James Horner's WILLOW (1988) - NEW! 2022 2-CD Intrada Records

[mstrox 6,651]

Wasn’t the whole story of the Willow release that the source for this was some ancient long-album program that was prepared by Horner?  It so, it seems unlikely that there is any dialogue bleed-through.  Nonetheless, I cranked it up and definitely hear something going on too.

[Luke Skywalker 1,795]

yeah maybe is talk in the recording booth or something.

[Trope 527]

40 minutes ago, mstrox said:

Wasn’t the whole story of the Willow release that the source for this was some ancient long-album program that was prepared by Horner?  It so, it seems unlikely that there is any dialogue bleed-through.  Nonetheless, I cranked it up and definitely hear something going on too.

I thought I heard that before as well, but I can't find an official statement about it. The CD booklet states, "This release was mastered from the original stereo session mixes made by Shawn Murphy at Abbey Road and Air Studios in London." The Intrada website says it was "mastered from the original digital stereo mixes made by Shawn Murphy at the scoring sessions and beautifully preserved by engineer Simon Rhodes."

 

Regardless, I'm convinced it is some kind of speech that can be heard, particularly in the left channel. It sounds too high-pitched to be regular recording booth chatter. From what I can make out, it sounds like it could be dialogue from the Brownies in this scene (this is where the music plays): 

 

I wonder if the dialogue track was playing back in the recording booth and it was loud enough that the mics picked it up towards the quiet end of the cue. Pure speculation on my part.

 

[Brónach 1,302]

great film scores should all be rerecorded for the fun of it

[crumbs 14,317]

Could it be the dialogue playing loudly through Horner's headphones, caught on a studio microphone?

 

He conducted this score, right?

[Trope 527]

5 minutes ago, crumbs said:

He conducted this score, right?

Correct! So your headphone dialogue leak theory is also feasible.

[Holko 9,529]

40 minutes ago, Trope said:

I thought I heard that before as well, but I can't find an official statement about it. The CD booklet states, "This release was mastered from the original stereo session mixes made by Shawn Murphy at Abbey Road and Air Studios in London." The Intrada website says it was "mastered from the original digital stereo mixes made by Shawn Murphy at the scoring sessions and beautifully preserved by engineer Simon Rhodes."

That comes from this audio interview I also only discovered today, the talk about the sources starts at 11 minutes or so:

 

[Marian Schedenig 8,202]

11 hours ago, Trope said:

Observable by spectrogram, too! I promise I'm not hearing voices that aren't there!

 

Just because you're paranoid doesn't mean they're not really after you.

[Tallguy 3,399]

Maybe it's coming through the Overton Window?

[Brónach 1,302]

2 hours ago, Trope said:

Correct! So your headphone dialogue leak theory is also feasible.

how... loud is the headphone and how sensitive the closest musician's mic is for this to happen?

[Marian Schedenig 8,202]

1 minute ago, Brónach said:

how... loud is the headphone and how sensitive the closest musician's mic is for this to happen?

 

There are scores where you can hear the click track on the official album (Last Crusade, for example). I've never quite understood how this happens, but the possible explanations I came up with over the years are the same that have been suggested above.

[mstrox 6,651]

Can you imagine trying to conduct an orchestra in time while the Brownies from Willow are shrieking at max volume in your earphones?

[Brónach 1,302]

we need to experimentally reproduce the same headphones playing really loudly this dialogue at several distances from the same mic

[Jay 37,369]

I cannot think of any reason why the conductor would need to hear film dialogue in his headphones while conducting the music.  That isn't how you record film scores.

[Smeltington 1,440]

Well, the music is composed with the dialogue in mind, so it seems possible.

[Chris Malone 49]

I helped with a recording anomaly on Willow and wasn’t privy to all the data/music.

 

Regarding conductors and dialogue, Franz Waxman’s Paramount scores often had dialogue heard during the quieter musical passages. When I investigated this further, I discovered he sometimes did listen to the dialogue through a headset when conducting. I painted it out.

 

Another example I can think of is Leith Stevens who, in at least one instance, did this too for a Paramount score so he could see how his music sit in and around the dialogue.

 

Yes, it’s probably highly unusual now to do this. But there was a time when everything ended up through a horn-loaded speaker coming from a monophonic optical track full of crackle and pop. Knowing how dialogue intelligibility was going to be maintained in concert with dramatic underscore was as important as ever.

 

Chris

[Jay 37,369]

Great information, thank you so much for that!

[Demondm810 399]

pretty wild

[Luke Skywalker 1,795]

Chris, What was the recording anomaly?

[mstrox 6,651]

Somebody accidentally recorded a Schumann symphony over all of Horner’s tapes!!!