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I'll go for one. Though my personal preference would be a Humphrey Bogart double-header IN A LONELY PLACE and KNOCK ON ANY DOOR.
I was thinking maybe the best way to make Antheil saleable would be to do a compilation of his work like Charles Gerhardt did for Korngold in the 60s, creating a whole new audience for him. THE PRIDE AND THE PASSION could be the spotlight piece like THE SEA HAWK was for the Gerhardt.
p.s. Thanks for that radio link, Niall!
A George Antheil FSM Box Set compilation along the lines of the Raksin release would be a terrific and important archival project. I have long wondered if it would be possible to access the Music Division Of The Library Of Congress, in Washington, D.C. where acetates for six of his film scores are stored, and I quote;
" Transferred Material
Sound recordings of the music of George Antheil, including the unpublished acetate discs for six of his film scores transferred to Library of Congress Motion Picture, Broadcasting and Recorded Sound Division"
Now, wouldn't it be fabulous if some enterprising specialty label could do a restoration project on those, historically significant recordings!
Check out this link and just type in "George Antheil Collection" in the search box, then scroll down to "Transferred Material":
http://lcweb2.loc.gov/faid/faidquery.html
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I don't know any sales figures but I agree that Antheil is a composer who has followers in both camps, film music and concert/classical. And over the years there have been a lot of Antheil disc releases in the latter field: symphonies, chamber, ballet, etc.
It still upsets me when I remember the day that I saw Antheil's autobiography Bad Boy Of Music, in a lovely hardback edition in a sale at a bookstore here in Dublin many years ago and I didn't have the money to buy it as I was a poor mature student at the time, wah wah!
NB. Folks, check out this interesting link:
http://www.archive.org/details/Antheil
Interesting show. Thanks alot for the link.
It's the first time I've ever heard Antheil's own voice. He profoundly regrets having written the autobiography at such a relatively young age. Anyway, he suggests one should not write if one is a composer.
The music selections got a bit drowned in the program. It's almost 30 years since they aired it...
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Antheil was most definitely a "bad boy of music" in his day. His "Ballet Mechanique" created quite a stir, even inspiring a line in the play and film, AUNTIE MAME, when Mame refers to her composer friend, saying, "He has live sheep and airplane motors on the stage..."
There's even a story of a concert he gave, where he was, literally, banging away at the piano, when an audience member yelled at him. Without stopping, Antheil supposedly reached into the piano, pulled out a heavy revolver, banged it down on the top of the piano, and kept on playing. The audience reputedly became more respectful...
Obviously, Antheil came to regret his sophomoric early behavior, which haunted him the rest of his life. I love P&TP, though I'm not as well-acquainted with the rest of his music. I have a recording of "Ballet Mechanique," which I played once, just to see what it was like. And there are several other classically oriented pieces.
Interestingly, some of the cues he wrote for P&TP serve as background scoring for a TV version of the Thornton Wilder novel, "The Bridge of San Luis Rey," originally aired in 1958 on the DuPont Show of the Month. I happened to watch a tape of this at the Museum of TV and Radio, or whatever it's called now, and was intrigued by their inclusion in the score.
I wonder how many other TV scores he did.
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Posted: |
Jun 20, 2009 - 11:52 AM
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By: |
manderley
(Member)
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.....Interestingly, some of the cues he wrote for P&TP serve as background scoring for a TV version of the Thornton Wilder novel, "The Bridge of San Luis Rey," originally aired in 1958 on the DuPont Show of the Month. I happened to watch a tape of this at the Museum of TV and Radio, or whatever it's called now, and was intrigued by their inclusion in the score.....
I think that, at one time, it was possible for live television broadcast media (as with live broadcast radio) to utilize previously recorded material within that live broadcast and it fell under some sort of fair use licensing contract. (I believe this usage was only granted to shows which went out "live" and, theoretically, would not turn up again. Little did they imagine today's digital age!)
The scoring of this show may well have been taken from Antheil's original soundtrack Capitol recording of the period, intermixed with other "canned" composers' material.
I remember seeing a major network documentary years-and-years ago and being astonished when I heard cues from Newman and Herrmann's score for THE EGYPTIAN.
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a proper score. From the days of proper scores.
big, powerful and its grabs you and doesnt let go. Lots of music too in the film, with all that moving of the cannon across the hills etc.
Sounds like a good idea to give it the treatment it deserves.
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As readers of that thread my have noted I've suggested to do George Antheil's Hispanic score from THE PRIDE AND THE PASSION.
"Hispanic" refers to the Spanish-speaking people and culture of the New Word; THE PRIDE AND THE PASSION takes place entirely in the Old World -- Spain, during the Napoleonic Wars. The score is, therefore, Spanish, or more correctly, Spanish-influenced, since Antheil merely incorporated and adapted melodies and modalities common to the music of Spain.
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I'll bet the small-r rozsaphiles would enjoy THE JUGGLER if they heard it, as would those fond of Gold's EXODUS, and those who like Jarre's LAWRENCE. A lot of Middle Eastern color comes into play.
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Posted: |
Jul 20, 2010 - 11:35 AM
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By: |
Ed Nassour
(Member)
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Thanks for the information Ed. You are clearly knowledgable and I shall look forward to your posts.
I largely agree with you about the film but, these days, it seems to have an almost emotional resonance for me.
It's suprising to hear that Franz Planer's magnificent achievement in VistaVision photography was never projected horizontally, even at premier engagements. Do you think UA lost confidence in the production?
The reason was very few horizontal projectors were ever installed in theaters. The Radio City Music Hall had them. So did The Paramount in New York. In the Los Angeles area, Century horizontal projectors were installed at the Warner Theater in Beverly Hills. Only a handful of Vistavision films were shown that way. "White Christmas," "Strategic Air Command" and "To Catch a Thief" were all shown horizontally. Not a single one had magnetic stereo. Paramount shied away from the mag stripe concept pioneered by Fox for Cinemascope claiming it was too expensive as well as the stereo sound on the prints could only be played a number of times before the magnetic coating was damaged with the result being no top end. So Paramount went with Perspecta Sound which was a poor man's stereo. It wasn't actually stereo, just a gimmick way to channel the single mono optical soundtrack to various speakers using a set of trigger tones that were placed on the mixed track during the rerecording process. It wasn't very effective. Towards the end of the 1950s it was dropped. MGM also used Perspecta, but in their case they also issued magnetically striped prints with true stereo sound.
A Century 35mm horizontal projector:
Although "The Pride and the Passion" made money, it wasn't a big box-office hit. Critics panned it.
I saw it with my dad at a press screening in 1957. I remember little other than the image was sharp as well as at the end of the screening overhearing people saying they didn't like it.
Variety gave it a good review. They praised Antheil's score as well as the photography and film editing.
George Antheil has contributed an imposing score that backgrounds the screen action with marked effect. Franz Planer's photography is brilliant, the editing by Frederic Knudtson and Ellsworth Hoagland provides expert continuity and other technical credits are top caliber.
One the other hand, New York's Bosley Crowther called it "turgid" finding it slow and even plodding:
With the action episodes piled on stoutly and the human encounters running thin, the inevitable effect is to surfeit the viewer and do him in. Before they get that cannon to Avila and breach the defended walls (an implausible permission, incidentally), one's patience may be close to being spent.
Mr. Kramer has spread a mighty canvas but it has virtually no human depth.
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