pixie_twinkle

Thankyou nja! My brain was beginning to hurt trying to make sense of this post!

I can imagine you mean it's a bit too big for a romantic comedy, is that what you mean? But I think it's very romantic with all those strings and the oboe counterpoint. The style is somewhat like a fusion between Rachmaninoff and Gershwin which I think is very cool. Nope, I think it's small. But it's creepy. Morlock has a point. Since William Friedkin used sections of Mike Oldfield's Tubular Bells to underscore certain moments of The Exorcist back in 1973, piano (or synth) ostinati have become almost synonymous with horror films. Check out the Omen (a great score, but a rip off of Stravinsky's Symphony of Psalms!), Suspiria (very effective), and anything by John Carpenter, though Halloween comes immediately to mind. Sabrina also begins with a piano ostinato. Not only that but the pitches are slightly chromatic (Do Ti Le Re La Do) owing to the inclusion of flat 6. The end result certainly could be rather chilling if it were used in a horror flick! Having said that I LOVE Sabrina. Moonlight is a great song, robbed at the oscars. If they had had a small jazz combo playing it on oscar night with Sting singing, the audience would have heard the song as it was intended. I forget who actually sang it, but the arrangement was horrible. I voted Star Wars, how could I not? I would rather this poll had been to number these scores in order of preference deal. THEN we would have seen some results! Star Wars and Superman would come first of course, but the rest would have been very interesting to see. Pixie

Thanks! I hope I remembered to put my address on there!!! BTW. I just became an Uncle!

Modern Times isn't quite Chaplin at his best IMO, though it does have feature some of his greatest sequences. The factory, rollerskating blindfold etc. My all time favourite Chaplin movies are: The Kid City Lights Sunnyside Closely followed by: The Gold Rush The Circus The Immigrant Pay Day Limelight I have yet to find a decent collection of Chaplin Keystone movies though. They seriously need to be restored!!! MaestroJW, I sent you a PM re. the Chaplin CD. If you don't get it let me know on this thread.

Thanks I'd love a copy! Likewise I'd be happy to burn anything you'd like. I have pretty much anything by Williams! Even so, I'm AMAZED the Chaplin scores aren't available! Does anyone know the story behind the song Smile? I know the theme originally appeared in Modern Times, at the end of which Chaplin tells the Gamin to smile (in a beautifully mimed sequence that brings a smile and, perhaps, a tear). Were the words to the song already written by this stage I wonder?

Loggin' In sounds like an album by The Folksmen! (Pickin', Wishin' etc...) Thanks Morn, I'll try that.

As an enormous admirer or Chaplin's films I have often wondered if there exist any CDs of his film scores. Does anyone here know of any? I'm especially interested in finding scores for The Kid, City Lights, Modern Times, and his earlier First National films. Carl Davis recently re-recorded the score for City Lights for a restored theatrical release of the film but I don't think it's available on CD except for a 4 minute cut on the Cinema Century 3-disc set of 10 years ago.

For some reason I have to log in every 5 minutes or so at this site. Also, If I check the "automatically log me in" box it makes no difference. Anyone have any suggestions? For instance: After logging in and typing the above message, I then had to log in AGAIN before submitting it, which meant re-typing the message!!!!

Where's The Godfather? Surely the most revered saga in cinema history!

I went for family theme. Am I right in thinking that's the theme we hear when Harry gives Hedwig a Yuletide flight in the first movie? I hope so because that's the theme I like the best. Beautiful! I saw Johnny conduct this at the Blossom festival a few years ago.

Pee Wee's Big Adventure. Great quirky score to a great quirky film!

I don't know the exact dictionary definition off the top of my head, but the word has no negative connotations as far as music goes. Bombastic is often used as a performance indication in scores. To my mind it means "With gusto", a little oppressive perhaps. It's a great word! It can hardly be applied to any composer's entire output, however. Battle of Hoth is clearly bombastic, as indeed are many of Williams' battle cues. I wouldn't apply the word to Garrison Family Theme though .

Speaking of "borrowing" music from other pieces, check out Gorgon by Christopher Rouse. One it's an awesome piece! And two, in the 3rd section he borrows the ending from Johnny's Forest Battle. Gorgon was composed in 1984, a year after Jedi came out. Coincidence? I think not.

I went for Adventure on Earth. It's a great piece even if it is completely ripped of Hanson's "Romantic". I like what Hanson did, and I like what Johnny did. If Asteroid Field had been there I would have picked that though.

But did the book have Jenny Agutter nude?

I don't really care what they do with this film, as long as they keep all the gratuitous nudity. Yey Jenny Agutter! This was indeed an important film in my road to manhood.

BTW I just heard Boulez conducting Mahler 10 with the Cleveland Orchestra at Severance Hall, that's why I'm on a Mahler 10 kick!

What about the 10th? The Adagio is amazing! Actually the whole symphony (pieced together by Derrek Cooke) is pretty good. I had to vote for the 4th though. IMO the 4th is the most perfect. Every movement makes use of a 4-note motive, gradually evolving into the beautiful 4-note theme in the last movement, sung by a soprano. The whole symphony represents childishness, and the death of children. It's not exactly a laugh a minute, but it's beautiful! The second subject of the 3rd movement? Aaah! Tearjerker!

Oh yes. I'm disappointed Danny Elfman didn't win this year. Has he ever won? Big Fish was easily the best score of the bunch this year IMO.

Ok, I give up. What is AGAIG?

I believe it was a hurdy-gurdy.

In the movie the music cuts to Nessun Dorma from Puccini's Turandot. It was a great mistake. First of all not only do we miss out on one of Johnny's most lovely tunes, but also a year or so after the movie came out Nessun Dorma became the official song of the football (soccer for non-Brits) World Cup. Now whenever that scene comes up in the movie, everyone watching in England thinks of football and fat tenors. Luckily we have the CD release to hear the piece as it was intended. Well, I have it anyway. Hehehe!

I have the 45rpm picture disk vinyl single of the theme from Superman. I have no idea if that's worth anything or not. I also have the CD single of the Imperial March which came out in 1997 with the special editions. I can't remember how I got that. I think it was a freebie with the Special Edition video box set.

I would recommend Sibelius over Finale any day! I worked with Finale for years and found it clunky and needlessly complicated. I picked Sibelius up within two days. It's so much easier. I still use Sibelius 1.4, I prefer to have the "properties" box hidden in the right-click of the mouse. Sibelius 2 has a tiny properties box onscreen that I think is too small to read clearly. I don't know much about Sibelius 3 yet. Hopefully they have switched back to the original properties.

I really like Heartbeeps, though I'm sorry to say that I HATE the Crimebuster music. It's horribly cheesy. I know you can argue that the whole score is cheesy, but Crimebuster just makes me cringe. Sorry Neil. :roll: I love the first two tracks, especially track 2, all twinkly and glittering. A sort of "Fortress of Solitude" echo, with rather less power admittedly. When I read in the CD notes that the Crimebuster theme was up there with The Imperial March (or however it was worded) I nearly fell off my chair.