Christian Filmmakers

Sorry, previous post was rather off topic.

I had always wondered what they were saying in Star Wars Episode 1. I saw a behind-the-scenes for it once that talked about the lyrics, but can’t remember what they said.

Danny Elfman did the original Batman scores from Tim Burton’s Batman.  Those were darker versions from the 1960s Adam West upbeat theme.

I really enjoy the theme Elfman did and you can also here that theme used on the excellent animated series of Batman (the one from years ago)

Gladiator is one of my favorite soundtracks.

Michael Kamen’s Band of Brothers soundtrack has some great choir singing. The Main Theme is my favorite song in the album.

Tom, yes, to say I’m a lover of film music would be an understatement. Besides, it’s what I do (I’m a composer), and I’ve listened to film music since I was a young boy.

Like I said, there are countless other examples. I’m familiar with both The Prince of Egypt and The Abyss, more so with the former.

Jerry Goldsmith’s love theme to The Mummy (the middle to end of “The Sand Volcano” on the CD) has a gorgeous strings/choir passage.

“Battle of the Heroes” from Star Wars 3: Revenge of the Sith obviously uses a choir as well. It’s mostly wordless, although there is one section when they’re singing the original “Duel of the Fates” lyrics (although you can’t tell in the CD recording; it’s on the actual printed score). I’m not talking about the actual “Duel of the Fates” piece being used during the duel, but during the track “Battle of the Heroes.”

Joshua, Danny Elfman scored Tim Burton’s two Batman movies. Elliot Goldenthal scored the third and fourth. Hans Zimmer AND James Newton Howard collaboratively scored Christopher Nolan’s two films (the two most recent).

As for “writing your score, and then playing it,” what that actually means is pretty vague. John Williams writing a score is with a pencil, paper, and piano, if he uses anything. This is similar to what Mozart did, except he finished stuff in his head and wrote with pen. Beethoven often composed at a piano, but he would scratch out passages dozens of times sometimes. One famous composer (and I forget who) actually rewrote one particular passage 90-something times!

Anyway, Zimmer has an enormous digital workstation in his studio where he (and his team) do his work. Him “writing” his pieces is basically playing them on his piano keyboard, which is attached to his computer, which plays back as a digital orchestra (or whatever ensemble he chooses). This is how the majority of film composers work these days, especially independent ones. Zimmer’s sounds are just completely custom, and he has a very recognizable style. His music also tends to sound very similar from score to score ... so when he “writes,” he has a good deal of previous stuff to draw from (i.e. “copy and paste”) if need be.

Composers come in all shapes, sizes, and abilities. Some of us, like Mozart, get a great deal of our music done in our head. Others of us, like Beethoven, bang out dozens of versions at a piano until we feel we’ve finally found the right one. Still others of us, particularly the “classically trained,” approach a piece at a piano, armed with pencil and paper. And of course, most of us, especially independent composers, do our work at a computer with a MIDI keyboard, like Zimmer (and others). There are also many combinations of these processes.

For instance, I compose differently depending on what music I’m writing and what the situational and technical demands are. If it’s a concert piece, I strongly prefer to work at a piano, preferably a grand, with pencil and paper. That’s my classical training. Having perfect pitch and strong musical training, I’m capable of composing entire pieces in my head. This just takes a great deal of mental energy and stamina, and a piano in front of me makes the task significantly easier. Writing a piece in my head is handy for 2 things, really:
    1.) To work on it in my head when I’m somewhere other than in front of a piano or computer
    2.) To impress girls

However, if I’m scoring a film, I prefer to work at my computer, because there are more technical demands, such as the music lining up at specific points, and the tempo (speed) and dynamics (volume) constantly changing. Also, generally concert pieces are written to be performed (and again, generally to be performed by other people). But as an independent film composer, I perform and produce all of the music from start to finish. This is done at a computer 99% of the time anyway (100% for me).

Anyway, more scores that make various uses of a choir:

  * “August’s Rhapsody” from the recent August Rush, scored by Mark Mancina, has a beautiful passage with a choir. Also, the little girl has a nice wordless solo.
  * Bambi was the first film to have a wordless choir. Very “old school,” but it started the trend we now know and love!
  * Ben Hur: A Tale of the Christ is an epic score by Miklos Rosza that as a choir throughout. Tons of scores, perhaps most notably John Williams’ original Star Wars score, have been based on this.
  * John Debney used a choir throughout Cutthroat Island to give the score an epic, action-adventure feel.
  * A choir is used in a handful of places throughout John Williams original Indiana Jones: Raiders of the Lost Ark score. Most of the score, say 85-90%, is “only” a full orchestra, but the choir is used whenever the Ark is seen or discussed, giving it a very timeless, epic, holy feel. For instance, when Indy tells the government agents about the Ark’s power, when he’s in the map room and the sun hits the medallion, and near the end when God strikes down all the Nazis.
  * First Knight, scored by Jerry Goldsmith, has a choir throughout. Especially check out the final battle!
  * The Land Before Time by James Horner has a gorgeous choir every now and then, especially the end credits! WOW!
  * Zimmer’s score to The Lion King has some great choral moments. Check out the score tracks on the CD (tracks 6-9 on the OST).
  * Only Danny Elfman could pull off the wackiness in the main title to Mars Attacks. Choir chanting odd syllables (“Jah,” “Yah,” etc.), an orchestra, a theremin, and some synthesizers. Wacky, wacky, wacky!

Alex Beard, composer
http://www.composeralex.com
http://www.myspace.com/composeralex

* James Newton Howard used a choir, very softly, in a few places in The Sixth Sense. A soft choir can REALLY change the texture of the music. (Check out “Kyra’s Tape” on the CD.)
  * The new love theme to Superman Returns by John Ottman has a beautiful choir.
  * The Three Muskateers had a cool choral piece at the beginning of the film, when Cardinal Richelieu is walking around in the secret caverns and has the peasant executed. Michael Kamen wrote a semi-requiem-style piece, and it rocks!

  Also, a live choir is usually used in the scores for films that:
    1.) Would benefit from a score that has a choir ... this isn’t every film! Obviously, Dumb and Dumber, amazing film as it was, doesn’t need a Lord of the Rings style choral ensemble woven into the score!
    2.) Have the budget for a choir! Contracting an orchestra (30-100 people), sheet music preparers (“engravers”), a conductor(s), a recording studio, recording engineers, and a music editor(s) isn’t cheap. Tack on a 25-75 member choir, and you really have a nice bill coming your way!

  As for the latter, it’s less and less the case, especially with cues that involve a wordless choir and a choir that chants syllables. There are now virtual choirs (and orchestras, for that matter, but back to choirs ...) that have boys, sopranos, altos, tenors, basses, soloists, “church choirs,” etc. singing. You can buy this software and their accompanying libraries and add a nice choral touch to your score for a fraction of the cost.
  The key there is, add a nice touch. Speaking musically, assuming the choir is professional and awesome (which it should be for you to even consider it), live performers are always preferred! But, due to budget issues, it’s not always practical to hire a choir. It’s straightforwrad enough to record the score with a real orchestra (or even produce it yourself with a virtual orchestra) and then add some choral touches here and there.
  This technology can’t hold up scores like Lord of the Rings, but other composers like Hans Zimmer, Danny Elfman, Harry Gregson-Williams, and John Ottman regularly “touch up” their scores with virtual choirs.
  This is both a blessing and a curse, to film composers, film makers, and audiences alike. The blessing is that the use of a choir in a score is not something both attainable and practical for low to medium budget films that don’t have the music budget for a “real” choir. We all know that when we hear a choir in a film score, it makes the film seem like a bigger deal, like it had a bigger budget, that there’s something special about it, right? Well, now that special quality is now accessible to independent film makers through composers, but it was completely out of the question a decade or two ago.
  The curse is that very blessing. Because it’s so accessible, choirs are becoming more commonplace in scores. It’s not quite as special as it used to be. Don’t get me wrong ... I believe a full choir and orchestra is one humankind’s greatest achievements! That, and a rock band are my two favorite musical ensembles But, it has become more commonplace, and I won’t say it’s lost any of its value, but it’s just not quite as big a deal as it once was. Epic films like Ben Hur, animated films like Disney’s, and very special fantasy films like Willow (again, scored by James Horner) got to have a choir. Even the original Star Wars scores made very, very limited use of a choir, and these are well-known, epic scores! (No choir in A New Hope, choir in 1 piece in The Empire Strikes Back, and a choir for the Emperor in Return of the Jedi and the finale.) But now, there was a ton of choir in the new trilogy, especially episodes 1 and 3. (By the way, in case you haven’t noticed, I’m a Star Wars fanatic, and I hold the original trilogy scores to be some of the best film music, indeed some of the best music, of all time!) Now, 75% of summer action films have choirs, nearly all fantasy films have choirs, plenty of sci-fi films have choirs, some special dramas have choirs ... do you see what I mean?
  That being said, I absolutely LOVE getting to use a choir whenever possible with my own music!

Alex Beard, composer
http://www.composeralex.com
http://www.myspace.com/composeralex

You can check out a couple examples of the same piece of music both with and without a choir:

  * Check out John Williams’ theme to Jurassic Park. Track 4, “Journey to the Island,” has a choir from 5:06-7:30. (Also, “Theme to Jurassic Park” is the same piece, just the excerpt.) Now, listen to track 7, “Welcome to Jurassic Park” (which is mislabeled, as is often tragically the case with John Williams CDs; this is actually the final scene and the first part of the end credits). Check out 1:58-3:20. Same piece, but no choir! It might sound good, except if you’ve already heard the version with the choir, it sounds hollow and empty, like something’s missing (and not intentionally! in a bad way). You can also hear a faster, choir-less version of the same piece on the 2nd soundtrack, The Lost World, track 14, “Finale and Jurassic Park Theme,” from 3:04-4:50.
  * Also check out “Duel of the Fates” from Star Wars 1: The Phantom Menace, again by John Williams. Famous piece, you probably already know it, but it’s track 2 on the OST. Now, pop in your “old” Episode 1 Racer game (can you believe that was nearly 10 years ago???) and race a few levels until you hear it. Just the instrumental track! You can hear the horns etc. playing the notes that the choir would normally sing, but ... no choir! Alternatively, you can just browse the files on the CD until you find the music tracks, and then you can listen to them without playing the game. There’s a ton of stuff on there that’s not on the OST, including an alternate (original) version of “Duel of the Fates”! (The same goes for Battlefront 2 having plenty of music from Star Wars 3: Revenge of the Sith that’s not on the OST.)

Alex Beard, composer
http://www.composeralex.com
http://www.myspace.com/composeralex

This is really good stuff.

Very interesting and informative.
I just listened to several compositions on your website.
Incredible samples.  We’ve come a long way from string pads.
I was most impressed with the airy soundstage in which you placed your orchestra.
I’ll have to mention your name and website to various producers I know.

Alex, thanks so much for sharing about the various themes and the impact of the orchestra and choir.  You can probably tell that movie music has made a great impact on me and has inspired me tremendously as a filmmaker.  When I was younger someone bought me the score to Star Trek 2 on a 33 record (yeah my parents also had some 8 track tapes they played, too)- I’m pretty sure, if memory serves me right that was my first score that I owned.  From there I started buying them and still to this day some of this music is tremendously inspiring.

I agree, Star Wars is one of the greatest of the soundtracks made for film.  I have to say that my favorite score by Williams is probably Superman the movie.  But of course, Star Wars is incredible.

I was really impressed, believe it or not, with the score the Veggietales composer Kurt Heinecke did for their short Esther animated film.  The music is so beautiful and I’m pretty sure they went to a larger orchestra for the Battle is not Ours. It must have been cheaper for them because it wasn’t as much time as a larger film.  On the credits, it looks like there was a small pit band that they used also (which had to be less expensive)  I tell you, Kurt Heinecke does a tremendous job and is very versatile - having kids I’m a big fan of Veggietales so I’ve seen most of them

I’ve heard that it’s profitable to get a real orchestra recording a smaller group and using the technology to multiply the tracks to make it sound grander.  I bet that would also work with a small choir consisting of 5 to 10 singers.  Do you think that can be more effective than using digital choirs?

Blessings,
Tom

James, thanks for your kind comments and recommending me to producers! I really appreciate it. I checked out your site, and first let me say ... nice site! I wanted mine to look something like that. Upgrading my site is pretty high up on my priority list right now. Anyway, nice work! I checked out a few of your works, and I especially enjoyed what you did with Pilgrim’s Progress! I’ll have to check out the film. On a side note, that clip had great music, too!

Tom, you’re right, both Superman and Star Trek 2: The Wrath of Khan are incredible scores. Can you believe that James Horner was only 28 when he scored the latter? Man, the late 70s and early 80s were such a great time for classic films, and of course, their music ... think about these films and their incredible scores, mostly by John Williams, but also by Goldsmith and an emerging James Horner and Alan Silvestri:
  * 1977: Star Wars 4: A New Hope (John Williams)
  * 1978: Superman (John Williams)
  * 1979: Star Trek: The Motion Picture (Jerry Goldsmith)
  * 1980: Star Wars 5: The Empire Strikes Back (John Williams)
  * 1981: Indiana Jones and the Raiders of the Lost Ark (John Williams)
  * 1982: E.T.-Extra Terrestrial (John Williams)
  * 1982: Star Trek 2: The Wrath of Khan (James Horner)
  * 1983: Star Trek 3: The Search for Spock (James Horner)
  * 1983: Star Wars 6: Return of the Jedi (John Williams)
  * 1985: Back to the Future (Alan Silvestri)

I, too, remember when I first got the Star Trek 2 soundtrack. I got it on CD, when CD was really starting to take off. I was just a kid! I listened to it all the time. My dad would take me to school, and I would always pop it in the CD player.

My first score was actually Titanic. We got it as a family. We listened to it for a week or two, but after they were more or less done with it, I listened to it more and more and fell in love with it! I saved up and bought the soundtrack CDs to Star Trek 2 (Horner), Star Trek 7: Generations (McCarthy), Star Trek 8: First Contact (Goldsmith), and Star Wars 1: The Phantom Menace (Williams, of course). I absolutely fell in love with film music and knew at then, before I was even a teenager, that I wanted to be a film composer! While other kids bought video games (which again were taking off) and designer clothes, I only ever bought soundtrack CDs. The first few to follow after that were Air Force One (Goldsmith and McNeely), The Patriot (John Williams), the original Star Wars trilogy (Williams), The Mummy (Goldsmith), Braveheart (Horner), The Mummy Returns (Silvestri), and Gladiator (Zimmer). Now my collection is around 800 CDS and growing!

Anyway, enough about me.

Tom, if you enjoy Star Trek 2, then you’d probably enjoy most of Horner’s early scores from the 80s. He seemed to go through a “sci-fi” phase then. Even in his late 20s he was writing incredible music! Most of the scores kind of run together, though. He would present an idea in one film and then use it again in another, usually improving it in the process. (Horner’s “self rip-offs” are several forum discussions of their own, but for now I’ll stick to his 80s scores.) To me, Star Trek 2 was really his crowning achievement around then. But anyway, you should check out these scores if you have some extra money and free time ... I think it’s really interesting to listen to how his ideas progressed:
  * 1980: Battle Beyond the Stars
  * 1980: Humanoids from the Deep
  * 1981: Deadly Blessing
  * 1981: Wolfen
  * 1982: Star Trek 2: The Wrath of Khan
  * 1983: Brainstorm
  * 1983: Krull
  * 1983/1984: Star Trek 3: The Search for Spock
  * 1985: Cocoon
  * 1986: Aliens

You’d probably particularly enjoy Krull if you can find it. Get the 2-CD collector’s edition ... usually about $40 (I think). At least it was a few years ago. It sounds like a sister score to his two Star Trek scores, just different themes.

None of that is particularly relevant to this forum topic, but while we were on the subject of Star Trek 2, Star Wars, Superman, and Horner, I just thought I’d share.

Yeah, Tom, Kurt Heinecke is an awesome composer. I own a couple Veggie Tales CDs, and I’ve seen plenty of the films. I don’t know any of his work outside of Veggie Tales, but his work on those projects is excellent!

Alex Beard, composer
http://www.composeralex.com
http://www.myspace.com/composeralex