Intrada Soundtrack Forum

March 05, 2002

Die Hard
Composed and Conducted by Michael Kamen
Hollywood Studio Symphony
Varese Sarabande VCL 0202 1004
Tracks: 21 Time = 76:51


Varese Sarabande has a popular CD club. Discover gems from the past, gems from the present. This time, one of the most-requested of either persuasion. Without fanfare, wake up one morning and find DIE HARD available!

It's the movie, of course, that made Bruce Willis popular. It's the movie 20th Century-Fox enjoyed dynamite box-office in 1988. The movie scored by rising composer Michael Kamen, already hot with Pink Floyd’s THE WALL, BRAZIL and LETHAL WEAPON.

It's the movie that blew you through the back wall of the theater!

Yet they never made an album.

DIE HARD 2, yes. DIE HARD 3, yes. But DIE HARD number 1? No.

Until now.

The music is dramatic, often exciting. It's also unique. DIE HARD has lots of music, but no real main title, no scored end title, nothing original for the climactic fight, random Christmas tunes, even quotes of Beethoven's "Ninth". Somehow Kamen needed to forge these elements with original music into something cohesive. He managed.

His game plan merits attention. He doesn't avoid the variety of stuff tossed at him, nor does he compete with it. He just absorbs it!

Disguised bits from "Winter Wonderland" work into the score on muted trumpets during the imposing early music for "Gruber's Arrival". They're melodically accurate but harmonically challenged, thus fitting comfortably with the suspense. Beethoven's tune emerges in low brass, signing in the bad guys. It too is appropriate. Gruber links with the melody, even hums it. Particularly striking is a segment of the familiar melody heard low, in open fifths. In fact, the tune is seldom quoted in any register other than very low.

Kamen does have original ideas. Most flexible is a repeated rhythmic figure that plays on one note for a few beats, snaps upwards by a half step, then halts. It's introduced in pizzicato strings and muted brass at the beginning of "John's Escape". Kamen uses it to punctuate movements of the terrorists, McClane’s lone resistance of same. It’s also the basis for a lengthy action set piece, "Assault on the Tower". Here, from the get-go, it weaves about, ducks for cover, jabs, parries.

One of the most interesting elements of Kamen's score is an abundance of unison and octave material. Throughout the score, Kamen galvanizes his disparate elements by assigning them to families of instruments in different registers, with little or no harmony. Solo lines, unison ideas, fat octaves for strings. Whatever, Kamen continually works with this unique timbre. Even if things are busy, unison or octave figures dominate. Harmony is sparse. In action sequences it often remains absent altogether. Where some composers would have turned to overt dissonance, outright aggression, Kamen succeeds by going the other way. His jagged motifs keep things hopping but the music stays clear of extra baggage. Kamen removes the clutter!

That said, it's interesting how Kamen adds spice to his Christmas music quotes. While much of the suspense and action music remains sparse, even transparent, Kamen adds dissonance to his Christmas music. It stings, rather than sings.

DIE HARD is often mentioned as one of the most exciting scores of the eighties. It is. What's also amazing is how much of the score is designed to play under dialog, around a cat-and-mouse plot. By working with fragments in unison, in octaves, Kamen weaves in and out without being detected. Except by his fans.

When action does come, it hits hard. A highlight: "The Battle". Expertly assembled into a stunning ten-minute "tour-de-force", it punctuates a helicopter assault, various gunfights, lots of noise. And it cuts through just fine. Particularly noteworthy is a snare drum cadence underlining the helicopter winging down through the thick of things.

Kamen also tackles the central, emotional core of DIE HARD by fashioning a melody for guitar and strings. Used mainly for scenes where McClane (Bruce Willis) talks to officer Powell (Reginald Veljohnson), Kamen finds the heart of DIE HARD by illuminating their conversations, apologies. Both guys have regrets, both seek redemption. Even here, Kamen remains tense. The tune is tender, but harmonically, like everything else, it's sparse. In fact, Kamen avoids obvious major and minor sonorities altogether. He's aloof. Suspense is never far behind.

Varese Sarabande first issued a soundtrack to the 1990 sequel. Another company followed with the third movie. Now the gap's filled. DIE HARD's out.

Producer Nick Redman provides solid liner notes that detail not only the musical variety and chronology but also production history on the movie. It's fascinating.

It's not a score full of melody. Thank God. This is one time various snippets and quotes do the trick. Kamen's triumph is in having roped all this stuff together.

Obvious footnote. DIE HARD is about a tall skyscraper under attack. An exploding building, whirling chopper in the fore, highlights the artwork. Where's Bruce when you need him?

Fortunately, Michael Kamen’s here. Go ahead and play his music from DIE HARD.

It's yours to keep.

March 12, 2002

Love Is A Many-Splendored Thing
Composed and Conducted by Alfred Newman
Varese Sarabande VCL 0202 1006
Tracks: 20 Time = 62:57

Music for anyone who loves Newman's ROBE and EGYPTIAN.

And Jerry Goldsmith's CHAIRMAN.

So what's this about? I'll tell you.

LOVE IS A MANY-SPLENDORED THING (1955) finds Newman's luxurious melodic gift mixing with Oriental colors similar to Goldsmith's later work.

What's frustrating is how many fans look away from this score. There's good reason. Sammy Fain and Paul Francis Webster wrote one of the great screen melodies. Newman interpolates it throughout. Both the song and score won Academy Awards but Newman's part is overshadowed.

Listen closer.

The movie is first-class soap, with drama, gorgeous Hong Kong locations galore. William Holden dates Eurasian doctor Jennifer Jones while covering events during the Korean War. Romance, tragedy result.

Alfred Newman (with assist from songsters Fain and Webster) ensures viewers become emotionally involved. And they do.

I've always found the love theme for Jean Simmons in THE ROBE (1953) to be Newman's finest melody. No one's topped it. Newman himself comes close in THE EGYPTIAN (1954) with another Jean Simmons tune, also a favorite.

Along similar lines is a theme Newman composed for LOVE IS A MANY-SPLENDORED THING. Actually, two themes, cut from similar cloth. They're the real flesh and blood of Newman's score.

Both tunes wait awhile before appearing. After four tracks and some nine minutes, they do.

The first is worked extensively from the start of track five, "Destiny". The second makes an appearance later in the cue, disappears for awhile, then takes over. This second melody is usually heard on woodwinds, such as on flute just before the famed Sammy Fain theme takes over.

Both melodies have leaping intervals, yearning ideas. They're packed with "leading tones", those Newman trademarks where notes in the harmony lag behind for a beat or so before catching up with the changing chords. Linked organically, these two melodies provide striking contrast to Fain's melody, yet retain their own warmth. Harmonically, they're more advanced.

Though similar, I prefer the second tune, fully developed during the sixth track, "Waking the Sleeping Tiger". Ironically, Newman plays it on flute just prior to reprising Fain's melody, as in the previous track. The shape and color of Newman's theme bears more than passing resemblance to ideas from THE ROBE and THE EGYPTIAN.

Darker variants of the first Newman theme permeate "Departure". In "Third Uncle", Newman moves away from his tunes but the colors remain dramatically similar to the earlier costume movies.

Oriental colors that bring Goldsmith into mind illuminate "Chung-King" and "The Eurasians". In the former cue, Newman shades the music with expected fourths and fifths but relies heavily on muted trumpets and an array of percussion. Travel music in Goldsmith's CHAIRMAN (1969) also relies heavily on muted trumpets and a strikingly similar array of percussion. In the latter cue, parallel fifth ideas for strings comprise the melodic interest. Identical devices color much of Goldsmith's SAND PEBBLES (1966).

Great minds think alike.

Varese Sarabande issues LOVE IS A MANY-SPLENDORED THING in complete form with spectacular stereo sound. Spread and clarity, especially with woodwinds, is amazing. Oboe, cor anglais, clarinets. What great colors! Percussion parts are clean, background noise is minimal.

Another asset. Strong notes by Nick Redman. Not just a discussion of the music but copious details on the picture, Fox, various production persons, movies in the fifties. Redman likes film and film music. Here he does double-duty, produces the album, writes about it too.

Executive producer Robert Townson has steered this limited edition series through many years of highlights. He's got a spectacular track record. It continues!

So listen to this one. It's got that famous theme by those two famous songwriters. And it's got background music that plays in the foreground.

Unforgettable score, unforgettable album.

March 19, 2002

Lust For Life
Composed and Conducted by Miklos Rozsa
Film Score Monthly FSM Vol. 5 No. 1
Tracks: 39 Time = 68:57

What a great opportunity for music!

Here’s a movie about producing great art in the midst of great pain. You’ve got this tortured person who lives and dies in torment. It’s not a happy story.

But you’ve also got all these glorious paintings!

Miklos Rozsa captures both Van Gogh’s creative agonies and all those exciting results in one score. In fact, he manages to capture both in one theme.

Irving Stone’s 1930’s novel received top-drawer production by MGM in 1956. Produced by John Houseman, directed by Vincente Minnelli, played by Kirk Douglas, scored by Miklos Rozsa. Quality up the wazoo.

Few screen biographies outdo this one. It’s especially good because no one slapped an upbeat ending onto it. The movie makers knew there were all these priceless treasures to ponder. They’re part of the story. Maybe Van Gogh lives and dies in pain but the world still gets all this great art!

Rozsa’s main theme reflects this.

It’s drawn in two parts, actually. Both can be heard in the “Preludeâ€