A great analysis with a lot of detail that makes one of the most popular scores to one of Kurosawa's most popular films, even easier to connect with. The music of Kurosawa films, while not completely dissimilar to Western film scores of the time, still has a lot of Japanese musical approaches that are quite specific to Japanese music.
It's nice to read something that helps describe it all in vivid detail.
A great analysis with a lot of detail that makes one of the most popular scores to one of Kurosawa's most popular films, even easier to connect with. The music of Kurosawa films, while not completely dissimilar to Western film scores of the time, still has a lot of Japanese musical approaches that are quite specific to Japanese music.
It's nice to read something that helps describe it all in vivid detail.
Indeed, a great analysis. There was another great article on Hayasaka's "Seven Samurai" which I've read a few years ago. I've had hell trying to find it again though.
And then this is behind a paywall, so I can't see, but "Expressive Meaning and Historical Grounding in the Film Music of Fumio Hayasaka and Toru Takemitsu" by Timothy Koozin from the Journal of Film Music: https://journal.equinoxpub.com/JFM/issue/view/452
Thanks for pulling up those articles! Speaking of Takemitsu, he was one of the orchestrators for "Seven Samurai" along with Keijiro Sato and Masaru Sato. Orchestrations began on April 1, 1954 and lasted over a six day period. Recording sessions began on April 8, 1954 and continued over a seven day period, ending on April 18, 1954.
A brief trumpet solo, cue M-49, was recorded outside at night as the indoor recording proved to be no good. Naturally, people in the area complained.
Two examples of film scores that took already great films into the stratosphere and made them the classics that they are: Herrmann/Vertigo and Takemitsu/Ran........
You could also argue that each of these scores really made these two films great from the get go!