Film music theory & 'tricks' resource? (for the composers of the forum)

[thared33 0]

Forgive me if this is the wrong forum.

I'm a songwriter and I'm fascinated by film scores. Pop music isn't too terribly difficult to analyze - it's usually a couple of borrowed chords and some secondary dominants and so on at its most complex. However, at times, film music seems to be all over the place and disregards traditional theory a bit, For example, sometimes a chord of the same quality is taken and moved around, producing a more of a modulating type sound, but it's still coherent and sounds semi-functional.

'Tricks' like that are what I'm after. The only place I've found to learn that kind of thing is by actually studying film scores to see what other 'tricks' composers have come up with.

Is there some kind of resource for this besides film scores themselves, like books? I haven't found anything.

[tannhauser 101]

Traditional film music composition techniques are to be found in the whole history of "classical" music so to speak. Study Beethoven, Brahms, Wagner, Strauss, Elgar, Shostakovich, Prokofiev, Stravinsky, rimsky korsakov, korngold, Herman, Williams, to name but a few. It's a natural progression.

[Ludwig 1,120]

Is there some kind of resource for this besides film scores themselves, like books? I haven't found anything.

There really isn't anything like this. You can find bits and pieces of analyses, but they're scattered among different books and are not at all complete. The Film Score Guides by Scarecrow Press, which take a single score (or scores for a film series) always end with an analysis, but they're not always theoretical in their approach.

To me, what's unique about film music is its highly eclectic nature, that different kinds of "tricks" or idioms are often skillfully blended together from different styles - late Romantic, modernist, jazz, pop, rock, folk, you name it. Williams is great for studying these idioms because he is truly a master of them all.

[karelm 2,913]

One thing to add to what others have already said...take traditional orchestration and voice leading techniques as your starting point and then break those techniques for functional purposes as needed. Basically, you need to understand the rules to break them effectively rather than through ignorance. You wouldn't be wrong to follow traditional orchestration technique while film scoring. What I mean by this is an understanding of what role each orchestral performer plays in the final music is really based on traditional orchestration...why you generally wouldn't use a shrieking piccolo line for a love scene, or ominous trombones for a quirky, light scene., etc.

There are practical differences between traditional and film performances and orchestration though - for example, in concert halls, players might play to project their tone through out the hall. In films, they play into a mic that might be only a few feet away so how and where they place the sound might differ somewhat.

I'm curious, why you say film music disregards traditional theory? Do you have specific examples? I believe when film music blindly disregards traditional theory, it is at its worst. But yet, solid composers still disregard theory as demonstrated by their mastery of it (Goldsmith, Williams, Herrmann, etc.). I believe the great film composers think in concert terms - that is why their music still sounds great in a concert hall...it works because the techniques are proven and well learned by these composers. Examples of what to avoid - drones; excessive electronic manipulation (adding a low sine wave frequency below strings to make them sound unnaturally deep), fake percussion, etc., - these bypass traditional orchestration technique but might still work dramatically.

Check out Karlin/Wright's book "On the Track". It covers the history and general technique quite well.

[Uni 306]

Forgive me if this is the wrong forum.

It's not!

'Tricks' like that are what I'm after. The only place I've found to learn that kind of thing is by actually studying film scores to see what other 'tricks' composers have come up with.

You're on the right track. There really is no "book" that explains these techniques; they evolve when composers, in need of an appropriate sound, pull well-practiced approaches off the shelf and combine them with odd ideas and creative epiphanies. So the best place to learn about how they do this is where they've already done it—within the scores themselves (both the recordings and the sheet music).

I'm curious, why you say film music disregards traditional theory?

Just a guess—our guest will have to confirm or deny it—but I think he may be referring to composers who work outside the traditional "box" to create their musical effects. Williams' affinity for broadly chromatic and aleatory techniques, or Goldsmith's atonal and percussive creativity in scores like Planet of the Apes, would probably be good examples of this.These don't "disregard" traditional theory per se, but they're not always classical approaches, either.

Check out Karlin/Wright's book "On the Track". It covers the history and general technique quite well.

Definitely. No one who's interested in what goes on in the creation of film music—whether they're interested in composing or not—should own and read this book.

- Uni

[gkgyver 1,645]

Great thread idea! Keep it coming please!

[thared33 0]

A good example is Gustav Holst's The Planets, like the Neptune piece. In certain film music scores, it seems like they disregard the traditional rules of harmony and chord progressions. An example can be moving a chord of the same quality up or down and seeing what happens (Planing I think it's called?). Another one is taking a pop chord progression, but re-harmonizing it to where the only thing that's making it coherent is its root movement. Take any pop progression and use nothing but minor or major chords on it and you'll see what I mean. It may take a little work but you'll stumble upon something great like that (I just gave one of my 'tricks' away!)

I've been reading this morning and I'm thinking what I'm after is called nonfunctional harmony, or coloristic harmony. To further expand on what I'm after, it seems like some composers have pieces that are right in between traditional harmony (the formulaic, robotic stuff) and atonal stuff. If you put yourself right in the middle of those two, I guess we could call it semi-functional harmony. That's what I'll call it since I don't know how to refer to it. But in semi-functional harmony as I'm going to call it, it kind of creates this mysterious, unresolved, alien-like beauty that you just can't get with traditional harmony so much, but it's still cohesive to your ears.

That's kinda what I mean by the 'tricks'. It's finding that middleground between functional and nonfunctional harmony that gets you color, but it still remains coherent and a little diatonic.

[Sharkissimo 1,973]

Examples of what to avoid - drones; excessive electronic manipulation (adding a low sine wave frequency below strings to make them sound unnaturally deep), fake percussion, etc.,

John Williams is guilty of most of these.

[thared33 0]

Check out Karlin/Wright's book "On the Track". It covers the history and general technique quite well.

Definitely. No one who's interested in what goes on in the creation of film music—whether they're interested in composing or not—should own and read this book.

- Uni

Did you mean 'everyone'? Does this book actually have any theory in it?

I looked on amazon at every film scoring and composition book available and it seems they're all more about the business & production side, and less about the theory or composition itself.

What I'd love to see are books that have analyses of the music itself using the jazz roman numeral analysis thing whenever applicable. Sometimes pieces are too 'out there' for any RNA though and it just isn't making any sense. That would require a text/paragraph analysis explaining what the 'trick' is (like the tricks I gave earlier).

I'd pay serious money for scores that were analyzed like that. It's a LOT of work doing it all on your own, and sometimes you're not catching the 'trick' in the end. We seriously need a book called 'The Book of Film Score Tricks'.

[karelm 2,913]

Check out Karlin/Wright's book "On the Track". It covers the history and general technique quite well.

Definitely. No one who's interested in what goes on in the creation of film music—whether they're interested in composing or not—should own and read this book.

- Uni

Did you mean 'everyone'? Does this book actually have any theory in it?

I looked on amazon at every film scoring and composition book available and it seems they're all more about the business & production side, and less about the theory or composition itself.

What I'd love to see are books that have analyses of the music itself using the jazz roman numeral analysis thing whenever applicable. Sometimes pieces are too 'out there' for any RNA though and it just isn't making any sense. That would require a text/paragraph analysis explaining what the 'trick' is (like the tricks I gave earlier).

I'd pay serious money for scores that were analyzed like that. It's a LOT of work doing it all on your own, and sometimes you're not catching the 'trick' in the end. We seriously need a book called 'The Book of Film Score Tricks'.

I still think "On the Track" might be what you're looking for. There are sections in there about using harmony for characterizations where the sheet music is explained. It also goes into the mechanics (clicks, streamers, cue sheets, etc.) but that is why it is highly regarded - it is so comprehensive. Chapter 14 deals with harmonic language contrasting modal, diatonic, and chromatic harmony with samples from Goldsmith, Horner, Rota, etc. Unfortunately, I didn't realize the cost was so high. It must be out of print but perhaps you can find a used copy.

When you said "I looked on amazon at every film scoring and composition book available and it seems they're all more about the business & production side, and less about the theory or composition itself." that is probably because the orchestration and composition for film isn't specific to film - it would be in the music section where you'll find these books on orchestration and composition. Are you looking for a lead sheet type of thing - showing the chord symbols? Also, check out Ludwig's blog: http://www.filmmusicnotes.com

[Sharkissimo 1,973]

On the Track is great and covers a very wide range, though if you're looking for a more intensive, cue-by-cue analysis then try George Burt's The Art of Film Music. This focuses on the Silver Age gang, such as North, Rosenman, Friedhofer, Raksin, and so on, so have an interest in those composers would help. A lot of those guys influenced Williams's writing - North and Rosenman in particular.

[gkgyver 1,645]

A good example is Gustav Holst's The Planets, like the Neptune piece. In certain film music scores, it seems like they disregard the traditional rules of harmony and chord progressions. An example can be moving a chord of the same quality up or down and seeing what happens (Planing I think it's called?). Another one is taking a pop chord progression, but re-harmonizing it to where the only thing that's making it coherent is its root movement. Take any pop progression and use nothing but minor or major chords on it and you'll see what I mean. It may take a little work but you'll stumble upon something great like that (I just gave one of my 'tricks' away!)

I've been reading this morning and I'm thinking what I'm after is called nonfunctional harmony, or coloristic harmony. To further expand on what I'm after, it seems like some composers have pieces that are right in between traditional harmony (the formulaic, robotic stuff) and atonal stuff. If you put yourself right in the middle of those two, I guess we could call it semi-functional harmony. That's what I'll call it since I don't know how to refer to it. But in semi-functional harmony as I'm going to call it, it kind of creates this mysterious, unresolved, alien-like beauty that you just can't get with traditional harmony so much, but it's still cohesive to your ears.

That's kinda what I mean by the 'tricks'. It's finding that middleground between functional and nonfunctional harmony that gets you color, but it still remains coherent and a little diatonic.

This extremely intriguing. Can you give a concrete example progression? I'm not that big with abstract things like that.

[Ludwig 1,120]

A good example is Gustav Holst's The Planets, like the Neptune piece. In certain film music scores, it seems like they disregard the traditional rules of harmony and chord progressions. An example can be moving a chord of the same quality up or down and seeing what happens (Planing I think it's called?). Another one is taking a pop chord progression, but re-harmonizing it to where the only thing that's making it coherent is its root movement. Take any pop progression and use nothing but minor or major chords on it and you'll see what I mean. It may take a little work but you'll stumble upon something great like that (I just gave one of my 'tricks' away!)

I've been reading this morning and I'm thinking what I'm after is called nonfunctional harmony, or coloristic harmony. To further expand on what I'm after, it seems like some composers have pieces that are right in between traditional harmony (the formulaic, robotic stuff) and atonal stuff. If you put yourself right in the middle of those two, I guess we could call it semi-functional harmony. That's what I'll call it since I don't know how to refer to it. But in semi-functional harmony as I'm going to call it, it kind of creates this mysterious, unresolved, alien-like beauty that you just can't get with traditional harmony so much, but it's still cohesive to your ears.

That's kinda what I mean by the 'tricks'. It's finding that middleground between functional and nonfunctional harmony that gets you color, but it still remains coherent and a little diatonic.

This extremely intriguing. Can you give a concrete example progression? I'm not that big with abstract things like that.

thared is right that it's called planing. It means using one type of chord in the same inversion throughout a passage. Because the voice leading remains in parallel, the technique is also called parallelism. People often cite Debussy as the first to exploit it, but it goes back further than that. Berlioz uses first-inversion major chords in the first movement of his Symphonie Fantastique (from 8:58):

Debussy was a big fan of it in root position, but Holst, like Berlioz, used a lot of it in first-inversion major chords in Mars from his Planets suite, as here (from 1:26):

And Williams uses the technique quite a bit as well - here's a form of it in root-position major chords from the mischievous "Parade of the Ewoks" (from 0:44):

[Datameister 2,042]

Yeah, Williams loooooooves harmonic planing. (The concept isn't new to me, but the term is! I like it.) You see it in his action writing, his suspense writing, his adventure writing, all over the place. He'll do it with major triads (the above ROTJ example), minor triads (the Potter "Nimbus 200" theme), quartal triads (the Raiders truck chase), you name it. Sometimes he'll mix it up with some different inversions, as in the theme from TLW. There's usually some sort of pedal tone beneath, too. Sometimes the roots of the chords move chromatically, sometimes diatonically.

I wish I had some good resources to offer for this thread, but ultimately, I think you do learn the most simply by listening to the music you like and studying what the composer did to make it sound that way.

[Ludwig 1,120]

Yeah, Williams loooooooves harmonic planing. (The concept isn't new to me, but the term is! I like it.) You see it in his action writing, his suspense writing, his adventure writing, all over the place. He'll do it with major triads (the above ROTJ example), minor triads (the Potter "Nimbus 200" theme), quartal triads (the Raiders truck chase), you name it. Sometimes he'll mix it up with some different inversions, as in the theme from TLW. There's usually some sort of pedal tone beneath, too. Sometimes the roots of the chords move chromatically, sometimes diatonically.

I wish I had some good resources to offer for this thread, but ultimately, I think you do learn the most simply by listening to the music you like and studying what the composer did to make it sound that way.

Agreed. And with Williams, I think your idea of "mixing it up" is crucial. Even in the Ewok's march above, it begins with the major-chord parallelism, but then becomes diatonic, providing some variation. Williams rarely keeps a single pattern going for long before varying it in some way. I imagine it derives not only from his creative personality but also from his training as a jazz pianist, where the modus operandi is to take a theme and endlessly vary it.

The pedal point is also exceedingly important. In countless Williams passages, it gives the music a tonal grounding (essentially an extended tonic function) while the parts above can do non-functional things like parallelism - and it doesn't have to be in full chords either. In Lincoln (as just one example), there are points where he uses open fifths over a pedal, like here at 0:29:

[Datameister 2,042]

Very good point about Williams just generally avoiding the extended use of any one "formula" or approach. There are cases where he'll use, say, a repetitive motif or drum groove, but typically, the accompanying material will be less monotonous. Some of the action music in TLW comes to mind.

[crocodile 8,008]

Is there any good music theory websites that you'd recommend to visit for reference? I can read notes (it might take me longer to figure out, but still), attended music theory, piano, flute and choir lessons when I was younger, so basics are generally there. But I could use some boost in that area - especially with all terms and techniques composers tend to use.

Books would be cool, too.

Karol

[Ludwig 1,120]

Is there any good music theory websites that you'd recommend to visit for reference? I can read notes (it might take me longer to figure out, but still), attended music theory, piano, flute and choir lessons when I was younger, so basics are generally there. But I could use some boost in that area - especially with all terms and techniques composers tend to use.

Books would be cool, too.

Karol

Two sites that are good for solidifying basics like identifying intervals, and chords, and developing ear recognition of these, are teoria.com and musictheory.net.

But it sounds more like what you're after is something describing how harmony works. For tonal harmony, I'd go with Steve Laitz, The Complete Musician, 3rd ed, or Miguel Roig-Francoli, Harmony in Context, 2nd ed. And if you're after atonal music at all, Joseph Straus' Introduction to Post-Tonal Theory, 3rd ed, is the one I'd recommend. None of these are cheap because they're used as university textbooks, but they're the best books out there IMO.

[crocodile 8,008]

I can at least take a look and decide whether those are too difficult for me or not.

It's mostly to describe music accurately. We, half-literate people, might confuse terms etc.

Thank you and keep up the good work on your site!

Karol

[tedfud 38]

For tonal harmony, I'd go with Steve Laitz, The Complete Musician, 3rd ed, or Miguel Roig-Francoli, Harmony in Context, 2nd ed

your library is on fire...and you can only keep one of these books.....?

t

[Dixon Hill 4,234]

Forgive me if this is the wrong forum.

I'm a songwriter and I'm fascinated by film scores. Pop music isn't too terribly difficult to analyze - it's usually a couple of borrowed chords and some secondary dominants and so on at its most complex. However, at times, film music seems to be all over the place and disregards traditional theory a bit, For example, sometimes a chord of the same quality is taken and moved around, producing a more of a modulating type sound, but it's still coherent and sounds semi-functional.

'Tricks' like that are what I'm after. The only place I've found to learn that kind of thing is by actually studying film scores to see what other 'tricks' composers have come up with.

Is there some kind of resource for this besides film scores themselves, like books? I haven't found anything.

Simple. Study anything and everything that's been done, and absorb all the possibilities. Then learn how to not be ruled by any of that, but merely informed by it, informed to imagine and create to fit whatever your own musical needs are.

You don't want to plow through every technique under the sun when figuring out how to start a piece or what to do next. Just imagine it. Keep composing a creative act, not one ruled by theory. You have to approach it like a young kid approaches drawing, only driven by imagination. But make sure your imagination is an informed and fluent one.