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Harry Potter 7CD Collection - MUSIC discussion


Jay

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I think it's very possible that the idea for the frogs came up after Williams recorded his demo, and some third party might have added the croaking sounds to the demo to be used on set. The sound people got very detailed with their score editing on this film, after all.

 

But I would love if it turned out there was Williams-written sheet music somewhere that included the frog sounds, LOL.

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Here's the thing: If the frog sounds are on the music stem that was used on that podcast, then the music team was behind it

 

If they are not, then the sound effects team was behind it

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I'm sure at the live to projection concerts, the frog sounds are part of the audio streaming playing the film's dialogue and sound effects

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14 minutes ago, Jay said:

Here's the thing: If the frog sounds are on the music stem that was used on that podcast, then the music team was behind it

 

If they are not, then the sound effects team was behind it

 

The podcast had the music stem from the film, right? So that may or may not tell us anything about the demo that would have been used on set.

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On 25/01/2022 at 7:20 AM, Jay said:

I'm sure at the live to projection concerts, the frog sounds are part of the audio streaming playing the film's dialogue and sound effects

 

http://www.artofthescore.com.au/podcast/2018/11/20/episode-23-harry-potter-and-the-prisoner-of-azkaban-part-1

 

Film version starts at 21:42. No frogs but the music mix sounds slightly different to the album version; the bassoons (which sync with the frog croaks) are more prominent.

 

There's also some additional ghostly synth in the film version of the Something Wicked Intro, but that could be spillover from the SFX track rather than an unreleased music sweetener?

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Woah those extra ghostly synths under the Something Wicked Intro are really cool.  Damn, I want WB to find all the proper elements and for MM to rebuild this score from scratch as a 3CD set!

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Also, come to think of it, I think those synths might not be part of JW's recorded cue at all. I seem to remember that cue being used in some mini-game on the DVD, without synths... Happy to check.

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Well the synths were probably a later-recorded overlay, like so many other differences in the final film mix compared to the OST/LLL mixes

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  • 1 month later...

Just enjoying HP1 again. Anyone else find it odd that The Norwegian Ridgeback and Filch's fond Remembrance are two tracks? Especially because JW cross-faded the first track with something else on the OST. I really think the two would work better together.

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I've never thought of that. Ridgeback has a good ending and Filch has a good opening. Neville Stiffens' parts, however, work a lot better in their proper places stuck to Third Floor and Fighting the Troll rather than bogging down the jump into the third act with a slowish transition IMO.

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Ah, I love Neville Stiffens as it's the film version now. The reason the ridgeback ending is jarring to me is because that's the type of ending MM tried to avoid in COS (Filch's Warning/Detention).

 

Also, I think I've just discovered something new! 4:07 in The Dark Forest, a very distorted and dark Hedwig's Theme variation in the violas!

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14 hours ago, Jay said:

I listened to the Children's Suite this week for the first time in a while and found myself enjoying it more than I was expecting to.  It's a lot of of fun!

 

I almost feel like "The Stone" (7M3 Three Note Loop) should be added to the suite, it'd fit right in!

 

Yeah, I'm not sure why Mike put 7M3 in its recorded spot, since it's completely irrelevant to the film's presentation anyway.

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And it's part of the published suite for orchestra! Which somehow also contains Nimbus 2000 and I think that's weird. But it should be in the main program (too) as it partly plays in the film.

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  • 3 weeks later...

:conf:

I did buy the very first pressing of the HP box-set which had six tracks from PoA discs that did have frequencies over 16khz missing for certain sections:

 

I would like to know, do the corrected tracks from PoA are featured in the latest pressing of the box-set, please ?

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13 minutes ago, EhTar said:

:conf:

I did buy the very first pressing of the HP box-set which had six tracks from PoA discs that did have frequencies over 16khz missing for certain sections:

 

I would like to know, do the corrected tracks from PoA are featured in the latest pressing of the box-set, please ?

 

Yes

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7 minutes ago, Holko said:

But it's all inaudible, no need to take one of the 5000 away from some hopeful fan just because of this.

Don't try to understand me, I'm a deep nerd when it's about JW work ! :P

 

6 minutes ago, Jay said:

If you sell your old one yo fund the purchase of a new one, you're not. 

That's my purpose indeed. Even if I loose some money, it's also a way to support MM and LLL.

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17 hours ago, Holko said:

But it's all inaudible, no need to take one of the 5000 away from some hopeful fan just because of this.

This is a noble principle, however this set has been released years ago so people really had the opportunity to buy it.

I would rather see the same principle implemented when it comes to concerts with only a few hundreds tickets on sale which sell out in minutes because people need to attend the same concert twice in 20 hours...

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7 minutes ago, ciarlese said:

however this set has been released years ago so people really had the opportunity to buy it.

Yes, like all the new fans who will only discover it now or in the last batch.

 

8 minutes ago, ciarlese said:

I would rather see the same principle implemented when it comes to concerts with only a few hundreds tickets on sale which sell out in minutes because people need to attend the same concert twice in 20 hours...

Now that we can really agree on...

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2 hours ago, Docteur Qui said:

Did they fix the minor editing glitch issue at the end of Saving Buckbeak/Time Past (at 9:28)?

Apparently not. Which is the real problem, not those frequencies.

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Agreed, bit disappointed that little editing glitch was never tidied up. Always distracts me listening to that track now (regardless of the LLL version or my attempt at fixing it). 

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I've finally gotten around to listening to my box and I'm loving it.

 

CoS is not my favorite of the three scores. William Ross's comments in the liner notes are enlightening, but the listening experience feels a bit like meager pickings after the feast of PS. The one knockout theme here (for me) is the Flying Car motif, which I'm still hung up on. Then again, I have to wonder how much of this opinion is biased by the general tone of the films (and the orchestration that follows).

 

I am ashamed never to have noticed that the "Hogwarts Forever" rising motif is used as a sort of response to the two statements of the Quidditch fanfare. I was humming it to myself just now before I realized that it was a familiar idea in plain sight.

 

Still working on PoA, starting (out of album order) from the additional and the source music.

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4 hours ago, j39m said:

I've finally gotten around to listening to my box and I'm loving it.

 

CoS is not my favorite of the three scores. William Ross's comments in the liner notes are enlightening, but the listening experience feels a bit like meager pickings after the feast of PS. The one knockout theme here (for me) is the Flying Car motif, which I'm still hung up on. Then again, I have to wonder how much of this opinion is biased by the general tone of the films (and the orchestration that follows).

 

I am ashamed never to have noticed that the "Hogwarts Forever" rising motif is used as a sort of response to the two statements of the Quidditch fanfare. I was humming it to myself just now before I realized that it was a familiar idea in plain sight.

 

Still working on PoA, starting (out of album order) from the additional and the source music.

Yes, the other day I was surprised to find that COS' first act is actually pretty great and has loads of thematic variations, btu then it all goes downhill between the diary and dueling the basilisk. The spider chase is good, but the rest is a drag most of the time.

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CoS is still mostly a missed opportunity for me. There's some great music in it but there's way more middling underscore than the first (much of it directly lifted from that one) and the two new themes are criminally underused. Top it off with a barely audible mix in the film and it's easily the most forgettable of the three. I'm also not at all a fan of how much the three-note loop is used when Williams wrote a perfectly good new mystery/danger theme in "The Chamber of Secrets" which is barely used. It's almost like like he wrote the concert piece after Ross finished adapting most of the score and they only had time to cram it in a couple of scenes. Or Columbus got a case of temp-track-itis.

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23 minutes ago, Docteur Qui said:

and the two new themes are criminally underused.

Dobby's used for 2 of his 3 appearances (even if a big cue's unused), Fawkes plays in wide variations every time we see Fawkes. The Spiders theme plays every time we see the spiders, Lockhart plays in almost every scored scene of his, Myrtle plays in Myrtle's scenes, what more do you want?

 

After removing some badly looped less inspired reprises and recreating the tracked cues to fill some empty segments out, I find CoS to be a highly engaging dark sequel with a lot of thematic development, punctuated well by the Chamber theme and the hidden Tertiary Danger Motif.

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When you say it like that, it makes sense, but I kind of agree with Docteur Qui. It's like with Home Alone 2, he writes brilliant new material and then goes and uses it sparingly. I mean, what kind of a stupid idea was it to cover the chamber dialogue scene in tracked material? Use the theme! It's like overusing Somewhere in my Memory when Christmas Star and Merry Christmas are just begging to be used.

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55 minutes ago, Holko said:

Dobby's used for 2 of his 3 appearances (even if a big cue's unused), Fawkes plays in wide variations every time we see Fawkes. The Spiders theme plays every time we see the spiders, Lockhart plays in almost every scored scene of his, Myrtle plays in Myrtle's scenes, what more do you want?

 

 

Maybe a major theme that appears in the movie more than a couple of times or for a few seconds? Look, I'm not complaining about the quality of Fawkes or Chamber, but given their significant concert expansions and prominent spot in the end credits you'd be forgiven for thinking they'd be featured more heavily in the movie. As I said, the Stone theme could've been replaced in every instance with the Chamber theme, and also used for scenes depicting Harry's struggles with Parselmouth etc. Fawkes' theme is basically a more whimsical friendship theme and could easily have taken the place of anything present in the uplifting or hopeful scenes. Yeah I get it's for a phoenix that only appears twice in the film, but it's a great theme and deserved better.

 

As I said, missed opportunity. Imagine if we'd only heard Hedwig's Theme in the scene with the letters arriving and then never again in the whole film.

 

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Now i'm imagining Tom Riddle exploding to the cadence of the Chamber theme, intertwined with Voldemort's theme from the first. Or the finale, featuring Fawkes' theme in its final flourish, with the phoenix gliding past the castle as the camera pans out. Belissimo! Not sure why Columbus didn't think of that. Not that I'm complaining about the finale too much, it's Williams cranked up to eleven and it works.

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On 08/04/2022 at 6:31 AM, bollemanneke said:

has loads of thematic variations,

 

This is often a positive for me but I'm not as sure in this case. Things like the "flying" theme (Hedwig B?) being used in Cakes for Crabbe and Goyle are fun to listen to, but feel a bit thematically off.

 

To be fair — I have been largely uncritical of the uncontrolled expansion of scope for Star Wars motifs, so I have no strong basis for objection here :)

 

I've finished the box and looped around for another pass at CoS. I think I will come to like it, but it may take some time and a lot more listening.

 

IMO Dueling the Basilisk was always going to be difficult. Contrast the task against the talk-heavy scene of Harry's confrontation with Quirrell or the one-two punch macabre action scenes of vs. Lupin followed by vs. Dementors.

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