David Coscina

Absolutely Rogue Leader. That was what got me into watching the show in the first place! Mike's music is so much fun to listen to. And he actually does better spy music than David Arnold with a fraction of the music budget. Giacchino rocks.

I got the ALIAS Season 2 box set for x-mas and I was kinda hoping they would have done a little bit on Giacchino's music or perhaps a little interview. Sadly no. Still a good set mind you.

Ed Shearmur is credited for the film score. Should be good.

Rogue Leader, I totally agree. I wonder if someone will set-up a Giacchino fan website or whether he'll add a Forum Section to his own website so we can discuss all matters pertaining to his great work? That'd be cool.

You know, the more I see this trailer, the more I wonder what Michael Giacchino would do with the music....Would be kinda interesting eh? But I'm not knocking Shearmur. In fact, I was listening to Reign of Fire on the way into work this morning. Pretty good writing. I read that the director independently financed this film himself. This might bode well since he's not compromised by studio pressures or producers to change his vision. I know the trailer seems a little audacious but that's what I like about it. It's so different from the usual crap with the heavy metal drum, migraine inducing temp scores that comes out of Hollywood these days. I'm still excited by the premise and the style. I have no illusions that this film won't be cheesy in some regards, especially if it does harken back to '30's styled films. Some of them WERE hokey. But that's the fun of it. If this film were a historical drama, then I'd probably be worried but it's evocative of those old B-films; a lot of action, a lot of style, and a lot of fun.

I think you guys are missing the point. I don't think the director ever imagined the film as a realistic place. I think he wanted to achieve that comic-book styled world of ROGER RABBIT or DICK TRACY. I know with the proliferation of CGI films these days it's easy to knock this film, but let's wait until it's released and hear what the director has to say before dismissing it as another botched CGI spectacle.

I think this film has some real vision including the Art Deco look and the neo-'30's style. It has the texture of a living comic book and judging from the info about how the film was conceived, I'll bet the director is going for that. Unlike Star Wars:TPM where Lucas was trying to achieve a certain reality in his world, SkyCaptain doesn't appear to have those pretensions. I don't think the director is going for ultra realism. I applaud that move too. Perhaps he's also crafting a film that allows the audience to USE THEIR IMAGINATION rather than have eveything done on screen for them. That's why I like SHyamalan's films. He believes in imagination, and doesn't patronize his audience (at least I don't get that from his films). SKyCaptain looks like a film looking back to a simpler time. I for one am very positive about this film. If it ends up stinking, well, okay, at least the director had the balls to try something different rather than coming out with a safe, predicatable piece of s**t. Can't wait to hear what Shearmur brings to the music table on this one!

Yeah, I think he's after a comic book/serial film type look. I think it's really brilliant. Reminds me of Warren Beatty's DICK TRACY in 1990. It appears to have that 2 dimensional look to it. I wonder how Shearmur will approach it. We all know he can do James Bond-type music extremely well. I wonder if he'll approach this like a '50's sci-fi film. Maybe he'll use a Therimen or Odnes Martinau to underscore the evil scientist. The music on the trailer is a combination of Arnold's STARGATE and something that sounds like James Horner...maybe LEGENDS of THE FALL since it has that low ostinato with bi-tonal horns over it. Cool trailer though. .. Jude Law is a great actor too.

Just caught the trailer at Appletrailers.com COOL COOL COOL!!! It stars Jude Law, Gweneth Paltrow and Angelina Jolie and centres around 1939 where SkyCaptain (Law) must stop a mad scientist from taking over the world. THe director is listed as creating an animation software program that allows him to shoot a film entirely using blue screens to create a virtual world around the actors. It looks like an old comic book to me which I think is great. And the composer who will be scoring it is............... Klaus Badelt! Just kidding, it's Ed Shearmur (I know some of you are relieved, I certainly am). Seriously, I think Shearmur will write a kick-ass score. I like quite a bit of his REIGN of FIRE music. Hope he doesn't get kicked off the project. I'm keeping my fingers crossed. The film is due out in the summer of 2004. Sweet!

I've heard a bit of the score. Sounds like Ravel's Daphnis et Chloe in the choral parts and Williams' HOOK in the more adventurous parts. But I'll still buy it because Howard is one of my fave composers next to Williams.

Hey Mark, nice list man! If you like Ifukube's work have you heard Toru Takemitsu's RAN or Hayasaka's SEVEN SAMURAI scores? They're amazing! As for the list, remember folks that this is fave and least fave composers, not Best and Worst composers. Everyone is entitled to their own listening preferences. We shouldn't bash someone for not enjoying Herrmann's works. ALthough the Essa Peka Solonen disc is AMAZING! I don't quite get what Morlock meant by Kilar being a twisted composer. But hey, Kilar's music doesn't do it for him. No biggie. My faves are: Williams (everything except Lost World and 1941) Goldsmith (First Blood, Papillon, Tora Tora Tora, Wind and the Lion etc.) Goldenthal (Cobb, Alien3, Golden Gate) Howard (Signs, Unbreakable, Grand Canyon, Wyatt Earp etc.) Kilar (BS Dracula, Portrait of a Lady, 9th Gate) Ifukube (Godzilla, Majin series) Elfman (Edward Scissorhands, The Hulk) Giacchino (Alias, video game work) Silvestri (Contact, Forrest Gump, Predator) Korngold (Sea Hawk) Herrmann (F451, Vertigo) Really Don't Listen to: Alan Menken Brian Tyler Mark Shaiman (although he's not a bad composer, just not my cup of tea) Eric Serra David Arnold (post Stargate)

John Adams- Harmonium, Harmonielehre, The Wound Dresser, Short Ride in a Fast Machine Barber- 2nd Essay for Orchestra, Knoxville:1915, Adagio for Strings Debussy- Reverie, Prelude to the Afternoon of a Faun Ravel- Pavane for a Dead Princess, Daphnis et Chloe Elgar- Enigma Variations (the Nimbrod being my favorite) Wagner- Parsifal Mahler- all 10 Symphonies, Kindertotenleider, Das Leid Von Der Erde Prokofiev- Alexander Nevsky, Ivan theTerrible, Fiery Angel opera, Symphony #3, Romeo and Juliet Vaughan Williams- all 9 symphonies, Job, Tallis Fantasia, Five Variants of Dives and Lazerus Holst- St. Paul's Suite Bartok- The Miraculous Mandarin, Concerto for Orchestra, The Wooden Prince, String Quartets, Music for Strings, Percussion and Celeste, Bluebeard's Castle Xenakis- various pieces I cannot spell Crumb- Black Angels Glass- String Quartets Shostakovich- Symph. 5, Symph. 12 Ligeti- Requiem Mozart- operas Puccini- Turandot Gorecki- Symph. #3 Kilar- Exodus for Orchestra okay this could go on forever....

The one thing that is disarming about meeting Williams is how candid he is and how humorous. He's always so composed and formal in his interviews so it's really surprising at what a great sense of humour he has. And a delight I might add! Thanks for sharing your story with us! It just reinforces my respect for Williams as a person as well as a great composer.

Williams can still write amazingly complex, kinetic action cues. Perhaps not best exemplified in AOTC or TPM but listen to "Everybody Runs" from Minority Report. That is, without a doubt, my favorite action cue by Williams in the past 10 years. The triple-tonging trumpets and 16th note string flurries are amazing. And all of the rhythm is generated through the use of ostinatos while percussion serves to fill in accents here and there. The folks at Media Ventures and a few other composers I will not name should take note of this rare technique rather than blasting simplistic drum patterns over some very uninteresting held strings and the ubiquitous brass sforzandos.

What about Ed Shearmer? He wrote a pretty bombastic score for Reign of Fire. He can certainly provide the balls that the story needs. And he does Goldenthal-styled orchestrations pretty well too. Otherwise I think we should take tissue samples from Silvestri, Goldenthal, and Goldsmith, clone and develope a composite composer- Alan Goldensmith. The ultimate composer!!!

A.I. Brilliant score.

I didn't really get upset at the comment he made. And he did say this verbatum. I believe it was in an interview with Apple.com or Steinberg...one of the two. He did say this. But he has his own tastes. And he also said that he didn't expect to win for Gladiator. He was upset at not winning for THin Red Line since it took him a year to write. I wish he had more time to spend on Last Samurai. As my other post "Last Samurai post screening thoughts" attests, his music was basically functional and did, at times, detract from the film. On the way home, I played "Night Fight" from Crouching Tiger HIdden Dragon. That kind of rhythmic style is what was lacking in LAst Samurai. Zimmer has no idea of advanced rhythms. There were no polyrhythmic elements so the Taiko drumming was all very bland (and barely audible with all the friggin electronics!). I've no doubt that Zimmer will do something great in the future. Last Samurai just wasn't it. But, knowing the Academy voters, he'll get a nomination for his "stirring score". Somewhere, Toru Takemitsu is rolling in his grave.

I'm just back from having seen The Last Samurai. It's a beautifully shot, well acted, tightly edited film. And thankfully Zimmer's score blends into the film reasonably well. I don't change my opinion of the quality of the music as its own entity- it's still an average score. But the film itself is one of the best I've seen in a long time. I read the script a few weeks ago and was worried that the filmmakers would alter the story for the worse which is what usually happens to great projects. Luckily, they cleaned up the clunky first act and delivered a solid film. Cruise's performance surprised me. Reading the script, I had a certain idea of how he'd approach the role of Lt. Algren. He surpassed my expectations. The Katsumoto character played by Ken Wantanabe was alittle harder to appreciate, at least in his preliminary exchanges with Algren. As the film progresses, he settles into the role quite well (I believe this is his first English speaking role). The cinematography is stunning as are the set designs and costumes. The attention to minute details was paramount in the authenticity of the film. Zimmer's score in the film is more atmospheric and focuses on the quieter moments from the soundtrack. "A Hard Teacher" features some harmonic variations on the third most Asian sounding theme that Zimmer came up with which underscores Algren's immersion into the ways of the samurai life and Japanese culture during his time in the village. What doesn't work well are his anthemic sections that sound right out of Gladiator or worse, Crimson Tide. On the soundtrack they're much worse as they have no context but they are mishandled even in the framework of the film. A scene between Algren and a fierce and stoic samurai called Ujio is hindered by this electronic, Euro-anthem when it would have worked better either with a solo instrument or not being scored at all. When you see the film, you will know what scene I'm talking about. The more somber renditions of the second theme, the one that basically alternates between tonic-dominant and tonic-perfect 4th, underline the tragedy of the samurai's plight without seeming to be overly contrived. I got the sense that Zwizk or Zimmer were trying to force the viewer to empathize more with the samurai when the acting was good enough to evoke those feelings. Last Samurai is a first rate film. It's story has some historical underpinnings, some truly genuine humor, a central character that is truly interesting to watch grow to appreciate the rich culture of the samurai, and one of the most poetic, beautiful conclusions I've ever seen in a film. I would rate this film a solid 9/10. Had there been a more sublime score, it would have garnered a perfect 10.

Agreed. Zimmer's lifts of Wagner's RING cycle music is pretty obvious and not neary as deftly scored. Although it's not fair to compare any film composer to Wagner who revolutionised Western music. I've been listening to LAST SAMURAI some more and the quieter moments such as "A Hard Teacher" aren't too bad. I can see them working in the context of the film which is really all Zimmer's job was. Whether it's great music outside the film is something else. I'll be doing a follow-up review of the score tomorrow since I'm seeing a sneak preview of the film tomorrow night. I guess I shouldn't have been dumb enough to watch Akira Kurosawa's RAN the other week in anticipation of LAST SAMURAI. Zimmer's music will NEVER match the truly amazing score of Toru Takemitsu. His string elegy functions like a Mahler funeral durge during the seige on the fortress and is so haunting. Even as Takemitsu pieces go, RAN is one of his crowning achievements in composition. One thing that is found in almost all oriental music is the prominance of silence. There are wide open spaces that occur in this style of music that allows silence to function as a musical extension. Even look at Seven Samurai. The main theme which is boisterous and fairly western is played by a small ensemble (trumpets and trombones in unison, along with a few woodwinds). There has always been a certain economy to Japanese and Chinese music. It's much more linear and certainly less convoluted than Western music without being static. It's a balance that I don't think most Occidental composer's get. Goldenthal got it for Golden Gate though. Fire Water Paper too. Mychael Danna has also been very senstive to other ethnic musics. His score for ICE STORM is absolutely beautiful. In light of Danna's replacement on THE HULK, it would have been great to hear what he would have composed for LAST SAMURAI. I know he would have been better able to underscore the meditative moments with more delicacy and even could have had a more appropriate sound for the battle scenes (which I still believe are awfully written cues by Zimmer). We will never know though...sigh.

I agree. I don't have anything against Zimmer as a person or composer...well maybe a little of the latter. But I know he can score films reasonably well (Rain Main, Gladiator, Thin Red Line). I don't know what went wrong with Last Samurai. As I detailed, it very well may have been Zwick. Although listen to Horner's scores for Zwick films. They're pretty darn great. No, I just think this project was a little over Zimmer's compositional head. Or he had very little time to write the score and went into auto-pilot mode. That would account for his regression towards an older style. I'm still looking forward to seeing the film. It could very well change my low opinions of the music. I hope it does. But listening to the music of Michael Giacchino all week prior to getting Last Samurai was a bad idea. He's a much better melodicist than Zimmer IMHO. Cannot wait until his SWON CD comes out. I love "THe Siamese Coast" track. Now THAT would sound great under Last Samurai....

Hmmm. Seeing that I am not a huge Zimmer fan, his latest epic was always going to be a hard sell. Don't get me wrong, I think Zimmer has proven to be a very good film composer. Just look at The Thin Red Line. I still enjoy listening to that score. Something in that film enabled Zimmer to capture a meditative, metaphoric mood in the music. There is a stillness, a long flow to Thin Red Line that seems almost unmoving; but it somehow still captivates upon repeated listenings. No this isn't a review of Thin Red Line. I just wanted to set the tone...before I completely rail against it in my assessment of Zimmer's latest work, The Last Samurai. The first track begins quietly and does a nice job of establishing the Asiatic tone of the picture through some nice writing for ethnic instruments. Like THIN RED LINE, there is a stillness about this music that still entrances one. The problems begin when Zimmer has to pump things up. This music is what I'd call vintage Zimmer. It's stylistically not too different from Backdraft or Black Rain. It's a wall of sound that almost lacks any real depth (if that's possible). The main culprit are those synthesizers that he layers under the orchestra. Zimmer wisely eschewed any overt eletronic sound for Thin Red Line preferring to keep things acoustic and natural. I dearly wish he'd done the same for Last Samurai. And he's such a slave to sequencers that you can literally hear when he dials up the metronome on Cubase when things get hairy on "The Way of The Sword". This is the most unnatural accelerando that I've ever heard in the history of Western music. I kid you not folks. Worse yet, I cannot fathom how this bombastic pseudo-European music will mesh with the outstanding imagery of Japanese culture that Zwick has captured. Only one of the three main themes is evocative of the Asian landscape. My main problem with the music is that there is a sameness to it. And there isn't a lot of authentic Japanese scales or rhythmic patterns implemented here. Heck, listen to Michael Giacchino's "Siamese Coast" from his "Secret Weapons Over Normany" video game score. He uses Taiko drums but mostly a Western orchestra. However, the big difference is that he uses a scale that's intrinsically associated to the Japanese culture (tonic, min. 2nd, perfect 4th, perfect5, min 6th, octave). And the rhythmic figures played by the Taiko drums are more suited to that instrument (strong accent on downbeat in a higher pitched part of the drum while eight 16th notes play alternating figures around the basic pattern). For all Zimmer's talk about utilizing the Taiko drums for Last Samurai, they might as well be timpani insofar as the style of drumming that they are approached with. I wish Zimmer had listened to some traditional Taiko drumming or heck, Jerry Goldsmith's TORA TORA TORA for the next best thing (the critic who said the music to Last Samurai is more authentic than MULAN is plain wrong- I'll take Goldsmith's idea of Asian music any day over Zimmer). Even the beautiful quiet music I enjoy from "A Way of Life" the soundtrack's title track gets trivialized when Zimmer repeats this tone without providing any textural variation. Goldenthal's GOLDEN GATE was a magnicifant example of how mixing Asian music with New Age can work. And he used electronics too! But he balanced them very carefully with the orchestra and, once again, used a scale comprised of intervals that are found in that culture. And that story was also about a Westerner amidst a Chinese setting. Finally, when asked what he thought of Tan Dun's Crouching Tiger Hidden Dragon score, Zimmer said "it's good, not great". I guess it was good enough to borrow from for his third theme, the most Japanese sounding of the three. There is the same thematic arc over the same chord progression (I-bVI chord). He even uses solo cello in one instance. I was cynical when I first heard the news that ZImmer was scoring Last Samurai. Then I calmed down, listened to THIN RED LINE and got encouraged by that senstive and sublime approach he took toward that. Last Samurai doesn't at all live up to that standard. It is a regression backwards in time to the Hans Zimmer of the early '90's. I truly hoped that Zimmer had expanded and grown as a composer after The Thin Red Line. And for that score, he did. I'll give credit where credit is due. But I wouldn't even say that Last Samurai is as varied or deep as his score to Gladiator. Now lets just step aside a moment and take another film score that was written for a disillusioned Civil War hero who finds himself immersed in a foriegn culture: Dances with Wolves. John Barry approached his score to the film preferring to keep the music mostly Westernized (no pun intended). But first he had a dozen themes that were clearly different from each other while still having a fundamental continuity between them (the Love Theme and Two Socks both have octave leaps to begin with). And Barry's romantic style really gelled with the visuals from the film. It didn't hurt that his scoring tendencies have always leaned toward the broad and epic in his orchestration (lots of unison horns). The difference was Dances With Wolves was all acoustic. All of the textural effects were achieved through a variety of articulations and playing techniques on regular orchestral instruments. And when he wanted to evoke the sound of Native Americans, he had flutes flutter-tonging or the percussion section playing eratic, rhythmically staggered figures on large drums, the same he used for KING KONG incidently, just different rhythmic patterns since he didn't have that "one size fits all" mentality. What's truly upsetting is that Zimmer had an even broader textural canvas to paint on but resorted to paint-by-numbers when it came to the application of the instrumentation for Last Samurai. I cannot fathom as to what Zwick was going for where the score was concerned. After working with James Horner, who admittedly steals everything that's not nailed down, one would think he'd have a desire to keep the music acoustic and natural. From everythin I've read about themaking of Last Samurai, great lengths were taken to make the film as authentic as possible. I don't understand whether the score is merely Zimmer's inability or limitations as a composer to broaden his stylistic palette or whether this is yet again another case where someone who really understands very little about music had control of the ship and drove it into the perverbial iceberg. Either way, my enthusiasm for seeing this film has been tainted by an effort that I would call completly average, predictable, and as culturally rich as one of Zamfir's albums. I really hope the film improves upon my appreciation for the music. It certainly has its work cut out for it.

You're absolutely right Rogue Leader. I actually haven't heard anything from Giacchino that I didn't like. That's rare considering the amount of music he's provideed between ALIAS and his MOH video games. I wish more people would have faith Giacchino's abilities. Oh well. It will be neat to see how his career developes after scoring THE INCREDIBLES.

Um, folks, Giacchino has been scoring ALIAS for the past 3 seasons and has scored small films before. The guy knows what he's doing. and if you've heard his stuff from ALias, you'd realize that he's got a helluva lot more range than you're giving him credit for. I find his music inifinitely more interesting (and better written) than many of the newer "A-List" composers getting major scoring assignments these days.

The ALIAS article in Keyboard magazine back in July 2002 is quite extensive on Giacchino's compositional process and all that. In it he reveals that he's always composed one line at a time even if he was playing the lines into a sequencer. This accounts for why his music sounds more contrapuntal than most guys (aka Media Ventures) who use synths. I agree that SIAMESE COAST is a kick ass track. It reminds me a bit of Goldsmith's TORA TORA TORA. Really nice Asian flavor. I'm glad I checked out his video game examples because they are stunning! I mean, how many composers can write music that is as emotive as "Armen" for a video game? I agree that Giacchino is the shining hope for the future of film scoring.

I'm really surprised by the lack of faith in Giacchino. I guess not too many people have heard his stellar work on ALIAS week to week. This guys has been producing some truly excellent music week after week for that show and has elevated it by doing so. To be honest, I was never interested in the premise of that show but my girlfriend, an avid fan, made me watch it. What really impressed me was the music by this Giacchino character. I bought a lengthy KEYBOARD magazine article on the making of the music for that show and was even more impressed. Anyone who has any doubts about Giacchino's abilities should visit his website http://www.michaelgiacchino.com/alias.html and listen to some of the examples. This is quality stuff! And there's a stylistic breadth to his stuff that I've yet to hear from some of the other movie composers in the same age category. I'm really excited about this.