da du. dadu.dadu.dadu.dadu.dadu.dadu...

[AnconRanger Member Find all posts View Profile Close AnconRanger]

...my best effort at jaws when the shark is hungry.

be interesting to get a look into the world of scores/background music in movies.

what moment in the story cymbals begin. or the music stops. etc.

be interesting comparing music to the story. what instruments and whatnot come in here and there. and when. and why?

do ideas for music begin once the script is taken on? or is it once the film is shot?

if it sometimes begins with the script, it would be interesting to know how musically minded people read a script. where the notes are in a script. what a scene should "sound like," etc.

we're in the music business, in a way. they're in the writing business, in a way.

seems like to a knucklehead like me, anyway.

da da da dum. da da da dumb. etc.

[wcmartell Member Find all posts View Profile Close wcmartell]

Re: da du. dadu.dadu.dadu.dadu.dadu.dadu...

Just watched the DVD of DePalma's SISTERS and Bernard Herrmann asked to read the script before he would agree even to meet with DePalma. I don't know the reason for this, but DePalma tells story about their first meeting with Herrmann where he had ideas before they even screened the film for him. I'd bet he was working off the script (in his mind) before he saw the film.

- Bill

[NiteScribe User Find all posts View Profile Close NiteScribe]

Re: da du. dadu.dadu.dadu.dadu.dadu.dadu...

It wasn't easy to get Bernard Herrman to compose the music for "Taxi Driver," but I begged and pleaded until he eventually agreed, because he was my first and only choice. You get to know what you like if you see enough films, and I thought his music would create the perfect atmosphere for "Taxi Driver." I know I was right-Travis Bickle was the kind of person who didn't listen to anything besides the voices in his own head, and I was convinced that the only person who could capture this state of mind was Bernard Herrman. As was the case with so many of the brilliant films he scored-"Citizen Kane," "Psycho," "Marnie"-his music became integral to the experience of the movie.

I remember the first time I called Herrman from Amsterdam about doing the picture. He said it was impossible, he was very busy, and then asked what it was called. I told him and he said, "Oh no, I don't do things about cab drivers. No, no, no." I said,"Well, maybe we can meet and talk about it." He said,"No, I can't. What's it about?" So I described it and he said,"No, no, no, I can't. Who's in it? So I told him and he said,"No, no, no. Well, I suppose we could have a quick talk." When we met in London, he had read the script and agreed to do the film. He said, "I liked when he poured peach brandy on the cornflakes. I'll do it."

"I hear brass," he said in a call from London a few months later. For the exercise scenes in particular, he wanted to create the impression of strength, so they were scored with brass and percussion. They gave the impression of solidity, the unstoppable aspect of Travis's character. Herrman understood the film perfectly-the sense of Travis being haunted and obsessed, the inevitable feeling that his obsessions will lead to slaughter, and the realization that the massacre at the end was not the end of Travis's violence.

We discussed the score in detail for two months, and he actually came from London to observe some of the shooting in New York, during the long, hot summer of 1975. I could see that he was not in the best health at the time, but of course I realise now that he was dying as he composed the music for "Taxi Driver."

He recorded the score in Caliifornia, and on the first day of recording all the musicians came and greeted him, because it was the first time he had been back to California for years. He was a legend, of course. It was a very moving experience to watch him plow his way through the recording process, pushing himself and everyone else to give their very best.

In one of the last exchanges we ever had, I told him I needed a little sting for the shot at the end of the picture when Travis suddenly looks back in the mirror-the sure sign that he was still a ticking time bomb. He recorded it on the glockenspiel, and when I listened to the playback I thought it wasn't quite right. "Run it backwards," he said. As usual, he was right.

He finished recording every last note of music on December 23. He went back to his hotel to have dinner with his wife, and died in his sleep that night.

Working with Bernard Herrman was one of the most satisfying experiences that I've ever had in pictures. The day after he died the press called me and asked for a comment, and I still feel the same way that I did then: There was no one who could even come near him.

-Martin Scorsese

[AnconRanger Member Find all posts View Profile Close AnconRanger]

Re: da du. dadu.dadu.dadu.dadu.dadu.dadu...

good stuff, bill.

be interesting to learn what written words or images/conflicts pull notes and certain sounds, instruments, etc., from those who hear music when reading a story.

surely two people would "hear" different things, but i'd bet a lot of the time the notes strike from the same place in the writing.

if the writing is working like it should be.

but maybe not. don't know anything about it.