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I've recently come across a lot of mention of a series of scores Carl Davis did for silent film classics, including Ben Hur, Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse, Abel Gance's Napoleon, and a Chaplin film. I know the Ben Hur score was released, but were any of the others? I'm particularly interested in the rescore of the Gance Napoleon, which has its own interesting history of posthumous scores.
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Posted: |
Aug 8, 2004 - 12:09 PM
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By: |
JSDouglas
(Member)
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Prometheus released INTOLERANCE by Davis.
A compilation of silent scores by Carl Davis was released years ago by the Virgin label and the contents of that disc re-issued by Silva recently. Both CDs were called "The Silents" but the Silva edition was a 2-CD set. It contained excerpts from NAPOLEON, THE CROWD, GREED, THE THEIF OF BAGDAD, OLD HEIDELBERG, THE WIND, BROKEN BLOSSOMS, THE BIG PARADE, FLESH AND THE DEVIL, THE FOUR HORSEMEN OF THE APOCOLYPSE, WINGS, THE IRON MASK, THE WEDDING MARCH, CITY LIGHTS, THE PHANTOM OF THE OPERA and BEN-HUR (from what I can remember off-hand).
I believe Silva also released a stand-alone CD of NAPOLEON as well.
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The 'Napoleon' CD (are we allowed to insert sleeve numbers here?) is on Silva Screen FILMCD 149 originally produced in 1983 by 'Threefold Music Ltd.', and adopted by Silva in 1994. Davis uses lots of Beethoven's 'Eroica', written of course for Napoleon really, as well as traditional French folksongs and Revolutionary stuff, but Davis composes some fine original material. The album is only about 53 minutes though, unless someone knows of a longer release? Davis conducts the WREN ORCHESTRA here.
The track listings are: 'Eagle of Destiny', 'Teaching the Marseillaise', 'Reunion in Corsica', 'Pursued', 'Double Storm', 'Drums of the Sixth Regiment', 'Victor of Toulon', 'Bal des Victimes' (Gigue, 'The Fan' and Tambourin) 'Acting Lesson', 'Ghosts', 'Peroration' and 'Strange Conductor in the Sky.'
Silva last year commissioned a longer album of Davis' wonderful score for the TV series 'A World at War' with the Prague Phil., now on CD.
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franz, there are a lot of promotional CDs and Davis does some excellant work.
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Thanks everyone for the input. I will look into the Silva and Promethius CDs.
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By the talented Carl Davis, I also urge you to check out his vastly overlooked score for "The French Lieutenant's Woman", a beautiful work scored for strings mainly. The DRG CD maybe somewhat hard to find nowadays but you'll be rewarded with a beautiful score full of bittersweet longing, If you can skip the rather jarring contemporary source cues. Bu the rest of the album is an absolutely ravishing work, full of brooding early 20th Century romanticism. Along with Howard Blake's beautiful "Duellists" score, it ranks among the finest period scores of the early eighties. Well worth the purchase.
Actually, 'The French Lieutentant's Woman' is what aroused my interest in Davis. I found it second hand recently. It's a very nice score except for, I think we can agree, the contemporary cues! (And the finale track is a little disappointing in that it says on the cover it is 6 mins and 25 secs long, although it only turns out to be 2 mins and 25 secs long.)
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Gosh, I'd forgotten that there was an album release from Davis' appearance at the Glenlivet Whisky Fireworks concert ... it's held every year during the Edinburgh Festival with lots if amazing effects against the Edinburgh Castle backdrop. I was in Edinburgh when Davis gave his concert (thousands turn up) but missed it somehow. I'd no idea there was an extra 'Napoleon' track. Jerry Goldsmith conducted this open air concert one year.
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Thanks Joan and Projectionist for the suggestions.
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