the colors of the palatte that are being used. It's mostly the execution IMO. A lot of what I hear is just wallpaper. From all evidence, it would appear as though these chaps don't know how to plan a score and shape it over-all. IT seems very arbitrary and random, almost disconnected with the film. IN some cases, this is serviceable but I have to believe the constant lamentation over the quality of scores these days is in large part due to this factor. There's nothing to grab onto and not just for us score nuts. It impacts the film very much so without all of the components working at full capacity. Anyhow that's the way I see it. And for the record I don't think we're going to see symphonic scores return in the same manner. Even concert music is largely wanting these days. I attended a concert last weekend that featured John Adams' City Noir and Mason Bates' Liquid Interface and while both had some nice moments, they didn't hang together very well as a whole. The weekend before, I attended Stravinsky's Rite of Spring performance and for a 100 year old piece, it still kicked the shit out of the Adams and Bates pieces. 'nuff said.

This is Oscar's apology for snubbing Fincher for Benjamin Button a few years back. Just like they gave Scorsese director for The Departed when he should have gotten it for Raging Bull, or Goodfellas or even The Aviator. Fincher's okay but he ain't no Scorsese. He ain't even PT Anderson.

Well at least Powell won on this forum. Sigh. Mark O, I must disagree with you on this year's fare. It wasn't any better or worse than last year. Giacchino's UP was okay but were it not for that 4 minute montage, he would not have won, I'm sure of that. I didn't even watch the Oscars and I'm still upset. It's really a popularity contest at the end of the day. How else can you explain it? Oscar voters consist of people that listen to NIN and they think they're being cool for nominating it for a win just like voters a few years back voted for Rahman because of the songs, not the underscore, and for Santaolalla for his 3 note dittie. I think what upsets me more is how easily people rationalize these types of wins when they are flash-in-the-pan victories at best. Does anyone still remember FAME, or even Chariots of Fire? Not as much as Empire Strikes Back or the Raiders march, that's for damn sure....

Vote for the best of the nominated scores for this year's Oscars.

It's a very different aesthetic this kind of composing is after. It stems from the cerebral post Romantic school of thought that included composers like Varese, Xenakis, Ligeti, Crumb, even Bartok to an extent. Penderecki comes mostly to mind when I hear Giacchino playing with textures in this score. I like it. The spooky stuff is actually very well written. I'm actually surprised because that kind of composing cannot be done using samples or pre-fab stuff. You have to write those tone clusters, portamento glides, and such out or indicate it to the orchestra in some manner. The track "Parting Sorrows" is one of my fave cues of 2010. So much emotion there.

You should see the original, because that's exactly what happens as well. I was going to ask about that. That actually makes Let Me In even better IMO since I thought that was a more Hollywood device to my mind but if it's in the original, than it's fine. I did watch most of the original but never made it to the end for various reasons. I didn't think it was bad by any stretch but I liked the atmosphere of the remake. It was eerie. I love the deliberate pacing of the film too.

I finally had a chance to see Let Me In last night and I have to say it was a pretty good film. I love the atmosphere that Reeves maintained for the movie. It has this claustrophobic intensity. I love that he shot it old school with long shots, tracking shots, and not a lot of quick cutting (I honestly hate this new style of filmmaking of quick cuts AND shaky camera- it smacks of incompetence). Giacchino's score was also very effective. I like how he used that swelling cluster to underscore the bullying sequences while using that tender theme for the vampire moments. I like how the music plays against our expectations and our conditioning of what music should sound like. It's a very progressive, mature score. Some of the harp work recalls LOST but I will say that this is Giacchino's hallmark sound/style so that's fine. It works with picture. Like most of his scores, the music certainly is more 3 dimensional once having seen the film. This is where Gia still is separated from the greatness of Williams or Goldsmith- his music doesn't impact one the same way when there's no context for it. But perhaps he's just not operating with that ideology. It certainly is hard to these days when most directors want music to be out of the way. The score in Let Me In was actually mixed very loudly so it definitely has a presence. The film reminded me of The Shining in its tone. It's stark, moody, and largely quiet. I loved that about this. Reeves' did some other things well- such as never showing the mother's face, as if her presence was merely functional but not pivotal to the narrative. I also love the climax of the film. It was handled really deftly. I'm probably going to buy this on DVD (I rented it from iTunes) since there's a lot of interesting aspects I would like to see again. **** See my review above. I originally liked this score when I first bought it and now that I've seen the film I am even more impressed. I agree with Mark Olivarez that this was one of the best scored films of 2010.

Very sad news, I'll honor the maestro by playing his wonderful score to king kong. My personal fave of his.

Absolutely and if you listen to The Firebird, Stravinsky ripped off Rimsky Korsakov so it's understandable. I remember writing a theme or a film in Paris set in the style of Debussy's Prelude to the Afternoon of a Faun and sent it to Lukas Kendall to get some feedback and he said I'd ripped off John Barry note for note. The Barry score he'd cited was one I'd never ever heard in my life. So it's understandable especially the more breadth of knowledge you have about classical repertoire. All those years conducting the Boston Pops, studying scores and such, would make it easy for Williams to unconsciously take moments from Le Sacre or the Firebird and superimpose it onto Hook (Tink Arrives) or Jaws (gotta say that it worked very very well for the shark). There's a part in Powell's Dragon that recalls a classical piece, I think perhaps Mendelssohn's Fingel's Cave, but it's just a moment. So everyone does it. "Good composers borrow, great composers steal"- Igor Stravinsky "I agree, now where's my photocopier?"- James Horner sorry, cheap shot. but people are quick to call plagerism without any knowledge that the composer in question had/has any experience with the composer they are accused of plagerising. Agreed, see my post above. But in the case of Williams and Goldsmith, both had tremendous knowledge of 20th century composers.

I didn't mean to knock down Williams' efforts. Just illustrate that if your influences stem from these great composers, you're going to sound pretty good. I would think Williams himself would acknowledge this himself, and has as you mentioned. Powell is classically trained too and since he's broken off from MV-RC largely, you can hear his music diverging from that synthetic overproduced sound. I find Powell's sound more acoustic than anyone else at RC. I like his sense of harmonic motion and modulations to not the stock or standard progressions. I think he's not at Williams level but neither is Giacchino by a long shot. Neither of these guys understand jazz harmony at the same level as Williams nor 20th century harmony as Goldsmith did.

Please don't, it's certainly miles ahead of the rest of the dribble that's been nominated. But I found it rather generic sounding. Go back 15-25 years and this score wouldn't even make the top 25 considered for nominations. it's all relative in my books. I do honestly believe it's more the architecture and development of HTTYD that distinguishes it as opposed to complex themes and such. Truthfully, if you like Powell's work, than Dragon is a high water mark for him because it really is his most mature and developed score to date (and I own a lot of his CDs). Can I compare Dragon to E.T.? Uh, actually yes. As far as how the music impacts the narrative and the characters, it's as solid as E.T. and I'm not the only one who has made this comparison. In some ways, it's even less cutesy and cliche'd. Toothless doesn't say a word but the way the filmmakers animated him and how Powell's music accents his intentions, it's pretty amazing. Also, as far as the film is concerned, I urge those who may be luke warm to the movie to consider this: when is the last time a movie has given a composer this much space to highlight their music so prominently? UP! had that 4 minute montage (which I'm convinced is what locked the Oscar for Giacchino- without it that score wasn't as effective as Ratatouille IMO) but Dragon has many many moments where the score is mixed up front and is an integral part of the film experience. "Forbidden Friendship" has no dialogue in it and is one of the key scenes in the film since it's the beginning of the relationship Hiccup forges with Toothless. and it's not sappy or sugary. Same goes for "Test Flight" which is leaps and bounds my favorite film cue of the year. That majestic horn line sends shivers down my back. There's also that Goldsmith inspired Viking Theme for Stoic, the wondrous bombast when Hiccup discovers the dragon's lair, and the simple yet poignant piano recapitulation at the penultimate scene when Hiccup wakes up and finds that he's lost his leg (I mean c'mon, what other animated film or heck, live action film, disables their lead character in the final act giving even more weight to their heroicism? not many, if any at all). Obviously everyone has different preferences in music. some might not like the MV styled construction of some of Powell's themes (more the Burk theme than any other theme). I personally don't like much of Giacchino's harmonic sensibilities and find his simple piano stuff moving from the I chord to flat II chord from project to project kind of redundant. that's my taste though. Can he score films? Yes. Can Powell score films? Yes. I guess I would only hope that people could analyze the technique that Powell applied and separate it from personal preference because it truly is one of the best scores I've heard from the past decade or more. As far as this kind of narrative is concerned I'd put it with E.T. and The Iron Giant in the greatness category both for film and score. That's my take on it. p.s. as much as I love Williams and Goldsmith (and I do very much), I've been listening to a LOT of Stravinsky and I'm more than a little surprised at the amount of his work that was borrowed by both aforementioned composers. With Goldsmith it was more his rhythmic structures so I can forgive that but in the case of Williams, there are straight lifts from The Firebird (Hook) and Rite of Spring (Star Wars, Jaws, War of the Worlds). For goldsmith, we're looking at Symphony of Psalms and Les Noces (for the Omen). It's a lot easier to be cited as brilliant when you're channeling music from Stravinsky, Prokofiev, Bartok, Berg, etc etc/

right on Koray! so happy Powell got the nom. Best damned score of the year. Well, in my opinion..

Here's a cue from a score I'm working on. Not sure if it will be accepted but boy did it take a long time to write....not sure why. Doesn't sound that complicated listening back to it...sigh. http://snd.sc/ehNxK2

Maybe Noland will go with Trento Reznor now that he's joined the esteemed fraternity of Award winning film composers..... I would love to hear a Jonny Greenwood/Thom York Batman. That would own!

I thought I would too but I have recently discovered Stravinsky and have been buying a bunch of his works on CD as well as conductor's scores to study. As far as different score styles are concerned, well, my only gripe with refugees from the popular music world entering film scoring is that I haven't heard a lot of compelling evidence that they understand the medium too well. If providing a sound bed under a scene qualifies as effective scoring, then any 15 year old with Garageband could do it. I thought there was some forethought and connectivity associated with effective film scoring as a craft and discipline. this is what I try to bring to the table when I score something. How does the cue relate to what I've written before? Can I bring in something familiar but also new to keep the scene interesting yet connected to the rest of the film? I don't hear a lot of this same ideology, even in the hands of composers who purport to be "orchestral composers". I don't think one needs to be an orchestral guy to write good film music. But I would say that orchestral composers have had a lot of grounding in large music forms, so that their thought process automatically looks at their music as the sum of its parts and not just incidental music cues.

Richard definitely pick up F451 and Mysterious Island if you have the chance. They are amazing CDs. Battle of Neretva based on the clips Bill posted on YouTube sounds awesome.

Well if this is its own incarnation I don't want to be a part of such a movement. Pretty soon sound designers will be the "composers" for films since they know about as much about music as quite a few A list guys working on major projects these days. In some cases, more. I think it's honestly just a cop-out to dismiss music that has components that demand some attention as "antiquated".

It's an almost old-fashioned score and probably the reason why they declined it. Too bad that old fashioned means a score with melodies, harmonies, and interesting rhythms. Unlike much of the orchestral noise we get these days. A few composers are exempt from this statement but much of what we hear, especially in those big Hollywood blockbusters, is utter rubbish. they might as well mix out the music altogether.....

Actually Morlock, when I spoke with Yared right after all this Troy stuff, he asked me if I'd seen the film with Horner's score and I said I didn't care to. He insisted that I did watch it which to me suggested that he had no resentment towards Horner at all. Even with Peterson, Yared was more upset than mad at the way he'd been treated. Unlike a lot of North Americans, Yared's first impulse is not anger. He's the least spiteful person I know. He was just upset at the circumstances but even confidently didn't diss anyone involved. Seriously.

Once again, I heartily agree with you. And Karol, Horner's remarks about Yared's Bach influence was referring to The English Patient which had nothing to do with Troy. He was being a smug little prick and a total hypocrite.

It's one thing for Horner to give his opinion (although he sounded like sour grapes at the fact he wasn't originally hired) but I cannot stomach the hypocrisy of him accusing Yared of copying Bach when he's plagiarized more Prokofiev, Shostakovich, Vaughan Williams, and Arvo Part than any other composer in the history of film scoring. Now, that said, Horner has seemed to have cooled down since 2004. Interviews he gave for Avatar reveal a much different person. Quiet, humble and incisive.

Yared could have easily scaled down things at the directors request but he was never given the opportunity. He said as much to me in an interview in 2004.

I would love to hear Shore's King Kong. I think it would have been pretty terrific.

Different strokes for different folks. I like the score a lot. Although it's not my favorite Yared. That's Talented Mr Ripley.