track of the Tim Burton Film, Danny basically confirms that he doesn't actually write music, or orchestrate it himself. He just sings it into a tape recorder or sounds it out on a keyboard and then I guess gives it to an Orchestrator and they actually bring it to full Orchestral Fruition.
I love so many of his scores and his work. So is this saying that anyone who can sing and hum into a tape recorder or plunk it out on their Casio with great themes can be a successful film composer if they have the money, backing and right people to make it happen?
I'm sure a lot would not be as brilliant a hummer or singer or keyboardist, but wow how Danny made this work for him. I give him Props!
Elfman does it indeed inscribe his scores using paper and pen. What he is referring to is the initial imprints of his mind which he records and then later brings out out down to his full score sketches. Since he is a self taught composer and that is what he does in his technique and that he is very good at that being a successful composer- I have no issues with that.
This is a dumb thread. Having listened to the commentary elfman admits to no such thing. He says since he missed out on formal music studies he didn't have solfege training and so he needs an instrument in front of him to compose. That's a long shot from admitting that all his compositions are humming. Is Willams handicapped in someway by writing at the piano?
In fact Elfman did used to sketch with pencil and paper but gave that up like every other composer under 75 when software improved. Do we look down on novelists using computers to write?
I have no doubt at this point that he writes 100% of his music. You could get any copyist/orchestrators to handle his demos and it wouldn't make a difference. There is no substantial difference between elfman's method of composing any other composer working in Hollywood today.
The controversy about Elfman's capabilities as a composer and whether he really writes his own music pretty much died down in the 80's (thank God), so I don't see the point in dredging that back up now.
In a related note, the commentary for PLANET is a bit frustrating because it's clearly just interview bits pasted over more or less relevant scenes in the film -- it's not a "live commentary" like on EDWARD SCISSORHANDS.
