Film Music Composition Research
Since the invention of the first silent motion pictures, music and sound has been a key part of the experience, and today helps to convey the mood and atmosphere on another level to the image itself. Music for film today seems to be a bit taken for granted by the general public, especially with the advances in visual tools such as CGI and ability to perform live stunts taking the spotlight; However the thought of a modern day silent film is unheard of due to music and sound now being essential to the viewing experience. Some iconic examples of Film compositions include the main theme to Star-Wars, The Lord of The Rings, and the iconic repeating semi-tone line from Jaws.
Over time, the way film music is composed, arranged, recorded, and used has changed drastically, from the heavy Jazz influences of early film scores, to full orchestras, and even more synth based electronic scores.
There have been many notable key figures when it comes to film music composers, some worth noting are:
-Bernard Herrmann
-John Williams
-Hans Zimmer
-Vangelis
A key figure I will be looking into is the composer Jerry Goldsmith, who is best known for his composing of the soundtracks to Star Trek. He also created the score for The Planet of the Apes, which is another well known movie. I however, will be looking into his compositions for the science fiction thriller/horror film Alien.
Firstly a short background into Jerry Goldsmith, and how he came to be a big name in the film music industry.
Born on February 10th 1929 in Los Angeles, California, Goldsmith learned to play the piano, and studied musical theory, composition, and counterpoint as a young man. He also attended classes specifically for film composition at the University of Southern California, taught by tutor Miklós Rózsa. In 1950, he became employed by CBS as a clerk typist for their music department. While working here, Jerry received on of his first work opportunities as a composer for radio shows. An example of this was their show “CBS Radio Workshop.” In the 1960’s Goldsmith began composing for television shows such as ‘Dr. Kildare’ and ‘Thriller’ and it was later on this decade, 1968, where he composed the music for Planet of the Apes.
From here he composed for various motion pictures such as ‘Coma’ and ‘The Great Train Robbery’ and in 1979 the landmark science-fiction film Alien releases, for which Jerry had composed the score.
Alien (1979)
The film Alien premiered on May 25th 1979 in the US before its global release on June the 22nd. The film itself was met with critical acclaim and Box-Office success, also winning an academy award for the Best Visual effects.
When Goldsmith went about composing for Alien, he used an orchestra with the unusual use of more unorthodox instruments such as a Digeridoo, Indian Conch Horn, Serpent, and Steel Drums. The use of these instruments was Goldsmith’s attempt to make his score sound more ‘Alien’ and he took this further by using techniques such as delaying string pizzicati (plucked string instruments) through an echoplex – a type of tape delay invented in 1959. Many of the instruments were used in such unusual way that their sounds were almost no longer identifiable.
His overall score however, was heavily edited during post production, and he was therefore required to re-write and re-record much of his score for several scenes.
https://youtu.be/f9egQyLpEyI – Alien Main Title Theme.
In the main title theme, you can clearly hear many of these warped and delayed instruments that build up an uneasy and quite uncomfortable atmosphere, while still maintaining the ‘space like’ and science fiction sound.
https://youtu.be/3YTIMGmZUr4 – The Alien Appears.
In this scene, Goldsmith uses a classic film compositional technique known as ‘Mickey Mousing.’ This is when an action or on screen change is accented and made more profound by mimicking the action or change with sound. As the alien appears behind one of the crew members, you can hear brief stringed instruments build up faintly before completely cutting off as the alien strikes.
https://youtu.be/nPQ7om598OM – Chestburster Scene.
On more scene I think is a good example is the iconic chestburster scene. The first thing to notice with this scene is the absolute use of silence. The choice to have no music here whatsoever emphasised the dramatic, and quite shocking, turn of events and really leaves the viewer in shock.
Something else to note in regards to the score for this film in its entirety is the technological developments that made many of the sounds used achievable, such as the use of the echoplex tape delay that I mentioned earlier. The echoplex for example was a standard delay effect in the 1960’s and worked by recording sound on a magnetic tape, which is then played back at different speeds to create the delay effect.
Another advancement was the creation of synth effects. although this was only used very little in Alien itself due to Goldsmith opting for more use of warped orchestral instruments in this particular score, it was used in many other works. Synth instruments started emerging between 1960-1970, and are now used often in film scores, particularly science fiction and space themed movies.
On the whole, music for film has come a long way on a relatively short space of time, thanks to composers such as Jerry Goldsmith and others, and thanks to the constant evolution of musical technology. The reason I focused on the film alien to portray this is my main film interest is science fiction and space, and I therefore take a big influence from films like this and want to learn from their compositions to benefit my own work.
Bibliography:
En.wikipedia.org. (2019). Alien (film). [online] Available at: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alien_(film)#Music [Accessed 10 Dec. 2019].
Brigden, C. (2019). The Great Unknown: The Story Behind Jerry Goldsmith’s Score for. [online] Rogerebert.com. Available at: https://www.rogerebert.com/balder-and-dash/the-great-unknown-the-story-behind-jerry-goldsmiths-score-for-alien [Accessed 10 Dec. 2019].
En.wikipedia.org. (2019). Echoplex. [online] Available at: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Echoplex [Accessed 10 Dec. 2019].
En.wikipedia.org. (2019). Jerry Goldsmith. [online] Available at: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jerry_Goldsmith [Accessed 10 Dec. 2019].
IMDb. (2019). Jerry Goldsmith – IMDb. [online] Available at: https://www.imdb.com/name/nm0000025/bio?ref_=nm_ov_bio_sm [Accessed 10 Dec. 2019].
Paris, O., Duron, K. and Gavieres, J. (2017). Know the Score: A Brief History of Film Music – Film Independent. [online] Film Independent. Available at: https://www.filmindependent.org/blog/know-score-brief-history-film-music/ [Accessed 10 Dec. 2019].