June 29, 2007

  • HB: Bernard Herrmann

    Today marks the birthday of the legendary film composer, Bernard Herrmann (1911-1975).  Herrmann's iconoclastic personality coupled with an amazingly experimental approach to instrumental combinations is remarkable.  Each of his scores delivers fascinating orchestral colors whether it is low brass for his Sinbad scores, unusual sounds for The Day the Earth Stood Still, the multiple harps of Beneath the 12 Mile Reef, or screeching strings for the indelible Psycho.  Other than a select few cues one is hard pressed to hum a Herrmann tune, but you always know when his music is playing.  Perhaps the closest one come to recognizable thematic moments are the love scene music from Vertigo and maybe the music from his last film Taxi Driver.  But by the time Herrmann headed to Hollywood his style was firmly in place and he continued to develop as a composer using the opportunities for unusual combinations to create some of the most amazing film scores of the 20th Century.

    After 1941 and his Oscar for The Devil and Daniel Webster, Herrman would only receive a nomination for his music for 1946's Anna and the King of Siam (and his dual 1941 nomination for Citizen Kane).  He died after recording his final score Taxi Driver (1976) which along with Obsession was nominated for an Oscar.  He lost out to Goldsmith's superbly chilling The Omen.  Talk about a time of "overlap".  Herrmann's music, while firmly coming out of the Golden Age of music is so uniquely different from that music, even when it took on romances or historical dramas, that it is hard to remember that he was a contemporary of Newman, Waxman, Friedhofer, and Rozsa.

    Much of Herrmann's music circulates off and on in recordings.  Salonen put together a fabulous compilation disc for Sony with the LA Philharmonic several years ago that appears to be in a re-issued version now.  For the casual collector or music lover it will be "enough." 

    But perhaps one can revisit some of Herrmann's music through the films he wrote for in the end.

    Some personal favorites:

    Citizen Kane (1941)
    The Day the Earth Stood Still (1951)
    The Trouble with Harry (1955)
    The Seventh Voyage of Sinbad (1958)
    Vertigo (1958)
    Twilight Zone scores (1958ff--incidentally a young John Williams served as a pianist in these recordings)
    North By Northwest (1959)
    Psycho (1960)
    Jason and the Argonauts (1962)
    Fahrenheit 451 (1967)
    Taxi Driver (1976)