[Fmpro] Composer's sidelife out of film

[bipcress@comcast.net]

As a connoisseur I have been struck by the division in the ranks of film 
composers as regards those who do songs and those who don't. Of course we 
all know the most famous anecdote involving this issue: Herrmann and 
Hitchcock dissolving their marvelous, long standing partnership because 
Herrmann refused to "hack out" a song for TORN CURTAIN, and Hitchcock 
bitched that "But all the other directors get hit songs for their movies!" 
On the other hand John Barry built a sublime career and body of work out of 
many scores skillfully molded around the song/main theme which was at their 
core. He was damn good at this, probably the best. Guys like Goldsmith and 
Williams fall somewhere in between. They could each do melodically 
satisfying theme songs, but seemed to prefer relying on straight score. My 
gut reaction would be to say that any great composer should be able to 
out-write a songwriter any day of the week, and I mean beat the songwriter 
at his own game. But then the thought occurs to me, maybe there are some 
aspects of popular song writing that are very specific, and even outside of 
the general purview of even highly competent orchestral composers (but I 
doubt it). - JohnB

----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Marinho Nobre" <marinho at manommg.com>
To: <fmpro at nxport.com>
Sent: Thursday, May 08, 2008 9:10 AM
Subject: [Fmpro] Composer's sidelife out of film


> I've been hearing for quite sometime from agents to directors
> and producers, that film composers who pursue paralel activities
> in music (if there is even time...) do get an extra point on their favor
> when it comes to getting commissioned to score a film.
>
> Composers who can also write songs, then those who write
> concert classical music, those who have their own musical act
> and the ones who write and arrage music for Opera and Broadway
> shows, and teaching music at credible schools just to name a few...
>
> I would definitely imagine they would become more of an
> atractive asset to filmmakers, rather than say, the guy who
> just sits at his computer workstation...
>
> Any Thoughts ? Any other side activities I didn't list ?
> Would this be a good stepping stone for film composers
> to reach out and  match the increasing success songwriters
> are having with their placements on film ? Or just the greatest
> formula ever to make the best use of downtime ? (or both !)
>
> I do find this truly interesting and say... Broader...
>
>
> Marinho Nobre
> Music for Motion Picture
> score at marinhonobre.com
> Voice 347-424-4985
> http://www.marinhonobre.com
> http://www.imdb.com/name/nm1971862/
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