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The Jerry Goldsmith Memorial Appreciation Thread


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Jerry Goldsmith Memorial Appreciation Quiz  

31 members have voted

  1. 1. Do you like the music of Jerry Goldsmith

  2. 2. What is your favorite Film/TV score from Jerry Goldsmith

    • Star Trek: The Motion Picture
    • Ridley Scott's Alien
    • Other(s)
    • Patton/Tora! Tora! Tora!
    • Poltergeist
    • Gremlins
  3. 3. Are you sad to see Jerry Goldsmith dead and gone, even for ten years?



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Ladies and gentlemen, young and old, this may already seem an unusual procedure for me to speak to you all before we begin this memorial/appreciation topic about even the music of a certain dead film and television music composer, but...

http://37.media.tumblr.com/3b33a2f17ecdceee35c242fee4585d98/tumblr_n77tvbia951rcktu3o1_500.jpg

I know this film and TV composer guy has been dead for a decade already but I am a great fan of this guy's scoring style.

In fact, according to TV Tropes, this guy "was a very prolific composer so awesome he even scared the hell out of his peers....He was known for his thunderous, percussive orchestrations, his love for strange musical instruments, and his inventive integration of synthesizers as the 'fifth element' of the orchestra."

And so, to commemorate the ten-year anniversary of the death and passing of this legendary film and TV maestro back in 2004, let us talk about and even appreciate the music of Jerry Goldsmith (1929-2004), especially his music for film, TV, etc.

Let the Jerry Goldsmith Memorial Appreciation begin!

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I am kinda ddivided on Jerry, some of his stuff I really, really like, some of his stuff, I find to be dull.

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ST:TMP (and V), POTA, Chinatown, Alien. Dig them all from start to finish. Also a big fan of Powder, Explorers (which I think I prefer over a certain other 80s score involving kids and aliens), and Medicine Man. Not so into his more austere, neo-classical stuff, but his themes never go out of style (the First Contact and Voyager tunes in particular are instant classics). And there are a few big ones that I appreciate but don't often go back to (The Omen, Capricorn One).

He's one of my all time favorites, but there's a lot that I haven't explored enough or at all yet, and a lot that I have yet to really warm up to.

:jerry:

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I only have about 13 of his scores. But I like what I have, especially TMP, The Omen Trilogy (especially Final Conflict), Twilight Zone and "Soarin."

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Don't vote if you only know 10 scores or so. Goldsmith's body of work is so immense i always cry a bit on the inside if people rate him by, say, FIRST CONTACT and THE OMEN while leaving out dozens of scores from his most fertile period (really 1962 - 1982) where almost every work had something unique. That it was brilliantly written seemed almost beside the point.

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Hehe... I created that page on Jerry Goldsmith on TVTropes... I even organized the awesome pages... I even wrote that quote!!! I'm undertroper and before that it was chuckster before I lost my password and had to make another account. I also helped expanded some of those composer pages.

Long live Jerry Goldsmith!!!


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I am actually very impressed with that QB VII score re-recording that came out recently. Might be one of his strongest, actually. Very different as well.

Karol

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My favorite Jerry scores are Star Trek TMP and Alien. 1979 was an awesome year for him!

After that I like Air Force One, Poltergeist, First Contact, Total Recall, Basic Instinct, Twilight Zone, and Gremlins next.

I have many, many MANY of his other scores as well, I've basically been buying all the ones the specialty labels have been putting out since 2007 or so. Many I have not yet even opened and are looking forward to discovering one day. Especially Night Crossing, which I've never heard before.

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This is the stuff that I have and like from him, Goldsmith is quite new to me compared to other composers, but my list keeps growing each month: Under Fire, The Last Run, Chinatown, Poltergeist, The Boys from Brazil, The Omen, Mulan, Rio Conchos, The Mummy, L.A. Confidential, First Knight, The Secret of NIMH, Alien, Rio Lobo.

I think there's more but that's the stuff that I can pop in at any time and enjoy till no end.

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What 1977 was to JW, 1979 was to Goldsmith. Not only did it feature TMP and Alien, it also had The Great Train Robbery, another golden score of his.

But like Williams, Goldsmith had been scoring films for ages prior to his greatest year—and I agree with pub that too much of his early and great material goes unnoticed and unappreciated. As much as I love TMP, Alien, Poltergeist, and the like, I also have a great love for A Patch of Blue, Lillies of the Field, In Harm's Way, Freud (which got some great replay in Alien),The Sand Pebbles, The Blue Max, Papillon, and so on. I aimed to become a JW completist some years ago, and have pretty much reached the limit on that goal; I've since decided to do the same with Goldsmith, and am getting along pretty well toward accomplishing that. Frankly, I don't know that I'd spend the effort (or the money) on such an enterprise with any other composer besides these two.

Goldsmith was one of the true greats, and while JW brought big, epic scoring back to the fore in '77 with Star Wars, Goldsmith was doing what he could to keep that spirit alive during the 60s and early 70s when everyone else—including Williams—was doing light jazz rom-coms, beach party soundtracks, funkadelic/tie-dye underscoring, bizarre, avant-garde sci-fi stuff (although Jerry had a hand in that kind of thing, too), or just straight-up temp tracking. Goldsmith's work during this period was a sort of bridge over all this "meh" that spanned the time between the epics of the 50s (from Steiner, Waxman, Rózsa, early Bernstein, and the like) and the resurgence of the epic scores in the late 70s and early 80s. Williams led the march during that revitalization, but it was Goldsmith who kept the door open during the "dark years," and we owe just as much to him for that as anyone else (including JW).

So yeah, I definitely honor the man and revere his work . . . enough to be a little put off by the phrasing in the poll and first post (pointing out the all-too-obvious fact that he's "dead and gone," and referring to him as "a certain dead film and television music composer." Is that really the best and most tactful way to start off a thread that's supposed to serve in memoriam. . . ?)

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I've basically been buying all the ones the specialty labels have been putting out since 2007 or so. Many I have not yet even opened and are looking forward to discovering one day. Especially Night Crossing, which I've never heard before.

15mlkdt.jpg

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In fact, according to TV Tropes, this guy "was a very prolific composer so awesome he even scared the hell out of his peers....He was known for his thunderous, percussive orchestrations, his love for strange musical instruments, and his inventive integration of synthesizers as the 'fifth element' of the orchestra."

This was something that didn't register at first. Interesting that you'd have the idea of pulling information about Goldsmith from . . . TV Tropes. I mean, he did do some television work, and he was known in that industry, but . . . I dunno. Just not where I would've gone for the info (not that there's anything wrong with it).

Incidentally, that quote about scaring his peers came from Henry Mancini in 1993, when Goldsmith was receiving the Career Achievement Award from the Society for the Preservation of Film Music. Mancini said of him, "He has instilled two things in his colleagues in this town. One thing he does, he keeps us honest. And the second one is he scares the hell out of us."

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I have a ton of CDs I haven't gotten around to listening to yet. Many I had to buy before they went OOP again.

I have plenty of time to enjoy this music.

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One of the most wonderful cues JG ever wrote was his ultimate and-all-was-well cue from Ridley Scott's LEGEND - of course almost inaudible and inexplicably cut and replaced in several key spots in the movie but its combination of ripe impressionism, kitsch and almost eerie synthesizers struck me as one of the most, if not the most inspired musical reaction to 80's fantasy movies.

And look what became of it:

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If you haven't taken the time, and you want to get a great look at Goldsmith's career, approach to music, and the impressions of others who've worked with him, you don't want to miss this:

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everyone elseincluding Williamswas doing light jazz rom-coms, beach party soundtracks, funkadelic/tie-dye underscoring, bizarre, avant-garde sci-fi stuff (although Jerry had a hand in that kind of thing, too), or just straight-up temp tracking. Goldsmith's work during this period was a sort of bridge over all this "meh"

For me, mainly for the styles I emboldened, this "meh" is my favourite period of film music. It's the one time when the avant-garde was accepted into the mainstream, sometimes hand in had with pop music. 66-76 is where it's at.

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True 'nuff. It's never been my favorite kind of music, or period of film music (hence my own personal "meh") . . . although I did put the "dark years" bit in quotes specifically because it was meant as tongue-in-cheek, not as a summary condemnation of a decade and a half of film scores—some of which, of course, were very good, or even great.

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I am actually very impressed with that QB VII score re-recording that came out recently. Might be one of his strongest, actually. Very different as well.

Haven't really found access to it yet. Surprisingly, after all the praise I've read for it over the years. Perhaps it'll still click someday.

I've basically been buying all the ones the specialty labels have been putting out since 2007 or so. Many I have not yet even opened and are looking forward to discovering one day. Especially Night Crossing, which I've never heard before.

I've also been blind buying every Goldsmith release for the past few years. I've listened to each of them at least once, but I'm sure there's a lot of stuff I don't remember at all and will rediscover someday.

Hearing Goldsmith live with the LSO for the first time in 2001 remains one of my most exceptional concert experiences.

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Yes.

Under Fire.

I don't know.

As brilliant as Goldsmith was his insane amount of output made him a hit or miss composer for me. He's by far the most expanded/reissued composer right now for the specialty labels, so every 2 weeks I feel like I'm getting a new score. In that regard, I don't really miss him. Got a ton of stuff piled up waiting to be explored. Not all of it will be great, but it's always nice to find that diamond in the rough.

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Poltergeist. One of a few scores I know every single note to.

Oh yeah? What was the note which was played half-way through "Escape Form Suburbia", then, smarty-pants?!

E-flat.

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I do too. Thinking about him the last day or two, about his scores, taking another look at that "Masters of Film Music" documentary, reflecting on all the moments he gave us . . . I haven't given much thought to how saddened I continue to be with his passing, and—in spite of all he blessed us with—how much we've missed hearing over the last ten years if he'd stayed around.

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Poltergeist. One of a few scores I know every single note to.

Oh yeah? What was the note which was played half-way through "Escape Form Suburbia", then, smarty-pants?!

E-flat.

You better be right.

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1.  Hell yes.

2.  Patton - it's in my all-time top 5.  As I think about it, Goldsmith was actually the only composer I can think of who wrote more than a handful of scores yet never produced a score I've heard I didn't like, and that's something I can't even say for John Williams (although his overall output I'd say averages out higher than Goldsmith's).  I'm sure there's probably something he wrote out there that I wouldn't like if I heard it, but I have yet to actually come across it.

3.  Ten years later, he's still quite missed.

 

On the topic of Jerry, one thing I'd love to hear would be a completely acoustic recording of Hoosiers.  Hearing it like this is so tantalizing:

 

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On the topic of Jerry, one thing I'd love to hear would be a completely acoustic recording of Hoosiers.

Oh, yeah. That would be fantastic.

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Oh hell yeah, it's LIONHEART. With the excellence of Tadlow's re-recordings nowadays, Lionheart deserves a proper re-recording.

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Well, HERE you can vote for your favourite next re-recording by Tadlow. Who can guess the winner?

That's not directly related to Tadlow, is it?

Also, one interesting thing Leigh Phillips posted in connection to this post: He claims that Goldsmith overdubbed synth brass because the original brass performance was too poor. That's something I've been speculating for years, and may have mentioned a couple of times here, but it's the first time I've ever heard anyone else comment on it. Do we have more info on that?

In any case, I've been crying for a Lionheart rerec ever since Tadlow started their Goldsmith series.

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