Vaudville
theather for dominat venue for exhibting motion pictures before the rise of the Nickelodeon, would be more likely to have music acompanymant.
Silent era divides itself to three different phases
1) Early Cinema 1895-1905, 2) Niceldoen 1905-1915, 3) The picture palace 1915-1929
Early Cinema
1895-1905- where sound practice was extermely heterogenous, almost wholly determinded locally and by venue
THe Nickledeon
1905-1915 Transtional phase when sound was first instutlainzed as a specifically cinemeatic practice and determined more by the instutionalized as specifically cinematic exhibtion.Located in Storefront often located near transporation hubs.
- Illustrated
Playing the Picture
after about 1910 nickeldeon musican were encourged to to cooderinate musical selections more or less closely with the screen action.
- classical and melodramtaic music were used more in films dynamic over the ragtime.
- Music shifted from entertaining the
Promblems with playing to the picture
- not enough time to rehearse, not have enough time to watch the movie before the show, changed daily, expected to play for the entrance and exits during movies.
Picture Palace
much larger, 1915-1929 small handfull of orchestra of a handfull of players or perhaps nothinng more than a phonograph , continued well something along the lines of a deluxe performance was achieved by the ocassional employment of a small time vaudville a
Samuel Rothafel
5,920 seat theather called the Roxy seat theater fourtenn seat theather, fouirteen grand painos spread throughout the building,
Radio city music hall and Sheas are other picture place
- Roxy believed that a proper atomsphere was the key to forgetting
Fitting the Picture
- the musican tried to find music that was appropiate for the movie.
thebasic principles of accompaing films with improv or complications did not change from the Nickelodeon
- in conjuction the publishers offerd cue sheets which sujested appropiate music
Special scores in the 1920's
any film with ambtion- one where an extended run expected or the film was to be distrubed through a road show - would likely have a comminosend score of some sort. fully orgional scores were reativley rare until the comming of sound. the special score wer
Background Music
term often used for non digetic music
Complication scores
- in silent film era most scores were complied that is not orgional music written specifically for a fil, but mostly preexistinng works gatherd and ordered for a particular performance.
Digetic
was borrowed from literary theory to refer to the workd of the narrtive, the screen world or world of the film.
Non digetic
- refers to the level of narrition- voice over narration is non digetic and so is underscorring
Kinetoscope
- appartus for viewing pictures invented by thomas edision, did mange to proudce a number of short expermental films.
source Music
- term used for digetic music
Style Topics
- conventional muisc figures that evoke, repersent,siginfy a particular mood,place, emotion or some other charatcer trait in the narrtive.
Underscore
- nondiegtic- synoym for backgorund music
Issues of technology and ecnomics
-a. Sound synchronization was attempted for almost from the time Thomas Edison invented the apparatus for taking moving pictures.
b. His specific stated goal to distribute grand opera to the masses very much embodied the American ethos of cultural uplift
Talking picture
The most successful early scheme for providing films with speech espically in the larger theater.This involved placing a troupe of three or four actors behind the screen to speak lines of dialougeand provide sound effects .
i. The sidebar provides one acc
sound research in the 1920
-a. The amplification problem was finally solved by developments in radio, or ,specifically , by the technology of the radio tube. Electronic public address systems based on the radio tube were introduced in 1919, but it wasn't until the later 1920s when
Vitaphone
system consisted of a special phonograph mechanically coupled to a projector. The real advantage that it enjoyed over phonofilm and other earlier attempts at sound film lay not in the medium, however, but in the amplification
News reels for sound research in the 1920's
i. Newsreels were the finial areas for sound research, and these posed a completely different set of challenges to sound than did a vaudeville or musical act, which were filmed in a studio, theater or some similar acoustically controlled environment.
This
sound film and standarzation of exhibition
a. In all if the cases, the sound film was a "short" meant to supplement the feature on theaters program. The primary Impetus for the development of the sound film in the 1920's was in fact the standardization of exhibition not the development of a featur
The Jazz singer
The Jazz singer, proved to be a turning point in the history of the sound film, as it demonstrated that synchronized sound could be effectively incorprated into a feature presentation,THE JAZZ SINGER was conceived as a silent with a few synchronized sound
Transition from sound to silent film
-he passage from silent film to sound film took roughly five years, from 1926 through 1930; but many of the technical and asthetic issues were still not satisfactory settled until 1933, some even later than that.
-The theaters would not be completely weir
Types of early sound
Sound films fall into three types 1. Synchronized sound, 2. Part talkie 3.100% talkie. This termonolgy can be confusing because a synchronized film in this typology is what we now call a silent film; synchronization here refers to the fact music has been
mastering the sound track and elements of style
-a. In the sound picture, by contrast, sound effects and dialogue became tied very strongly to image; unlike the silent period, where the decision on whether to render sound effect could be overridden for musical purposes, in the sound era it became extre
proudction phases
-By 1932 engiers had devised solutions to most pressing technological problems: better microphones with increased sensitivity, fidetilty,dynamic range, and directionally; improved film stock and development timing for sound film;the microphone boom; impro
Music Department
a. The music personnel for the early sound pictures was drawn from two primary sources; the large deluxe theaters and popular music industry, especially the part associated with musical theater. Their duties were dived along predictable lines.
b. After 19
Music and the soundtrack in the classical studio era Imporvements in recording technology
a. Two sound formats variable area and variable density compted with one another for decades. Completion worked for the studions advantage RCA controlled one and western electric the other.
Rerecording
-This allowed for during production to focus on dialogue then and music and effects later.
-Although this was brought about earlier recording was difficult and expensive results weren't the best pieces
The soundtrack in the studio eraand elements of style: foreground and background
a. In early sound film the audio background was silent due to the challenges of technology and mixing; silence was in easy background.
b. The invention of concept audio background not just mere silence was crucial for sound film and this concept used rere
Background music and sound track
a. Music by contrast had the advantage of being composed, and a skilled composer could work it in and around dialogue to a degree that ambient sound could not match. This was in important consideration in the relatively low fidelity environment of early o
scoring practices
-a. Playing the overall mood remained a common solution, however because it held the important advantage of continuity, of presenting well rounded musical themes and ideas, rather than constantly breaking off into a series of seemingly musically incoheren
music department and studio and elements of style
-The music department was run by a director who had a variety of task such as budgeting, scheduling and assigning composers.
-Unlike the silent film house the job in the house was more managerial than the creative end of production.
-Most music directors
sound department
-divied in two to departments, proudction sound and postproudction sound.
Proudction sound
- organized to caputre dialouge and its principal workers
post proudction sound
- sound effect came under full jursdecation of the sound department
Issues of high fidelity and stero sound: legal and ecnomic challanges to industry
-The 1948 United states supreme court's decision on paramount consent decree (1940), which prohibited studios from owning theaters, completely transformed the economics of the film industry
- The traditional studio system dissolved over the 1950's
Wide screen and stereo format
-Widescreen suffered from a similar lack of a clear standard, but the investment required for a larger screen, a different sprocket gauge on the projector.
-When 20th century fox introduced cinemascope the studio initially demanded that theaters exhibitin
Magentic tape in proudction and post proudction
-a. Technogically, the biggest changes in the 1950 and 1960 concerned the introduction of the magnetic recording and stereo reproduction, which affected production and post production phases in both music and sound departments.
b. Magnetic sound was more
Issues of stereo
-a. Stereo's faced two substantial obstacles: Its slow adoption by the theaters prevented it from affecting filmmaking to the same extent as magnetic sound; and required significant conceptual adjustments. For stereo changed terms of representation, desta
stereo and space
-The solution ultimately adopted was to channel sound according to function. Onscreen dialogue and most foreground sound effects were recorded in monaural sound and played on the center channel, thus mimicking the standard optical sound track, where as ba
Issuses of Ascetics
-Stereo allowed for a number of changes to the sound track, the most important of which was a shift away from thinking of it in terms of stems arranged hierarchically in foreground and background and background toward a concept of graduated layers. Among
Pouplar sonng and underscore
-In High noon the song is treated rather traditionally as a musical theme, and it is the intermingling of the score and recording that represents the strongest departure from classical practice in the film. The score overall, however is not reconceived in
Soundtrack albums
a. Along with the rising of theme songs soundtracks became important in the 1950's . Although potions of scores had been released to radio stations on disks.
b. Mancini was particularly influential in developing a model for film scoring that could result
Importance of recording
a. By 1960's recording had eclipsed sheet music as basis for a song.
Relation to the music
a. Songs with recording bean to take root in musicals.
b. This trend began in 1950's Elvis Presley musicals were tied to recording releases.
c. The Beatles music function in several distinct ways in the film used as performance recording, as music backing
Scoring with recording
a. Songs were not grounded in presence of performers respenation is somewhat limited. The Graduate gives an example of this with songs not grounded diegetically but serve to represents the main characters inner psycho
music department
The dissolution of the studio system had a direct impact on the music department, which had all but disappeared by 1960. In 1958 the studios did not renew their standing contracts with the studio musicians , making all but few music worker in to freelance
Max Steiner
king kong, gone with the wind,casablanca
Erich Wolfgand Korngold
adventures of Robin Hood
Bernard Herrman
Citzen Kane,Vertigo,Psycho
Ennio Morricone
The Good, Bad and the ugly, Cinema Paradisco
Nino Rota
The Godfather 1and 2
Quincy Jones
Cold Blood, Color Purple(1985)
Danny Elfman
Batman (1989)
Duke Ellington
Anatomy of a murder (1959)
Jhonny Mandel
I want to live (1958)
John Williams
Jaws(1975)
Harry Potter and the sorcers stone (2001)
Lisa Gerrard
Whale Rider (2002)