Intrada Soundtrack Forum

I was just thinking about when I was a kid back in the 80's how I would place a tape recorder next to the TV speaker and tape my favorite musical moments from some particular movie on HBO or Regular TV because I couldn't find or afford (I was just a kid after all) that films score.

I remember recording several action and suspense cues from the Roger Moore film Ffolks, as well as that wonderful climax piece from the movie Airplane as the plane comes in for a crash landing. It wouldn't be till a couple of years later I would come to know the names Michael J. Lewis or Elmer Bernstein, but I recall how much I loved playing those recordings over and over well into my later teens when I first began to become seriously interested in cinematic scores.

Another one I taped was Silver Streak. I just loved the music played while Richard (Jaws) Kiel chased Gene Wilder on top of the Silver Streak.

So, the question is: Did you ever do the same thing? And if you did, which movies did you put on the ol' tape cassette recorder?

Tai

Of course! I would also sometimes use headphones, placed over the recorder's microphone; and I naturally shut the door, asked for silence, start over if there was the slightest noise, ...

I remember recording the main / end titles of Jaws, Superman, Star Wars, Indiana Jones (?), Rabbi Jacob (by Vladimir Cosma, plus the end credits of another score of his, L'Aile ou la Cuisse). Possibly others, but I can't remember. I'm sure I still have the cassette somewhere.

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Doing this was an important part of my childhood. Started using a microphone and a Wollensak taperecorder, then graduated to alligator clips connected to the TV speaker, and eventually a male audio plug plugged into either a TV or film projector. The films I remember taping include: KINGS OF THE SUN (Elmer Bernstein), WHERE'S JACK? (Bernstein), LUST FOR LIFE (Miklos Rozsa), JULIUS CAESAR (Rozsa), DAVID AND BATHSHEBA (Newman), SUNRISE AT CAMPOBELLO (Waxman), IVANHOE (Rozsa), SALOME (Duning), KING OF KINGS (Rozsa), HIGH NOON (Tiomkin), D-DAY: THE SIXTH OF JUNE (Elmer Bernstein) and many others. Eventually I graduated to taping music from 16 mm prints of films that were rented for a local youth club. When the defunct Max Steiner Music Library released the score from Max Steiner's CHARGE OF THE LIGHT BRIGAGE, taken from Steiner's personal collection, the main title was taken from a tape I made from a Warner's 16 mm print. I still have these tapes from my childhood packed away.

b.

Yikes!!! Let me tell you what I would do. I would go to the drive in movies and take the speaker apart carefully and hook up a wire with a jack one one end and alligator clips on the other. I had a realistic reel to reel 5" tape recorder to which I would record all of the movies.
Tom

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"There is a principle which is a bar against all information, which is proof against all arguments and which can not fail to keep a man in everlasting ignorance...that principle is contempt prior to investigation.
Herbert Spencer

That is how I got my Creature music!
Tom

_________________
"There is a principle which is a bar against all information, which is proof against all arguments and which can not fail to keep a man in everlasting ignorance...that principle is contempt prior to investigation.
Herbert Spencer

Recording music off the TV was at one point the only way to get the music that I wanted to listen to. Pre-internet and even pre-soundtrack section in some of the records stores.

Movies I particularly remember that I taped music from are The Final Conflict and The Good, The Bad and The Ugly - both movies that have some great extended pieces of music with very little dialogue or SFX.

But didn't you just hate it when you were half-way through taping a piece and someone would come into the room talking away and ruining the "take"? At the time my parents acted as though they actually owned the house!