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Posted: |
Apr 19, 2015 - 6:53 AM
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By: |
Les Jepson
(Member)
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I’ve been watching the excellent three-part series, TREASURES OF ANCIENT GREECE, on BBC4. There have been two episodes, so far, and up to now the subtle use of background music seems to be of the needle-drop variety, predominantly. In the first part my ears caught a familiar piece, but I couldn’t place it. This is usual for me whenever I hear a piece of music out of context.
It appeared again in the second episode, and this time I nailed it. It was “The Firmament” cue from Nathan Van Cleave’s score for CONQUEST OF SPACE. Interestingly, it’s the intact version, complete with voices and orchestral parts. As the Intrada CD release has only the voices, I assume the Beeb has lifted it directly from the film soundtrack.
Anyway, it always fascinates me how adaptable music is: music from a science fiction film about the exploration of another world fitting nicely into a documentary about the art of an ancient civilization. I shall be watching the final part next Wednesday to see if the piece makes a third appearance.
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Posted: |
Apr 19, 2015 - 10:14 AM
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By: |
Graham Watt
(Member)
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Les, is that the Alastair Sooke programme? Sarah Warne is credited for "Original Music". I zipped through the episodes on YouTube and didn't hear the Van Cleave piece, only fairly subdued new-agey textures. I didn't get the feeling of a needle-drop approach, but I'm speaking as someone who just dipped in. Anyway, can't answer your question about the CONQUEST OF SPACE music/ choral mix. Ain't I great?
But yes, music, when placed in new contexts, takes on a completely different form because of new connotations. Film music is rife with this. Huge amounts of examples (library cues, re-tracking, film scores for sporting events - you know all that already).
More in line with your example is how the theme of ancient civilizations lends itself particularly well to the exploration of the cosmos. Not too surprising come to think of it. One little inconsequential anecdote - I remember visiting the London Planetarium as a teen when on holiday way back, and the music they played to illustrate the vastness of space (projected on the domed ceiling) was Bernard Herrmann's JASON AND THE ARGONAUTS. I think it was the "Triton" piece.
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Posted: |
Apr 20, 2015 - 3:24 PM
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By: |
Les Jepson
(Member)
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As you no doubt know, Graham, “original music by…” often means that the score contains extant music, too. I’ve forgotten when and how many times Van Cleave’s “The Firmament” cue appeared in part one of TREASURES OF ANCIENT GREECE, although it was definitely in there. I do remember that it showed up in part two within the first ten minutes and once only.
Returning to the versatility of music, I remember many years ago (late-eighties, I should think) there were two TV documentaries about the Voyager missions shown on rival channels within a couple of weeks of each other. The first, a “Horizon” episode on BBC2, used Berlioz’s “Requiem et Kyrie” from his GRANDE MESSE DES MORTS for the Jupiter fly-by. The second programme, on Channel 4, I believe, used John Carpenter’s main title cue from HALLOWEEN II for the same sequence. Both of these wildly different pieces seemed just about perfect for the job. The Berlioz went for an ethereal tone, whilst the Carpenter went for the overwhelming scariness of getting close to the giant planet.
I suppose phenomena like these tell us more of the human mind’s desire to make things fit than they do about the music.
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Posted: |
Apr 21, 2015 - 5:40 AM
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By: |
Graham Watt
(Member)
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Les, is this the piece you're talking about? Listen from the 7:45 mark -
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5MuKkGorjPU
It's really too short for me to be able to say if it's from CONQUEST OF SPACE or not (it's barely 10 seconds, before fading away). I'd say, if pushed, that it isn't actually from the Van Cleave soundtrack, but I don't want to sound like I'm trying to score points here. I agree with what you say about these kinds of examples telling us more about "the mind's desire to make things fit than they do about the music."
bobbengan's example is good in that it does "fit", but it'll still feel a little uncomfortable to some who know the source. Interesting that bob saw the documentary before knowing the source, and it works for him. And yet for others...? Momma Hue ought to tell us what to think here...
I'm reminded of a season of classic films shown on TV here (in Spain) years ago, a season presented by Oscar-winning director Jose Luis Garci, where they showed the movie and then dissected it with erudite intellectuals afterwards, in a lengthy round-table discussion. The point is that the (Hollywood) films weren't even shown in their original version - they were dubbed into Spanish and, as was quite common, had sections of the original film re-tracked with different music. I still remember watching a '40s Edward G. Robinson film (I can't recall now which one) that had some cues from QUATERMASS AND THE PIT tracked in (!), but for the vast majority of viewers (including Garci and his chums, apparently), it would still have been "the same film" if shown in its original form. Well it is and it isn't.
That was an incoherent rabbit, and I'm not quite sure how to steer it back into its cage, so I'll just let it run wild.
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I find a lot of British documentaries and reality shows track existing music in, or even track music from their other show, on top of sometimes having original scoring.
For example, just the other month I was asking for help identifying a piece of music from a Gordon Ramsay series and it was identified from a score by Alex Heffes. Then a week or so later I am browsing his Facebook page for info (using Google cache) and find him mentioning yet another British series he was surprised to hear his scoring tracked in.
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Posted: |
Apr 22, 2015 - 1:53 AM
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By: |
Graham Watt
(Member)
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I was interested in your story about the use of the QUATERMASS AND THE PIT music. Was it Tristram Cary’s score from the Hammer film, or Trevor Duncan’s from the original BBC production?
Les, it was from the Hammer film, but not from anything Cary wrote - it was the downbeat music for the End Credits, which had to be hastily redone after the original "happy ending" was chucked. A Carlo Martelli piece, and in the Edward G. Robinson movie it seemed to be on a continual loop - or that's the way I remember it.
One of the most striking examples I can recall is what happened in Spain with Ophuls' LETTER FROM AN UNKNOWN WOMAN. One of my wife's favourite films, and one I saw many times dubbed into Spanish. It even turned up in the Garci season I mentioned in the earlier post, where they spoke for three hours about the making of it, its subtexts, everything. I was also quite impressed with how it had no original score, but rather a selection of Respighi pieces tracked in - principally from "Pines of Rome". So Ophuls was a kind of early-day Kubrick when it came to choosing the music for his films.
Then in later years I managed to see the original English-language version. What was that Daniele Amfitheatrof score doing there? I had become so used to seeing it with the Respighi music that the Amfitheatrof original score almost jarred.
Again, when my rabbits begin to run loose, I have difficulty rounding them up, so see you later then!
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Posted: |
Apr 22, 2015 - 4:13 PM
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By: |
Les Jepson
(Member)
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Well, Graham, I’ve checked out the DVD of CONQUEST OF SPACE and I have to report that “The Firmament” cue, repeated several times throughout the film, is identical to the piece used in TREASURES OF ANCIENT GREECE. I’ve compared it with the link you posted, too, one immediately after the other.
Back to QUATERMASS AND THE PIT, and I apologise for going off-topic, but you might be interested in this. In August 1997 there was a big-scale live production of it at a gypsum quarry near Cropwell Bishop, a village in the south of Nottinghamshire. It was the original, much longer BBC script set on a building site rather than the Tube extension abridgement of the Hammer film. Because of the setting large earth-moving equipment could be used to gradually unearth the “bomb”, so in some ways it seemed a bigger-scale production than the Hammer. As the evening wore on and the darkness grew, it enabled some ingenious lighting effects. For instance, the giant “Hob” was painted on a gypsum cliff face in some sort of fluorescent paint, invisible before the sun set but startling in the darkness when it was hit with ultraviolet lights. Sickly lights emanating from the exposed Martian craft hit the thin cloud cover and people miles away reported seeing weird patterns in the sky. The sounds from the pit were awesome (a mind-numbing ostinato called “Chaos” on the CD), produced by Paul K Joyce, the composer of the score, and I imagine the inhabitants of the nearby village were locking their doors. Meanwhile, a large number of extras had been secreted amongst the audience, and they started stumbling about in a terrifying flash-mob. I had one sitting beside me and I nearly jumped out of my skin when he kicked-off.
The score itself was excellent, arranged for orchestra, synthesizers and choir (The East of England Singers). It was pre-recorded and controlled from a huge console/PA system. This was serious stuff, not a Jeff Wayne-style confection. I was soon delighted to learn that the score had been released on the aforementioned CD (the real thing, by the way, not a cheapo CD-R). It was on the shelves of HMV and Virgin over here for several years.
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Posted: |
Apr 23, 2015 - 2:53 AM
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By: |
Graham Watt
(Member)
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Les, no need to apologise for going off-topic when you're onto Hammer, Quatermass and all the stuff I love! That Q and the P live event sounds absolutely fascinating. No, I'd never heard of that before. I might mention it over at the British Horror Films site, which has a forum of (about twelve) really enthusiastic, friendly - and a bit nutty - Blighty-based people who may recall the event.
So it IS music from CONQUEST OF SPACE in the BBC documentary? Well done for identifying it! I wasn't able to due to the brevity of the piece. What strikes me as a bit odd though is that, now having actually watched a full episode, most of the music seems quite discreet, often just synth textures, and then in the middle of it you get a bit of Van Cleave '50s SF music - and not even the bold cues which would have sat uncomfortably with the rest of the pieces, but the ethereal "Firmament". I wonder why the producers just didn't get Ms. Warne to write a brief, ethereal cue of ten seconds on her synth, following the directive "ooh-aah, ethereal mood" - or pull it from a section of a library track.
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Posted: |
Apr 23, 2015 - 3:06 PM
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By: |
Les Jepson
(Member)
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It's no wonder "The Firmament" is brief in TREASURES OF ANCIENT GREECE", it's appearances in CONQUEST OF SPACE are also very brief. It's quite a mystery, isn't it? Although it does add a tone to the Grecian art, it's not really necessary for any music at all in those segments of just a few seconds. I noticed it didn't show up in last night's final episode, by the way.
As to the QUATERMASS IN A QUARRY hyper-theatre production, I should mention that the same outfit put on a similar show called FRANKENSTEIN: THE CREATION at a Victorian pumping station the year before, also in Nottinghamshire. Same composer, too, with a CD score release. In 1998 they were set to do A CLOCKWORK ORANGE at a disused RAF base, but for one reason or another I don't think it ever happened.
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Posted: |
Apr 27, 2015 - 6:07 AM
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By: |
Tall Guy
(Member)
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I’ve been watching the excellent three-part series, TREASURES OF ANCIENT GREECE, on BBC4. There have been two episodes, so far, and up to now the subtle use of background music seems to be of the needle-drop variety, predominantly. In the first part my ears caught a familiar piece, but I couldn’t place it. This is usual for me whenever I hear a piece of music out of context.
Yep - happens with some frequency. Okay, if it's The Mission (which it often is) of course I can name it immediately, but there are many cases where I know the music as well as anything (both film and classical) but can't put a name to it. Unless the film music is closely "mickey-moused" it just needs to convey a feeling or a sense of something - grandeur, mystery, joy, whatever. What better kind of music to use under those circumstances than film music?
There's a programme that I've occasionally seen that goes much further - Homes Under The Hammer. They play pop songs over the soundtrack that include in the lyrics the very words the presenters have just spoken. That's too literal for me and I roll around laughing at the trouble the programme makers go to.
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