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Oscar Winning ‘The Lord Of The Rings’ Howard Shore In Talks To Compose Music For Amazon Studios’ Middle Earth-Set TV Series


Edmilson

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3 minutes ago, Edmilson said:

Maybe Shore will just write some themes, with the majority of the score being handled by Bear?

 

That was my thinking, yeah.

 

But all we know is both composers are said to be involved. We don't know the capacity.

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Would be great to see Shore on board as the sole composer.

 

If Bear McReary is also involved then it could turn out like Powell/Williams' collaboration on Solo: Shore's theme(s), Bear's style. I am fine with that. But I'd prefer for this to be Shore's solo gig - and ideally in the same spirit as the Rings trilogy, and not the Hobbit trilogy.

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13 minutes ago, KK said:

Is McCreary the series composer that you were informed about Chen? Or is there another name you're still sitting on?

 

I'm not sitting on anything else. Well, at least, not in the music department. :whistle:

 

McCreary's name wasn't supposed to come-out for a couple more hours, but then this news broke out. We don't know any specifics about the capacity in which either composer is working, only that they're seemingly both attached.

 

6 minutes ago, Drawgoon said:

If Bear McReary is also involved then it could turn out like Powell/Williams' collaboration on Solo: Shore's theme(s), Bear's style

 

And some of Shore's colours, too: leitmotives tend to go with certain instrumental colours: The Shire theme with tin whistle, Master of Laketown with Clavichord, Faramir with Pan Flute, Lorien with Nay. Even in Wagner, Valhalla gets the tuben, Notung gets the trumpet, the giants get timpani, etc...

 

If Shore is sketching out themes, he should give some indication as for their "signature" instruments.

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The Shire is irrelevant to the timeframe.

 

Based on the premise as far as understand, a lot of the existing themes are perfectly applicable to the scenario: be it a lot of the Sauron and Ring material, some Orc material, certainly a great many Elven themes (especially if they decide to go with the Lorien theme for the younger Galadriel and that sort of thing).

 

I was thinking the "Second Age Gondor theme" from the alternate prologue would make for one hell of a Numenore theme; and the Power of Mordor had already been used to depict Sauron's might in the Second Age in early iterations of the prologue. Both are some of Shore's greatest material, so...

 

But maybe Shore will give Eregion a new theme? Or Gil galad? Who's to tell?

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A real stroke of genius would be to use the "Elvish Pledge" motive a lot. Its used for the reveal of the Doors of Durin to signify the alliance of Eregion and Moria, and later to parallel it with the alliance of the Elves and the Rohirrim.

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That'll take a while though. As far as I can tell, for the first couple of season we'll have Sauron mostly in disguise.

 

Not a lot of opportunities for a lot of overt "bad guy" music.

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Why get Bear McCreary (a fine composer on his own) involved when Shore is offering his services to the show? Shore has the luxury of spotting each episode, plus writing and recording without a ton of last minute changes like the Hobbit/LOTR films.

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Well we don't know in what capacity Shore will be involved. But him writing some themes which be expanded upon by McCreary (or others) sounds like the most likely scenario, a la Williams/Powell and Solo.

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12 hours ago, Kühni said:

 

 

I did my undergrad thesis on that very island. I should be booking the next flight there... :crymore: :devil: The photo below from my time there in 2006 is about 5 km to the south of where the eruption is currently taken place. Awesome videos so far.

 

Let's just hope La Palma remains stable and doesn't slide into the Atlantic Ocean, creating a huge tidal wave that will endanger the eastern seaboard of the Americas. @Jay...look out for high ground. ;)

 

Diplomarbeit La Gomera 070.jpg

It’s curious, to me, La palma always looked like the template they used to create most isla nublar maps in jurassic park merchandise in the 90s… and now “mount sibo” has erupted…

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7 hours ago, KK said:

Well we don't know in what capacity Shore will be involved. But him writing some themes which be expanded upon by McCreary (or others) sounds like the most likely scenario, a la Williams/Powell and Solo.

 

I hope it's not this arrangement - it feel that's having two implications; that the series isn't worth Shore's time for him to do the whole thing, and that McCreary doesn't get to compose his own themes.

 

Shore as primary composer with McCreary helping him out where needed would work, and indeed may be necessary if a large quantity of music is needed in a short space.

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  • 4 weeks later...
  • 2 months later...

Please let this happen. I just finished a dedicated listen through the Hobbits and we need Howard Shore to do this. There is no more important musical opportunity coming up that I can imagine, other than Williams scoring Spielberg's autobiography. Screw the Avatar sequels, this is what I'm lighting candles for.

 

 

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It does seem everything lines-up: Shore had said he's willing to return, Amazon has reportedly came in contact with him. The timing was around the beginning of post-production, with still plenty of time to conclude negotiations and for Shore to research, sketch themes (he doesn't need to wait for cut footage, he can write-off the script) and do whatever actual scoring he had committed to.

 

It is interesting how these serialized leitmotif scores are branching-out: Williams had done Adventures of Han and a theme park, Shore is appearantly doing a TV series, both with the objective of exploring new thematic material within their great construction.

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Sure.

 

We already know Amazon's show is a prequel to the films, not a re-adaptation.

 

 

So, if Moria looks the same, you'd expect its musical character to also remain similar.

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I think it's clear that Shore would care about leitmotivic continuity in new series entries than Williams ever has or would in Star Wars.  The obvious reason why is that Shore has great reverence for the works and world of Tolkien, he loves them as great works of literature and mythology.  While to Williams, Star Wars will always have the original association of being a silly Flash Gordon update for kids from Spielberg's friend George.

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I'm sure they both care.

 

The whole idea of these leitmotivic works is in providing new variations and new definitions of old themes and spinning new themes off of old ones. So they both relish in the opportunity to extend the canvas.

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