Music 2F03 Lecture 03 [January 12th, 2016]

Recap from last lecture:

Diegetic – the world of the film, everything that said to occur in that film
Non-Diegetic – something that is familiar to you as an audience, but not to those in the
film
Source music – music that comes from some source (record player, a band, someone
singing form the shower)  character from the film can hear that music
Non-Diegetic Music – refers to as original score (what we will pay most attention at)
The idea that music can be adapted (pre-existing music)  is shaped, rearranged and
people can’t tell that it has been changed around
Platoon – everything drops in slow motion  get a mythic sense (pre-existing music)
which adds to the abstractness

All pre-existing music, “Compiled Score”. Example 2001: A Space Odyssey (1968),
Compiled from the works of R. Strauss, J Strauss, etc. (The voice gives us a sense of
intelligent, but lack of words so don’t know what they trying to tell us. Used in Horrors
and Space film).

Describing the Music:

Style:
- What type of music has the composer chosen (Classical? With Big orchestra or
Chamber group? Pop music or Non-Western or Hip-Hop or Disco?)
- What type of instruments?
- How do these choices relate to the film as a whole?

Example:
Restoration (1995) Composer: James Newton Howard
- Set in mid 1600s.
- Score is part original part adapted, based on the work of J.F. Handel, an important
composer of the period.
- Use of period instruments including Harpsichord  the precursor to piano and the
dominant keyboard in the Baroque era.
 - The music is very flat in terms of dynamics (Baroque music  terrorist dynamics.
Quite often have fixed dynamic levels, from one level drop to another level – flat
jumps. Music has a control sense). It works because the movie is about people
who is very formal person on the outside, but it is what’s going on in the inside.

Local Hero (1983) Composer: Mark Khopfler

- A comedy about an oil executive from Texas who was sent to Scotland and his
mission is he has to buy this little Scottish village. This Scottish village sits in a
Harbor that works for all oil to goes through. He will be very rich if it works.

- Plot follows an urban American in a small Scottish village.

- Blend of folk and popular styles.
- Emphasis on instruments such as the guitar.

- Khopfler developed melodies similar to Anglo Celtic folk music (because this is a
small story, they brought in a relatively small band, and not a big orchestra).

- Most of the music holds that level. The music does not play much role in narrative
(no scoring or action scene). When people are talking, there is no music. From an
urban city to a small village.

The Godfather (1972) Composer: Nino Rota

- An epic family history story, about crime family and the leader of the crime
family. His isolation is the basis of the family structure, and his son is going to
succeed him.

- Follows the life of an organized crime family.

- Much of the instrumentation and melodies based on the folk music of Sicily.
(When the ensemble comes in, you get a Sicily wedding band comes in).Starts
with a wedding of his daughter, but it also speaks to the family’s connection to
Sicily. There is a sense in the film that he really runs for the simplicity of his
children. It comes to represents the innocents of the youth. The ideal
characteristics of the man (order murder without a second thought, but he still has
this guilt in him).

- Drawback in music because most people think it is very old style.

Concept:
- Is the music used in a consistent manner throughout the film?
- What is accompanied? What is left without accompaniment?
- What “motivates” the music? Action, characters, events, objects, flashbacks, etc.

Conceptual Approaches:
Most film music will fall somewhere between two extremes:
1. Playing the Drama (music is based on the emotion aspects of the scene)
- Music attempts to reinforce primarily emotional elements within the narrative

2. Hitting the Action (music is focusing the physical aspects of the scene)
- Music accents visual events
- Common approach to cartoon scoring
- “Mickey Mousing” (describe someone who hits the action in an excessive way)

Musical Characteristics:
1. Melody or Theme
- Considered the most “recognizable” music element for western ears.
- Do characters, objects or situations have a particular melody associated with
them?
- German Opera composer Richard Wagner – Leitmotive.
- Melodies can be taken through a number of variations to tell you what is going on
within a particular character – thoughts or feelings etc. (same set of notes but alter
in different ways to depict the picture of the scene).
- Are the melodies easy to hum, or are they “angular” and more difficult?

Example: Star Wars (1977) Composer: John Williams

2. Tempo or Pulse:
- How does the speed of the music influence the “tempo” of the narrative?
- On-screen action, framing, editing, sound design