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105 Cards in this Set
- Front
- Back
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Max Steiner
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-Major pioneer of original music for films
-The first serious composer of the sound era. -Called the father of film music. -One of the first to use the click track method (The Informer, 1935) -Very prolific composer, over 300 scores to his credit. -He believed in catching almost everything, he “mickey- moused the action.” |
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King Kong
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-This score by Steiner is deemed film music’s greatest achievement in the early 1930’s.
-This was one of the first times a Hollywood composer received on-screen credit as film composer. -He wrote a descending three-note leitmotif for Kong. |
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Franz Waxman
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-Most prominent German musician to contribute to film scoring in Hollywood.
-He became the head of music at Universal Studios. -He moved to Warner Bros. with Korngold and Steiner. -He placed great emphasis on orchestral color. He chose instruments to create the sounds that would match the style of the scene. |
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The Bride of Frankenstein
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-Established a new standard in the music of horror films.
-This was the most significant score Waxman composed while at Universal. -This utilized the leitmotif technique for the monster and his bride. |
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Alfred Newman
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-One of the most powerful and influential musicians in the history of Hollywood music.
-He was a composer, conductor, and an executive. -He wrote the 20th century Fox music logo in 1935. -He ruled the 20th century Fox music department from 1939 to 1960 with firm control and great authority. -He was nominated 45 times for an Oscar. (He won 9). -He composed 255 scores. *He created the “fox string sound”…strings playing in their highest register. *He liked fast vibratos. *His forte was writing religious-oriented scores. *His favorite score was The Song of Bernadette (1943). *His score for Wuthering Heights was instrumental in making this film a masterpiece of romantic filmmaking. |
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Wuthering Heights
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-The score is built around Cathy’s theme that appears many times throughout the movie.
-Newman considers this to be among his top three best scores. |
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Gone With The Wind
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-The bulk of the film score was based on American folk songs such as Civil War and Southern songs popular back then.
-Steiner used 5 orchestrators on this score and completed it in about four-week’s time, getting only about 15 hours of sleep the entire time! -There were 11 principal themes, the most famous being the “Tara” theme. -Selznick hired two additional film composers as a “back up”(Franz Waxman and Herbert Stothart) in case Steiner couldn’t meet the deadline. |
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Wizard of Oz
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-Herbert Stothart’s score won the Oscar in 1939, a very competitive year.
-MGM executives originally wanted to delete the song “Somewhere Over the Rainbow.” This song ended up winning for best original song at the Academy Awards. |
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Suspicion
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Hitchcock movie where music by Waxman sets mood changes, creates suspense, and parallels the action.
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Miklos Rozsa
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-Great composer of concert hall works and film scoring.
-His works can be broken up into 4 creative periods: 1. Exotic, fantasy period (The Thief of Bagdad, Jungle Book, Sahara). 2. Psychological period (The Lost Weekend, Spellbound). 3. Gangster film period (Brute Force, The Killers, and Naked City). 4. Historical-Epic period (Ben-Hur, King of Kings, and El Cid). |
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"Film Noir"
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Term applied to films that contain lighting that emphasizes dark shadows and that feature an abundance of night scenes. First used by French film critics in the late 1940’s.
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Examples of Film Noir
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-The Lost Weekend
-Spellbound -The Sea Hawk |
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The Lost Weekend
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Rozsa score which uses the theremin to enhance the main character’s craving for alcohol.
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Spellbound
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Score by Rozsa that became the first score to use a theremin supported by a full orchestra within a motion picture. The theremin was used to enhance the main character’s obsession with the color white and parallel lines.
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Erich Wolfgang Korngold
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-He was a child prodigy; hailed as a second Mozart.
-He was the first composer of international reputation to accept a Hollywood contract. -He had been an internationally famous opera composer in Europe before coming to Hollywood to score films. -He composed only 18 scores which were either swashbuckling adventures or romantic dramas while working in Hollywood. -His style is that of late Romantic-period composers such as Richard Strauss. His scores started with a brass fanfare followed by a sweeping melody in the strings. |
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The Sea Hawk
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Generally regarded as Korngold’s best film score, this is an excellent example of a swashbuckling adventure. The music is “in your face” because it is loud and practically “wall-to-wall.”
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King's Row
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The main title theme is considered to be Korngold’s best-known melody from his scores, this is an excellent example of a romantic drama.
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Bernard Herrmann
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-Described as a “mastodon of divine” conceit because of his huge ego and violent temper, he started as a radio composer at CBS in New York City.
-He made a cameo appearance in “The Man Who Knew Too Much”. -He always orchestrated his own scores. -He was a master orchestrator and tone colorist. -He tried to create new colors of sound through pioneering methods of orchestration. -He revolutionized film scoring in at least two distinct ways: 1. He customized the size of the orchestra to fit the needs of the scene... 2. He used short chord cues at times instead of long melodic lines, feeling that wall-to-wall music is not always as effective. -He had a special ability for depicting the dark and sinister side of man. -He had a fondness for the ultra dark sonorities and achieved these effects by scoring for low brass, low woodwinds, and low strings. |
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Citizen Kane
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-Herrmann’s first score was revolutionary in several ways:
1. He used low-pitched instruments to represent the smell of death at the beginning of the film. (This became his trademark sound). 2. He used short musical cues to link scenes together. 3. He used music sparingly (not “wall-to-wall” music). 4. His unique approach to combining dramatic underscoring with American dance tunes was innovative. -Herrmann wrote an opera sequence that would be out of the range of the soprano singer in order to make her sound like a feeble singer. -Herrmann captured the dissolving of Kane’s first marriage during the “breakfast table scene” by writing music that became increasingly more disturbing. (Sentimental waltz evolves into icy, calculating underscore). |
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The Killers
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Rozsa’s hard-hitting gangster score whose main theme became the famous television “Dragnet” theme.
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Techniques Used by Major Studios To Compete With The Coming of Television
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-Filming movies in color
-Using several different wide-screen processes -Using 3-D effects -Cinerama, making large-scale epics |
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High Noon
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Because of the success of Dimitri Tiomkin’s main title song, “Do Not Forsake Me Oh My Darlin’,” this started a new trend in film music that was the beginning of the breakdown of the exclusive use of symphonic scores by filmmakers. This new trend gravitated more toward the use of popular songs in film scores.
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A Streetcar Named Desire
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A landmark score by Alex North using jazz in a dramatic sense.
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The Man with the Golden Arm
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A landmark score by Elmer Bernstein using jazz to create an atmosphere.
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The Man Who Knew Too Much
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Re-make of an earlier (1934) Hitchcock film of the same name. Herrmann makes a cameo appearance playing himself as a conductor leading the London Symphony Orchestra in a performance of the Storm Clouds Cantata by Arthur Benjamin. An assassin attempts to shoot his single shot to coincide with the loud cymbal crash at the end of this piece.
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The Ten Commandments
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-The score that launched Elmer Bernstein’s career. He got the job after being recommended by ailing Victor Young, the originally intended composer.
-The most prominent music theme heard throughout the film deals with deliverance out of bondage. -Bernstein had almost a year to write this score. During this time, he had to play each new musical cue for filmmaker Cecil B. DeMille for approval before proceeding. Bernstein learned from DeMille how using faster music to underscore the slow-moving Exodus scene helped to move the scene along. |
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Forbidden Planet
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The first totally all-electronic score. This score, featuring the “electronic tonalities” created by Louis and Bebe Barron, launched the era of electronic music in film.
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The Spirit of St. Louis
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-This score ranks as one of Franz Waxman’s finest musical achievements. Music is very crucial to this film because much of the story takes place in the lonely cockpit of Lindbergh’s single engine plane. Music is needed to fill the void created by the lack of dialogue.
-The main title theme is suggestive of the feeling of flight. Waxman uses musical nationalistic references to countries over which Lindbergh flies (Ireland and France). The monotonous ostinato pattern is used in a sequence to convey fatique. |
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The Bridge on the River Kwai
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The curious thing about this score is the fact that it won as the best original score for a tune that wasn’t even composed by the winning composer. This whistled tune, the “Colonel Bogey March,” became extremely popular.
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The Big Country
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One of two western prototype scores. This score was by Jerome Moross. The Blanco canyon sequence uses the ostinato pattern to build suspense. The main title sequence uses a “hoe” down-like ostinato to convey a western flavor. This score uses the pentatonic scale, syncopation, and melodies based on triads (triadic melodies).
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Vertigo
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Considered by Herrmann to be his own personal favorite score, this is a powerful score containing a main title theme that conveys the feeling of vertigo by its swirling sound created by broken diminished 7th chords moving in contrary motion. Herrmann also creates a dramatic feeling of ultimate longing by the main character by composing a sequence in the style of Richard Wagner’s “Liebestod” section from his opera, “Tristan and Isolde.”
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What Did Max Steiener Say About Richard Wagner?
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"If Richard Wagner had lived in this century, he would have been the number one film composer."
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Journey To The Center of The Earth
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In this score, he used 5 organs (one cathedral, 4 electronic) instead of strings. He also used the serpent in this score.
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North by Northwest
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Herrmann uses an exciting main title theme in the form of a fandango to provide unity throughout this movie. Herrmann waits until the last possible minute to bring in this theme during the “crop duster” sequence in order to build up unbearable suspense.
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The Nun's Story
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Franz Waxman based part of this score on Gregorian chant source material. He also utilized the modern 12-tone row technique in the insane asylum sequence. During this sequence, he has the strings playing their parts by using by using pizzicato (plucking out the notes with their fingers instead of using the bow).
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Ben-Hur
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Considered to be Rozsa’s greatest score and one of the greatest movie scores of all time, this score abounds with themes and variations. Rozsa had 18 months to work on his score. He won his third and final Oscar for this score. He had done some historical research in order to make this score more believable. He wrote about half a dozen Roman marches that have become the prototype for this genre. His music supports about 2/3rds of this 3 and 1/2 hour film. After this success, Rozsa became known as Hollywood’s foremost composer dealing with historical settings.
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Psycho
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-Herrmann’s most famous score which accompanies Hitchcock’s most famous and successful motion picture. Herrmann used an all string orchestra to give a colorless, black and white sound to the black and white film.
-The use of the string glissandos in the shower sequence have become perhaps the most often imitated film music cue in the history of cinema. Hitchcock later remarked that 33% of the success of Psycho was due to Herrmann’s score. |
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The Magnificent Seven
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Some call this score by Elmer Bernstein the quintessential western score prototype. Certainly as influential as The Big Country by Jerome Moross, the music in this film was used to give the film drive and increase the excitement.
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Aaron Copland
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American composer responsible for inspiring the "Americana Style" heard in many western scores.
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Spartacus
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North gave us a score with a cold, brutal, and barbaric quality, heavy on brass and percussion, to accompany the many scenes with the slaves and gladiators. He had a total of 13 months to work on this score.
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Mysterious Island
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This score for this famous Jules Verne story once again illustrates Herrmann’s mastery over orchestration techniques. In one scene he turns the entire orchestra into the sound of a giant buzzing machine by using various orchestration techniques.
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King of Kings
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Rozsa’s main title theme serves as the major theme heard throughout the movie. It takes the place of dialogue in some places.
Especially in the sequences where Jesus performs miracles. Rozsa also wrote his only 12 tone row sequence of his entire career to represent Satan when he tries to temp Jesus in the desert. |
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El Cid
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Rozsa’s own personal favorite of all of his 90 scores. He did historical research in Spain using Spanish folk songs of the period and dance music of 12th century Spain to give this score its Spanish flavor.
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Barabbas
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-Mario Nascimbene recorded part of his score at half the tape recorder speed for the crucifixion scene to give it its eerie-sounding quality.
-This score has been an inspiration for other composers. |
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Maurice Jarrel
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French composer who was a pioneer i using a combination of electronic instruments such as the Ondes Martenot and ethnic instruments from various countries.
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Lawrence of Arabia
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The major themes are heard in the main title sequence. One theme represents T.E.Lawrence by using a British sounding march; the other is a sweeping panoramic Arabian-sounding theme for the desert. This won Maurice Jarre his first Oscar. He used the Ondes Martenot to provide atmospheric shadings for the scenes in the desert, particularly at night.
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Doctor Zhivago
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Perhaps containing one of the most recognizable themes in cinema history, “Lara’s theme” by Maurice Jarre was on the pop charts for over two years!
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Dr. No
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This was the first of a long line of James Bond movies. There is controversy as to who wrote the now-famous James Bond theme.
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To Kill A Mockingbird
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Elmer Bernstein’s own personal favorite among his many scores, this score launched a more intimate approach to scoring films by using a smaller ensemble of players instead of the usual full orchestra. Bernstein uses the piano to represent the innocence of children.
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Cleopatra
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Considered by some to be the last of the Hollywood big epic films, primarily because this film was responsible for the financial collapse of 20th-Century Fox studios. At one time it held the record for being the most expensive movie ever made. The music of Alex North captures the essence of Cleopatra, Egypt, and ancient Rome by using some instrumental combinations known to exist back then. North even had the prop men make actual historic looking replicas of the old instruments to be photographed within the film.
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The Sound of Music
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The movie that helped to save 20th-Century Fox from financial ruin because of its phenomenal success by playing in some theaters for two straight years.
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Marnie
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This was this last score that Herrmann completed for a Hitchcock film. This score contains a terrifying leitmotif to enhance the main character’s obsession with the color red.
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The Greatest Story Ever Told
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Considered by many to be Newman’s greatest score. It also contained some music borrowed from Handel’s Messiah.
(The Hallelujah Chorus). |
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Ennio Morricone
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Extremely prolific film composer, composing more film scores than any other composer, this Italian composer got his start writing music for a group of films made in Italy known as “spaghetti Westerns.” His scores contained experimental sounds from animals and birds, and whistling and grunt noises from humans.
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Planet of the Apes
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A very experimental sounding score from Jerry Goldsmith using both conventional instruments of the orchestra in unconventional ways, and some techniques such as prepared piano, the echoplex, a bass slide whistle, and the sound of steel mixing bowls being struck by a drum mallet.
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Patton
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A very effective score that captures the essence of the main character’s personality in the main title sequence showing his belief in reincarnation, the religion of fighting wars, and the great warrior. Jerry Goldsmith once again uses the echoplex with a triplet figure in the trumpets to represent reincarnation.
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A Clockwork Orange
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The music of various classical composers is played on the synthesizer by composer Walter Carlos who is now Wendy….he had a sex change. This classical music is used to “play against the action.”
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The Godfather
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An effective score by Nino Rota that was disqualified for Academy Award consideration because parts of the score had already been used in a previous Italian movie. Rota used the sound of the mandolin to create the atmosphere of the island of Sicily and the Mafia.
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The Sting
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Marvin Hamlisch won an Academy Award for arranging the music of dead black composer Scott Joplin, who was known as the “King of Ragtime.”
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The Exorcist
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A frightening and disturbing film which played in movie theaters with its temp track material instead of the intended scores of 2 composers who were strongly considered. Bernard Herrmann turned down the assignment and Lalo Schifrin had his score rejected. The director of the film used the song “Tubular Bells” by Mike Oldfield as the main theme to represent the main character who was a demon-possessed 12-year-old girl, because it reminded him of an innocent nursery rhyme.
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American Graffiti
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An excellent example of a compilation score that used existing pop songs of the 1950s and 1960s to provide atmosphere of time and place.
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Jaws
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-This film launched the careers of Steven Spielberg and composer John Williams. Although Williams had done a couple dozen films before Jaws, this was the first time Williams had won the Academy Award for his own music.
-The now famous two-note motive for the great white shark attacks is universally famous. It helped to make moviegoers all over realize the power of a good film score. |
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Taxi Driver
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The last score completed by Herrmann. He died the night he completed the last scoring session for this film.
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The Omen
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This is the first and only Oscar for Jerry Goldsmith. Some call this the prototype for Satanic movies. His “Ave Satani” is reminiscent of Carl Orff’s “Carmina burana.” The music is used sparingly, so that it will have a more major impact upon its arrival.
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Rocky
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The main theme from this film is in the form of a fanfare and is one of the most recognizable themes taken from any film. It launched the career of composer Bill Conti.
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Star Wars
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A film score with an “old-fashioned” Korngold kind of feel. This is a landmark score by John Williams that helped to resurrect interest in the full symphonic score once again at a time when that type of score had gone out of fashion. This film score contains leitmotifs for all of the major characters except Han Solo.
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Saturday Night Fever
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This film's score launch the disco craze.
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Altered States
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An innovative avant garde score by John Corigliano that contains new sounds never heard in any film score up to that time. Corigliano employs almost every modern convention known to 20th-century composers such as multi phonics, microtones, texture music, and the like.
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Chariots of Fire
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A score by Vangelis that helped to advance the appreciation of an electronic synthesized score.
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Conan the Barbarian
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A score by Basil Poledouris that featured a large orchestra complete with 24 French horns (most orchestras use only 4) and a violently pounding percussion section. This score launched his career.
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E.T. (The Extra-Terrestial)
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This film concentrates more on human emotions and drama than many of the other films made by Spielberg during this phase of his career, therefore John Williams chose to use the leitmotif technique to manipulate our emotions.
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Poltergeist
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This is a very diverse score by Goldsmith, containing the new sounds of rub rods, the childlike lullaby for Carol Anne, as well as the sound of strings playing in an impressionistic style and the almost atonal renderings in some of the most hair-raising scenes.
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The Natural
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A score by Randy Newman that is both original in concept and sound. It has been often used as temp track music for many coming attractions.
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Witness
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An all synthesizer score by Maurice Jarre in which the electronics give us an icy cold quality used to represent the standoffish quality of the Amish people. The barn raising sequence is particularly noteworthy in his approach of using the style of a passacaglia.
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Willow
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A culturally diverse score by James Horner that combines the sounds of a typical symphony orchestra with that of a wordless choir and various ethnic instruments.
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Glory
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One of James Horner’s finest efforts. Unfortunately, the members of the motion picture academy rejected this score for consideration because it was felt that Horner’s score was too much like some of the temp track material to be considered “original”.
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Batman
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This is the dark and moody score that launched Danny Elfman as a mainstream film composer. The score was inspired by the music of Herrmann.
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The Abyss
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A score by Alan Silvestri that showcases an effective use of a wordless choir.
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Dances with Wolves
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An Academy award-winning score by John Barry that showcases his homophonic style. This is the longest score that he has written for a movie.
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Jurassic Park
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-An exciting score for a landmark special effects extravaganza
-That contains various memorable leitmotifs for different aspects and characters of the story. One unique thing was that the score was sent via satellite to Spielberg in Poland from LA because he was still over there filming Schindler’s List. This score contains many of the typical John Williams techniques such as flashy brass parts, rapid woodwind runs with the piccolo on top, cymbal crashes, and pounding support rhythms. |
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Schindler's List
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Since Williams considers the dialogue as part of the score, this musical score is near perfect in its ability to interweave within the fabric of the dialogue. He won an Academy Award for this score.
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Speed
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-This was the surprise blockbuster hit of the summer of 1994. Mark Mancina cleverly combined the sounds of metal objects being struck, along with
-Electronic synthesizer sounds and colors, and live musicians. |
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Stargate
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British composer David Arnold composed a score that pays tribute to the symphonic traditions of Star Wars and Lawrence of Arabia. Arnold had been cleaning cornflake ovens in England before being discovered. He relied on a wordless choir for added color.
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Forrest Gump
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Alan Silvestri wrote a childlike piano leitmotif to represent the childlike innocence of Forrest Gump. There are also other leitmotifs such as the running theme and Jenny’s theme.
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Twister
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A challenge for composer Mark Mancina due to the extreme loudness of the tornadoes. His orchestral/synthesizer approach with prominent pounding percussion worked.
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Independence Day
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-David Arnold gave us a score that conveys the feeling of patriotism by writing a patriotic march. He represents the aliens from space by spelling out the word “DIE” in Morse code by using African and Japanese drums.
-This score shows a lot of influence from the music of John Williams and Korngold. |
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Emma
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A landmark score because this was the first time a score written by a woman won the Academy Award. The composer was Rachel Portman from England. Her music captures the delicate and subtle qualities of insight, wit, and gentle empathy as well as the unspoken interplay between characters, the misunderstandings, the jealousies, and deceits.
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Titanic
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Horner has given us a score comprised of synthesizer, vocals, and orchestra to create a timeless quality. He uses ethnic instruments to give the score its Irish flavor. The haunting solo voice cries out over the ocean the theme of Rose. Horner wrote each theme so that they could be heard separately or together.
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The Matrix
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-A futuristic score that contains many modern compositional techniques used by concert hall composers such as texture music, minimalism, polytonality, polyrhythmic sections, and other devices of the postmodern style.
-Composed by Don Davis. |
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The Sixth Sense
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A score by James Newton Howard that concentrates on creating a scary atmosphere by using electronics, string harmonics, texture music and a wordless choir.
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End of Days
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This score by John Debney combines elements of world music, Classical music, and pop contemporary styles.
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Thomas Newman
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Son of Alfred Newman. He has been responsible for a new style of film composing that is emerging. Instead of using leitmotifs and other recognizable themes, he creates sonic shadings (atmospheres) using longs rich chord clusters and a “muted” piano.
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Hans Zimmer
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Effective German born composer who has been composing memorable scores for movies such as The Lion King and Gladiator. The amazing thing is that he does not know how to read music.
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Duduk
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An Armenian clarinet used in many recent scores such as Gladiator and the Passion of Christ, composed by John Debney.
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Fox String Sound
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-Also known as "The Newman String Sound"
-Stings playing in their highest register. |
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Theremin
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This is an early electronic instrument invented in 1920 by the Russian Lev Termen. It operates on the principal of heterodyning two radio frequency oscillators. There are two antennae; one controls the pitch, the other controls the volume of the sound. The player of the theremin moves his or her hands to and from near the antennae to change pitches and can create a vibrato by using a slight rocking of the wrist.
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Swashbuckling Adventure
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Dealing with a mighty swordsman who also happens to be a daredevil.
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Romantic Drama
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Films that dealt with melodramatic story lines complete with a variety of human emotions.
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Pentatonic Scale
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A musical scale consisting of only five notes per octave.
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Syncopation
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Occurs in music when the musical notes do not always fall "on the beat". This creates a "jazzy" bounce feeling and can create tension, suspense, or excitement.
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Triadic Melodies
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A group of three notes that outline the intervals of thirds.
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Serpent
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Instrument invented around 1590; it's a bass member of the cornett family whose shape is that of the letter "s". It's tubing was about two meters long and was played at one end with a cup mouth piece similar to that of a bass trombone.
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Pizzicato
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Plucking out of the notes with their fingers instead of using the bow.
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String Glissandos
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Used in the film "Psycho" during the shower scene. These "shrieking" sounds became one of the most often imitated musical devices used in "slasher" movies.
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Ondes Martenot
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An electronic instrument invented by Maurice Martenot in 1928. It is a keyboard instrument that is monophonic (can play only one tone at a time)
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