Intrada Soundtrack Forum

3/4/08

Still hobbling. Doesn't affect my CD work, though. Good thing I didn't bust a hand. Anyway, last night, when I was playing a DVD - I randomly chose HEMINGWAY'S ADVENTURES OF A YOUNG MAN - I was thinking about favorite cues that weren't available on records when I was growing up. One of them was in this movie. Right after the very long main titles, there's a long trumpet solo as the opening narration unfolds, then a return to the opening piccolo material. The RCA record had all of this music, including the closing piccolo passage, except - arrgghhh!! - they edited out the trumpet solo!

So here's three of my all-time favorite movie cues that have yet to show up on any recordings. Nostalgia obviously plays a big part here. There may be numerous better cues still unavailable but these are ones I grew up longing for and still haven't gotten my fill. For some people, nostalgia goes pretty far back. For me it's the sixties. On the other hand, I've met some of you collectors who consider the eighties and - alas - the nineties a nostalgic period so... Oh, well. I guess it's really ageless.

So my numero uno unreleased cue back then, continuing for decades and remaining today is: the piece when George Chakiris sets Yul Brynner free to join his people in KINGS OF THE SUN (1963). The camera does an incredible long shot as Brynner walks out of the fortress and I get my all-time favorite Elmer Bernstein cue. Ironically, when he re-recorded the score himself a few years ago he omitted this music entirely. Arrgghhh again!! Elmer would've made my AWOL list twice more (the train arriving in THE GREAT ESCAPE, Max Von Sydow toppling the tiki's in HAWAII) but both of them finally made it to CDs eventually.

Anyway, a second unreleased favorite is from IN HARM'S WAY (1965). It's actually a late cue broken up into segments as the P.T. boats go into battle near the end. Jerry Goldsmith wrote the piece, RCA made the omission.

In fact, Jerry did the honors for my third favorite piece still missing in action, too. It's that fabulous main title from A GATHERING OF EAGLES (1963), particularly those ferocious opening woodwind trills over snare drums as the B-52 takes off and the titles begin. Wow! (To date, nothing at all from this score's been made available.)

I invite you to rattle off some of your own favorites on our forum if you've got a chance. Let nostalgia be your guide and remember to stick with cues not yet available on recordings.

And keep those fingers crossed. It worked for me with THE GREAT ESCAPE and HAWAII!

3/5/08

Once again we see the passing of a great composer. Leonard Rosenman. Born September 7, 1924. Died March 4, 2008. He'd been battling awhile with frontotemporal dementia, which destroys the memory, and finally let go.

Leonard Rosenman made music history by introducing advanced compositional ideas into background film music with his 1955 score for EAST OF EDEN. To this day, for anyone who actually understands the functions and possibilities of music in film, this impact continues to be felt. Such is the legacy of a truly great artist.

Intrada was honored to have premiered his massive 1978 score for THE LORD OF THE RINGS on CD.

Farewell, Lennie.

3/7/08

If you like your western scores to be in the big, traditional-style Americana mold, you'll want to check out our latest Special Collection release. It'll be posted for sale on Monday evening as usual and will begin shipping the following morning.

3/12/08

Limited editions are everywhere. In a sense, we pretty much started the trend when we negotiated rights with MGM and the musician's union for our limited RED DAWN LP back in 1985. In fact, we were inspired by what Elmer Bernstein was doing a few years earlier with his Filmmusic Collection and what John Steven Lasher had done with his own limited Special Edition LPs. But we still started something and it must've been a good idea! Limited editions abound from labels all over the globe. We recognize that you have a lot of options, too. Since we've increased our own production schedule considerably, we're thinking a lot about release dates and whatnot.

We'd like to hear your thoughts on the release pattern itself. Currently we're maintaining roughly an every-two-week release schedule for our limited editions. Random items like BONE DRY will continue to happen any time we have DVD tie-ins or something similar. Anyway, we're wondering if you prefer the limited CDs to come out every two weeks, as they do now, or whether you'd enjoy selecting from bigger bundles of stuff released once each month.

Feel free to post some feedback on the Intrada Forum.

On a related note, just for you score-keepers per se, we've finally received all of our approvals on that particularly exciting title we promised at the start of the year. In terms of studio relationships, it's a real breakthrough for us. We'll finally be able to share the CD with you next month. And the other item I teased you about - the one with the composer working closely with me on a score that used a massive brass section - well, we're wrapping up production on it next month. So it'll be available before too long as well. I could toss out tidbits about a dozen other things in production but... well, you might not have the energy to respond to my request for release pattern feedback!

3/19/08

Your feedback on release patterns was very helpful. Some good food for thought. Roger, Jeff and I are pow-wowing about the comments now. (George, Steve & Wendy don't get much say.) Anyway, for now we'll retain the current schedule for limited editions, which is generally every other week. Announcements will continue on Mondays, shipments will commence on Tuesdays. Hopefully, we'll be able to keep things somewhat predictable. Of course, non-limited titles will happen as they happen.

As such, our next two limited titles will be available March 25 while our standard release of BONE DRY will actually be in stock later today. The next date for something limited will be April 8 and so forth. By the way, our title for that date is particularly exciting!

3/26/08

It’s moving day! There's a lot happening around here as we expand production and website activities (and raise more hamsters.) Anyway, we’re wrapping up final preparations for our move to a bigger web hosting service. Our final changeover should happen over this coming weekend: 28-31 March. Having a more robust server will enable us to add features as we continue to grow. We’ll remain active, of course, so feel free to place orders and expect prompt service throughout the brief transition phase. Meanwhile, here are a few points to keep handy over the weekend:

1. www.intrada.com is moving to a new host over the weekend of 28-31 March.

2. The website may be unavailable via the regular URL of: www.intrada.com BUT will be available via this URL: http://shopping.netsuite.com/intrada

3. Once the move is complete, the URL of www.intrada.com will take you back to our store just like normal. There is no need for you to change bookmarks or favorites since the URL will return as soon as the move is complete.

4. It’s possible that some emails may be lost during the transition, of course. However, rest assured all orders processed through the website will be received and handled without interruption.

5. The Intrada Forum will not be affected during the update as it was updated earlier. In fact, during that update, the ground work was already set to ensure there would be no loss of orders (via the alternate URL: http://shopping.netsuite.com/intrada) during the move for www.intrada.com

6. Remember: You can access the store through this URL: http://shopping.netsuite.com/intrada and the Intrada Forum through http://www.intrada.net/phpBB2/index.php

The store URL will be posted in the Forum just in case.

Thank you for your support. You are the reason for our growth!