Úbeda 2006

[#SnowyVernalSpringsEternal 10,265]

Well I just returned from my short little trip to Spain.

After a rather disasterous start (my flight had a 5 hour delay, causing me to completely miss the first day of the Congress, and Mrs Goldsmith)

Luckily the rest of my holiday far exceeded my expectations, the beautiful weather, the beauty of Úbeda and Madrid, the unreasonable amounts of food and the Congress itself.

It's late, and I'm very tired so I'll post more about the congress and the concert tomorrow.

There is one thing I wish to share with you all though, probably the funniest thing I have seen this week.

[John Crichton 4]

LOL

Nice. And I assume that's the Grand Master's voice that can be heard in the background.

Looking forward to hearing about the trip.

[Romão 2,274]

I wish I was able to make it.

[Mr. Breathmask 555]

my flight had a 5 hour delay, causing me to completely miss the first day of the Congress, and Mrs Goldsmith

That sucks!

Hurray for geekdom everywhere! LOL

[Luke Skywalker 1,793]

LOL i hope all of you got an amazing experience

And steef you dont seem to have a funny accent...

[#SnowyVernalSpringsEternal 10,265]

I do not have any kind of accent.

It might be my good friend Rubén that you heard.

[Luke Skywalker 1,793]

I was just saying that you didnt had a funny accent...

[Trent B 337]

Delays in flights suck big time... at least though you had a fun time and returned with out an incident. Welcome back.

[Elmo Lewis 6]

I do not have any kind of accent.

Well, I beg to differ. Neil was right about your thick accent, Steef. Only he was short in his estimations.

[#SnowyVernalSpringsEternal 10,265]

You should not judge.

I was expecting to talk to an american, instead I heard the same English/Spanish that I had heard for days now.

And why didn't you talk about brewskies, and loudly proclaim America, f*ck yeah, after every sentence?

[Romão 2,274]

How was the Poledouris concert?

[#SnowyVernalSpringsEternal 10,265]

Right now I'm working on a long post about the Congress, so my opinions will be found there.

[deimos 0]

I should have been there!! banghead

[Incanus 5,713]

Hilarious! LOL

I wish I could have been there but the schedule and budget did not allow that But at least you guys had a nice time. Shame about losing that first day because of the flight delay Stefan. How many JWFan members were there in the event anyway?

[#SnowyVernalSpringsEternal 10,265]

Day 1

As I mentioned above, the whole thing got of to a bad start, I was stuck on Schiphol Airport for many many hours. Fortunatly the miracle of mobile telephone communication allowed my to keep Rubén (who some very old MB members might remember as this MB's Darth Furter) of the delays.

After finally lifting off, with the Superman Theme playing as the underscore and being able to relax a bit during the flight I arrived in Madrid and was finally able to meet my Internet friend Rubén face to face.

Time was short however if we wanted to catch the train to Linares, which led to a few nervous moments in gridlock in the taxi, and in the cue at Atocha station. (these problems seem to be unfortunatly international).

Catching the train in the nick of time, Rubén and I were able to spend the 3 hour ride getting to know each other further (furter) and naturally discuss films and soundtracks.

It was very obvious though that the first day of the Congress was lost to us, so when we arrived in Úbeda we had something to eat and retired to our (fortunatly airconditioned) rooms in the Hostel Victoria.

Day 2

Got up bright and early and we went out to discover the city.

Úbeda is a beautiful and old city situated in a breathtaking landscape.

The hot climate did not bother me nearly as much as Rubén had feared. (thanks to the greenhouse effect and the Dutch weather over the last few weeks).

The steep climbs were more of a challenge to the legs of a person who is acustomed to the flat landscapes of the Netherlands.

After a good meal (another good reason to come to Spain) in a fine restaurant we headed out to the Hospital De Santiago were the Congres was being held.

They were selling soundtrack CD's. A lot of somewhat rare titles for a reasonable price (for Dutch standards). I got Cherry 3000 and an Imax filmscore from Cliff Eidelmann.

Also got 2 geeky film music related T-Shirts.

John Ottman was having his picture taken with filmscore fans, he looked slightly uncomfortable I think, but he seemed to welcome the attention.

In the courtyard of the Hospital De Santiago they had put up a board were attendants could sigh their names and leave a little message. (presumable these writings will by now have been trown away though.

Later that day we attended 2 speeches by John Frizzell and John Debney.

Mr Frizzell was the least known of the American composers in attendence, but the work I have heard of him has never been anything less then competent. Part of Alien Ressurection are very good, Gods And Generals (unheard by me) was very well recieved I believe, and let's not forget Beavis & Butthead do America.

Frizzel talked a little about the film scoring process and illustrated his points by showing parts of one of his recent projects The Price Winner Of Defiance, Ohio.

After that he took some questions from the audience. The most memorable was the revelation that the orchestral effect of the lolly-pops rubbed against a gong that was shown in the Alien Ressurection Making Off was not actually used in the score. Frizzell also said that he scored a few episodes of Star Trek: Enterprise, but feels he could not be blamed for it's cancelation.

After a brief pauze it was Debney's turn to talk about his score for The Passion Of The Christ.

With him was American female vocalist Lisbeth Scott who would also perform at the concert.

Debney came off as a very pleasant guy, he spoke with fondness of his experiences on that film, even though it was a very difficult process for him. (at some point he was sure he was going to be removed from the project). Naturally Mel Gibson was a great guy to work with bla...bla...bla. (Debney did attempt a impersonation of Mel, which got a lot of laughs.)

Selections of the score were played to illustrate points Debney had made, I was not really familiar with the score, but hearing in played in a building that had once been a church gave it an impact.

And I liked the films central theme (the one John Debney claims God had given him....yeah....)

Among the questions asked was what Debney thought of Peter Gabriels score to The Last Temptation of Christ. (a score that apparently The Passion borrows heavily from at times)

Debney's response was that he loved it and hated it. He loved it because it was great, he hated it because Mel Gibson also thought it was great.

That day I also met Peio who had attended the first day of the Congress and learned that Poledouris considered himself a retired composer.

He also gave me a note with some words of wisdom from Ender.

Later that night Rubén and I attended the "Spanish Composers: An Audiovisual Concert" held in the Court Yard.

A lengthy, and fortunatly at times humorous tribute to Spanish film composers. I enjoyed this a lot mire then I expected, fortunatly most of the clips had English subtitles. And non-Spanish speaking attendants were given a translation of the introductions of the various Spanish composers.

I heard a lot of good or interesting music that night, ranging from fairly traditional European, to Bernard Herrmann type thriller writing, to big Hollywood style film scoring. (the Spanish animated film Puerta del Tiempo (Gate of Time) boasted an epic score with a 120 man orchestra, even though the animation was of cheap saturday morning tv quality?

A comic highlight of the night was the moment the large canvas projection screen caught the wind and promptly fell over.

Basil Poledouris attended this event as an audience member, he looked indeed a lot older then the pictures of video's I had seen of him.

After this event there was scheduled as cultural stroll through the Renaissance monuments

located in the Historic City of Úbeda and a opportunity to taste the delicious Cañas of Chocolate. But since we had already walked a lot that day, and endulged ourselved in an unreasonable helping of chocolate ice-cream we decided to retire for the night.

Part II concerning day 3 and the concert will follow ASAP.

[Luke Skywalker 1,793]

Mrs. Scott of Over some Narnia Shield lions, how fitting

[#SnowyVernalSpringsEternal 10,265]

Day 3

After even more sightseeing in the morning we attended a speech made by Robert Townson of Varese Sarabande records.

This speech was originally not part of the program, but another speech had been cancelled.

It will practically be impossible for anyone interested in American soundtracks not to own at least a few CD's with his name on it.

He produces an average of one CD a week and has done so for nearly 2 decades.

Towson spoke about how he got started in the film music bussiness with the Masters Film Music series (that released The Final Conflict and Lionheart amogst others) and that led him to his current job at Varese.

He spend most of the speech detailing his friendship with Alex North, and how that resulted into the re-recording of North's rejected score for 2001 conducted by their mutual friend Jerry Goldsmith.

He also showed the short documtary he made for the DVD of a Streetcar Named Desire, scored by North and one of the most influential scores of that time.

Robert Towson also very clearly explained that Varese Sarabande is a bussiness and to be able to keep releasing scores he sometimes has to make difficult decisions about what they can and cannot release. Some releases were not expected to recoup their costs, so some other more popular titles have to make up for it (the re-recordings of Sunset Boulevard and Last Of The Mohicans were cited as examples).

Then there were questions asked, the most interesting one was IMO about the CD Club, someone complained about the fact that the 1000 pressings seemed to sell out to fast.

Townson symphatised and suggested not going to sleep when a new batch was released.

Inside the church they were rehearsing for the concert.

They played the Patton part of The Generals suite. This was a pleasant surprise since that ment they would not be performing Goldsmith's own Movie Music Medley.

Later that day we attended a speech by French film composer Bruno Coulais. Since this was not translated in English I had to depend on Rubéns exceptional translation skills.

It was interesting, but there was not really anything noteworthy for me to report here.

So now on to the good stuff!

After that speech we discovered that the orchestra (The Andalusian Philharmonic Orchestra and Chorus) were rehearsing outside in the courtyard.

We were on the second floor and had a great view of the event.

Damon Intrabartolo conducted the Main Theme from Fantastic Four, which sounded nice, but the first part of the theme seems like sped up version of Goldsmith's Theme for Congo.

Then he conducted the tail end of the Superman suite. This was basically the finale of The Fotress Of Soltitude, the opening of the main titles end then the closing part, without actually playing the Superman theme, which was a shame.

Then Mr Poledouris stepped onto the stage and played Riders Of Doom and Atlantean Sword from Conan the Barbarian.

This was a really stunning preview of what were were gonna hear that night.

It made me wanting more!

Later we collected our concert tickets (and I collected my recording device), we were let into the courtyard and took our seats rather far from the stage and too the left.

They had hung the canvas projection screen (that had blown over earlier) out of the windows of the second floor, above the orchestra and were setting the correct aspect ratio and sharpness for the Conan DVD.

After they seats had finally all been filled this event that had brought me to this small Spanish town finally began.

John Frizzell (one of the organisers of the congress) took to the stage and announced the first guest conductor Damon Intrabartolo (he was unable to prounounce his name in one attempt) .

Damon Intrabartolo performed the Ottman part of that nights concert. But at this point a flaw in the organisation of the concert was revealed. No program booklet had been offered so the only way to know what was being performed is to have heard the CD or remember it from the film.

The first piece was a mostly piano based theme, I have no idea what it was, but it sounded nice.

The second piece was the Fantastic Four Theme, a good, if not exactly memorable piece with typical Superhero brass and percussion.

The third and final piece was the Superman Returns Suite, rather short buy also rather good, with pieces of original Ottmann composition interchanged with snippets of the original Love Theme and the Superman theme.

The ending of this piece was identical to what we had heard during the rehearsal, building towards the Superman theme without actually playing it.

After a deserved applause for Ottmann and the Conductor (who was nothing if not enthusiastic in his conducting, jumping around like a small monkey) It was John Debney's turn.

He opened with the Goldsmith part of the concert.

First piece was The Generals suite we had heard earlier, I have always loved this piece, and possibly the McArthur Theme even more then the Patton Theme, very well done.

After the WWII pomp and circumstance the second piece was the main theme from Rudy. A personal favorite of Goldsmith, and I agree with him.

Then came the third piece, my heart skipped a beat when I heard the churning low opening notes, Rubén instantly reconized it too and know what it ment to me. I had missed it in London in 2002 when I was unable to go, but then and there in a tiny village in Spain, The Enterprise had landed. For 5 minutes (since the performance seemed somewhat faster) I had the incredible experience of hearing my favorite Goldsmith piece ever, it was magical, it was fucking great!

After the thunderous applause, with my contribution not being the least, had died down John Debney introduced singer Lisbeth Scott and then started his suite for The Passion Of The Christ.

At first I had thought that was going to be a boring part of the concert, since I had sampled parts of the CD and was not really captivated.

But after Debney's fine choice of performing the Enterprise I was in a great mood.

Lisbeth Scott has a great voice and performed her solo's very well, the most impressive parts of the suite were the parts were the whole orchestra and choir opened up and performed the films theme.

The Resurrection piece with the very loud drums bouncing off the 4 walls of the courtyard were especially exciting.

Since this is an adaptation for orchestra this suite had cut out or re-arranged some of the pieces of world music with ethnic instuments that had initially turned me off.

Then followed the Intervall were Rubén made a futile attempt to get a drink and I bumped into Peio. He called Ender for me on his cellphone, so I was able to make a (somewhat) personal aquintance with yet another member.(Next time Ross, just be there, tell your boss to scr*w himself!)

I changed the 1 GB Minidisc in my player and hoped the recording would be somewhat listenable.

Everyone returned to their seat and John Debney once again came to the stage to introduce John Frizzell.

Frizzell performed his opening titles for the 4th Alien film, a bit slower then in the movie, but with the same air of creepiness.

Then unfortunatly the other pieces he played were completely unknown to me, I assume most of it was from Gods and Generals, but again I was given no booklet confirming this.

The music was pleasant and noble, but really nothing special, certainly not after 3 Goldsmith pieces, a theme composed by God himself, and Conan The Barbarian coming up next.

Nevertheless Frizell recieved a standing ovation, well deserved because I am sure he was instrumental in getting this concert to take place.

Then John Frizzell introduced that nights main attraction. The great Basil Poledouris!

The appearance of Poledouris was a treat in itself, during the day he had been dressed in regular clothes and a hat that made him look a bit like Francis Ford Coppola.

But what entered the stage now was not so much an old man but Basil "Motha-fucking" Poledouris. Clad entirely in loose black velvet like clothing and wearing a black bandana it seemed like Blackbeard the pirate had truly come amongst us.

He seemed genuinly excited to recieve the applause.

Unlike the other 3 conductors Basil Poledouris was going to conduct his suite like an actual score recording, so with the film playing on screen and wearing a headphone.

Peio mentioned to me earlier that Poledouris had never conducted a concert in front of an audience before so perhaps this was the way he was most acustomed to it.

The speakers started playing the opening narration from the original CD. (Between the time when the oceans drank Atlantis and the rise of the sons of Aryas, there was an age undreamed of...) I guess Lisbeth Scott did not have a low enough voice to pull this off.

After the voice on the CD died down the Andalusian Philharmonic Orchestra took over and with great gusto performed Prologue/Anvil Of Crom, Riddle Of Steel/Riders Of Doom and The Gift Of Fury. The scenes from this very violent part were displayed on screen. I wonder if the parent behind me regretted bringing their kids.

After recieving an applause we got a damn good performance of The Love Theme and then The Funeral Pyre. the strings were not as massive as on the CD, but that score was recorded with considerable overdubs in the string section, so that's hardly surprising.

Poledouris concluded with Battle On The Mounds part 1 and the slow music of Orphans Of Doom/ The Awakening brought the suite to a glorious end.

No less glorious was the huge standing ovation that was given to Poledouris, who seemed both pleased ans shy on stage. He left and returned to the stage twice, and since the clapping had not seased we have been deemed worthy for an encore.

It was gonna be The End Credits for the film (which is as everyone who seen the film knows is the Prologue/ Anvil of Crom all over again)

After this ended Poledouris brought his fellow performers of that night on stage and in a bug group hug they shared in the loving appreciation of the audience.

It eventually ended we made our way outside, waited for Peio, who had lended us a blanket so sooth out poor asses (the stairs were made of metal, designed by machochists.)

Also had a chance to talk to Juanki from the MB.

For some reason Peio had been unhappy with the performance of the orchestra. I had no idea why, and since I had enjoyed myself inmensly I did not really feel like arguing with him about this (we can do so now though, Peio )We managed to catch John Ottmann and eventually Poledouris leaving the building and Rubén and I said our fond farewells to Peio and Juanki and went on a quest to find some food on this late hour.

We were fortunate enough to literally bump into Robert Townson and Carol Heather Goldsmith. Rubén took the opportunity to ask a question he regretted not asking Townson at the Congress about a possible release of Spartacus.

I tried to thing of something to say, but could utter nothing but clumsy mumblings.

Eventually we found food and drink, and went to our rooms very tired, very late, but very pleased.

Day 4.

The congress still had a day to go, but unfortunatly we had to start our way back to Madrid (and Holland very early).

I spend a day in travel with Rubén, showing me around his vast and beautiful city, and had the pleasure of meeting his parents. I wished i could have stayed a bit longer, but even their attempt to pursuade me with low alcoholic drinks could not sway me. I had a flight to catch.

At Madrid airport I took my leave of Rubén, I even shed a few tears, which is very rare for me, since I do not endulge in public displays of emotion (it is not the Cosman way)

The flight home went without any problems, I arrived back to my house tired but gratified.

It had been a fantastic trip.

[Juanki 23]

But at this point a flaw in the organisation of the concert was revealed. No program booklet had been offered so the only way to know what was being performed is to have heard the CD or remember it from the film.

The first piece was a mostly piano based theme, I have no idea what it was, but it sounded nice.

It was the main titles from The Usual Suspects.

Nice reflexion from Ubeda, Stefan!

[#SnowyVernalSpringsEternal 10,265]

It was the main titles from The Usual Suspects.

Thank you.

Now all we have to find out what the Frizzell stuff is.

Nice reflexion from Ubeda, Stefan!  

Yes, I agree.

[Mr. Breathmask 555]

But at this point a flaw in the organisation of the concert was revealed. No program booklet had been offered so the only way to know what was being performed is to have heard the CD or remember it from the film.

The first piece was a mostly piano based theme, I have no idea what it was, but it sounded nice.

It was the main titles from The Usual Suspects.

I was going to suggest it might be that...

- Marc, who wishes he could have been there.

[Ollie 1,059]

Thanks Stefancos.

[#SnowyVernalSpringsEternal 10,265]

Don't mention it amigo.

[deimos 0]

Wow, it sounds great. I really regret not having been there. I just hope next year I can make it. Thanks for the posts Steef.

[filmmusic 1,823]

Does anyone know who were the final winners in the composers competition? i was among the finalists but nothing has been announced yet and i'm a little anxious!

[scissorhands 16]

DAY 1 - July 20th Thursday

After a 4 1/2 hours trip in bus (departure from Madrid), we finally arrived in Úbeda. I was suddenly impressed by the beauty of this small town.

After delivering the lugage in the hotel, I went to the reception of the Hospital de Santiago auditorium. We were given the material for attendants (including a DVD with tracks from the scores of the invited composers). We went to the chappel where... Poledouris was rehearsing in the piano with a couple of instruments! I was told that he had been there all the day working hard, and chatting with people around. One of the best things of this festival is that you could meet anytime with Poledouris or Debney or Lisbeth, and speak with them, take pictures, etc. In this one, Poledouris was speaking with Damon Intrabartolo and the guy who arranged everything for the orchestra.

There was nothing to do till 6pm, so we decided to visit the city (not big, so you don't need much time to see the most important monuments). At 6 o'clock were we in the conference room waiting for speeches on Jerry Goldsmith. It was the Jerry Goldsmith day, so we wore some Jerry Goldsmith T-shirts. They have the same front, as you can see, but for the back each of us chose one of their favorite Goldsmith works. (I'm the guy in the right... but well, you already knew it from the video above...).

First, an introduction by John Frizzell, then 2 spanish film music teachers, and then Robert Townson and Ray Costa. That was the beginning of this II Film Music Conference. It was pretty interesting, and Carol Heather Goldsmith was listening carefully to the last ones. Later did we (me and some friends from the mundbso.com forum -a spanish film music website-) manage to give Carol Goldsmith some presents (a typical plate and one of our T-shirts), she showed herself pretty surprised and grateful for it, so she decided to take a picture with us (she liked specially my T-shirt, "The Agony and the Ecstasy"). I wonder how old she is, but she looks insanely young...

Time for a break. We went out and had dinner, or something like that... there was not time for more, because Carol's speech would start at 22:00. She thanked all of us for coming and showing our admiration to Jerry. She could speak some basic spanish, but everything was translated into english When asked about the upcoming Goldsmith biography (written by one of Jerry's daughters), Carol replied:

"Un ojo, una visión, una voz. No tiene que ser necesariamente la verdad" ("One eye, one vision, one voice. It doesn't need to be the truth").

After that, the JerrySpirit awards were given to some spanish composers (sorry, konstantinos, I don't remember the names, but they were all in the hall).

End of Day 1.

[#SnowyVernalSpringsEternal 10,265]

Great pictures Peio, can't wait for the rest.

[scissorhands 16]

DAY 2 - July 21st Friday

The first half of the morning was about some spanish composers, I wasn't very interested about it, so I decided to get up later and go directly to the signing session, at 12:30pm. ALL the guests were in the Church waiting for all the fans. We were eager to get our CDs signed, and we were too many people, so only 3 CDs per composer were finally allowed. Poledouris was the busiest man around, obviously. You could see the other composers were a bit bored waiting for Poledouris to finish. I got to tell him some words (that I love his popular -not atonal or contemporary- style, and he replied me that's the only thing he can write). At the same time, Lisbeth Scott was signing my Munich CD, and Debney was doing the same with the 2 Cutthroat covers (that Romao and Miguel gave to me).

Downstairs, I could pick up the score from Conan (it was inside one box on the floor), read it and take a picture with it.

In this morning, I finally met Stefan, a really nice man. One of the greatest discoveries of the weekend

I have not much to add to what Stefan already said about the Frizzell and Debney conferences. They were very kind at all times. In the night, we were shown one video about Spanish film music composers.

I was told (the day after) that Poledouris loved the music on those videos, specially Ángel Illarramendi's (one composer I will always recommend), who is far beyond the rest in my opinion. Right after this event, we took a couple of pictures with Basil (and his partner Suni):

The guided tour was finally a waste of time, but the climate was really neat, and we finally ended up in some pubs and eating those Chocolate Biscuits (they were not drinks, Stefan not a big deal then).

End of Day 2

[Incanus 5,713]

Thank you guys for sharing your experiences with us less fortunate! Great pictures and very well written accounts of the great event.

[John Crichton 4]

Wow. Just...wow. Thanks for the reports guys. Hopefully they'll be something like this on this side of the pond sometime this century.

[scissorhands 16]

DAY 3 - July 22nd Saturday

Ray Costa, Robert Townson and spanish composers in the morning, that wasn't interesting for me, so I decided to sleep instead, I needed to recover energy for the concert in the night.

At 17:00 John Ottman was in the conference room, everything he told us was pretty obvious. I asked him one question about orchestration and orchestrators in modern film music, and he explained all the process (Damon Intrabartolo was sitting right in front of me, he was laughing all the time)

Afterwards, I met Stefan (and Rubén) once again, and we decided to take a picture for the record.

And then, the Coulais speech, very interesting (as it was quite different from the previous composers), but surprisingly enough, he didn't talk about Les Choristes, his most acclaimed work (he apparently doesn't like it too much).

And then, one of the most memorable, unique and personal experiences took place for all who left the room. They were rehearsing that night's concert in the yard!!! Very few of us stayed there watching Poledouris, Debney, Frizzell and Intrabartolo conducting the rehearsals.

Debney applauding when Poledouris was on stage, Poledouris saying "very well!!!" when Frizzell or Debney conducted their own pieces. And all that just in my back. We were around 5 or 6 fans sitting alone in front of those people. At one point, I gave the thumb up to Debney and Lisbeth, and they thanked me the same way.

You could hear their comments about the performance.

We had nothing to do until the concert at 22:00, so we had dinner and changed our clothes. The most important event of the weekend was about to start.

Once again, the honorary president of the Congress made a short introduction,

and then Damon Intrabartolo came onto stage. The Superman Returns part was the most amazing suite of this John Ottman segment (sincerely, I don't consider him a composer, but his collaborator Intrabartolo), ended by John Williams' (altered) theme.

Time for Goldsmith and The Passion of the Christ (movements 2, 7 and epilogue from the Passion of the Christ Symphony). The former was poorly performed by this orchestra, and the Passion of the Christ had a nice choir singing, in the lovely epilogue above all. I didn't know this score very well, and I was quite impressed by its quality (the epilogue) and Lisbeth Scott's voice (though she doubled/covered the chorus at times)

I felt very uncomfortable in that seat, so I decided to go upstairs and look at the concert from a more privileged place. (there was a big liberty to do that kind of things)

The 2nd half started with Frizzell's suite (a fan of Alien 4 myself, I was thrilled by that theme in the beginning), but it was only an appetizer for what was to come: Basil Poledouris and Conan. Maybe not a good performance, but the music's intrinsec quality and Poledouris' vital and human energy fulfilled all the expectations. Looking at the stars while watching Poledouris conducting for the first time Conan in concert is one of the best experiences in my life, and something I will never forget. We were all excited by this historic moment that might never be repeated.

A long and well deserved ovation in the end caused an encore, the Main Title (though Basil said "End Title", the orchestra didn't understand it, so they performed the Main Title instead).

I have so much to talk about Mr. Basil Poledouris. He felt he was an old composer from an older era (as he stated days before) . But he was wrong, he realized everyone, young and old fans, loves him. But I'll write about it in my next and last report.

End of Day 3.

[Sandor 796]

WOW! Great reports guys! Really fun reading!!

[scissorhands 16]

DAY 4 - July 23rd Sunday

The GoldSpirit Awards ceremony was going to take place at 12:00pm, but it was delayed till 12:45pm or 13:00pm, can't remember exactly. It was too long, to be honest, but it had some wonderful highlights I would like to remark: the announcement that John Debney will be the next honorary president of the Congress (Úbeda 2007), he already has some composers in mind to take them to Spain; John Frizzell and Debney thanking Basil Poledouris for his music and showing their admiration for his humanity. Poledouris couldn't restrain his emotion when he went on to stage, and started to cry. He had a surgery 2 weeks back, and he was still recovering from it. He was adviced not to come to Úbeda, still he decided to go to the Conference! Courageous man, full of energy and vitality, Poledouris was very moved when he thanked Debney and the attendants for everything.

Continuing the ceremony, John Williams (who wasn't present ) got half of the awards for best score, theme, horror theme... of 2005. "Goblet of Fire" achieved the GoldSpirit award for best fantasy score, and in the video, Patrick Doyle said he couldn't come to the Conference this time, but HE WILL TRY TO BE THERE NEXT YEAR!

This event ended with a "Les Choristes" concert by a boychoir from Úbeda. The sang terribly bad, but Bruno Coulais thanked for their effort in the end.

After a lunch with the composers in the Hotel City of Úbeda (I didn't want to spend 20 euros for it, so I had an alternative plan), the final speeches of the Conference were about to happen. John Debney, John Frizzell and Basil Poledouris, the 3 men all alone making questions to each other. Debney said he got to convince Frizzell and Poledouris to come back next year! It was a short but remarkable conversation.

And then, the most personal moment of all these days: Poledouris' conference. While we were entering the hall, Poledouris started to play the Conan them on the piano. He was very relaxed (and a bit tired after the busy weekend) talking to us about the creation process of Conan (we got to know he had 12 months to complete it, he spent two or three weeks in Almería, Spain, at that time, etc.), and other works like Conan the Destroyer (only 9 days to write it!!! so he wasn't very proud of it, in fact, he wishes it was never made). He played some themes for us (improvisation, more than exact playing: he had to remember those themes he composed some decades ago). He showed he was a great pianist (at least in the past). Of course, we had to ask him why he doesn't write anymore: he said that he has moved (he and his studio) from L.A. to an island in Seattle, where he spends most of the time, and he doesn't feel like composing for films anymore, unless it's something big. He will focus on concert stage and other medias from this moment on, and there is some project about a Conan ballet, with the involvement of John Milius.

In the end, we could deliver him another plate to him.

And this is the end of my report. They have been some of the best days in my life. Apart from meeting Poledouris (one of my biggest heroes) and other composers, I made some good friends, I enjoyed every moment of those intense days, and I wish next year's event is as good as this one. Everyone should have the oportunity to experience something like this.

[Mr. Breathmask 555]

I'm going to start saving up money for next year...

[#SnowyVernalSpringsEternal 10,265]

Afterwards, I met Stefan (and Rubén) once again, and we decided to take a picture for the record.

Why do I look like a dwarf in that picture?

(BTW, i'd be very gratefull if you could PM or email me the larger version of that picture)

[#SnowyVernalSpringsEternal 10,265]

A long and well deserved ovation in the end caused an encore, the Main Title (though Basil said "End Title", the orchestra didn't understand it, so they performed the Main Title instead).

A minor correction.

The End Title to Conan The Barbarian is the Main Title.

They just tracked it into the End Credits.

So Mr. Poledouris' comments constituted...a joke.

It was also interesting to read that he wrote the Conan The Destoyer score in only 9 days.

It explains why he re-used so much material.

It's no were the classic that The Barbarian is, but considering how much time he had, I'm surprised it came out as good as it did. Crystal Palace especially is a very strong track.

[Red 75]

It's no were  

You mean "where".

[AI 0]

Am I the only one who thinks that Lisbeth Scott chick has a nice back?

I know you are reading this Lisbeth, how about a date?

[Ollie 1,059]

Am I the only one who thinks that Lisbeth Scott chick has a nice back?  

I know you are reading this Lisbeth, how about a date?  

That's not one of the body parts I look for but I guess you could say yes.

[scissorhands 16]

[#SnowyVernalSpringsEternal 10,265]

Damn that's cool, I still hate myself of not having a camera handy during those rehearsals.

[scissorhands 16]

Poledouris conference

and

[#SnowyVernalSpringsEternal 10,265]

Wow Peio that's really cool.

Hard to imagine Poledouris had a brian tumor removed just weeks earlier.

I guess his operation explains why he was wearing headphones (he was probably conducting to the original soundtrack, or the DVD's audio track) because he didn't have enough time to prepare.

The screen was probably put up as a way to make it look nicer (since it served no real purpose).