February 23, 2015

  • Music From "One Step Beyond" Re-Issued--Well Maybe?

    Composer Harry Lubin (1906-1977) began his career in radio after first serving as an accompanist to the great Feodor Chaliapin.  Through the 1930s he would work on a number of projects from Broadway to television (beginning with The Loretta Young Show) and film (Caged Fury).  He is perhaps best known for the work he did for the Alcoa Productions of One Step Beyond (1959) and later for The Outer Limits.  Much of this is what is referred to as “stock music”, pieces that were composed for studio libraries to use at random throughout a series.  Much of Lubin’s production music was subsequently left to the UCLA library.  It is not quite clear from the low production value of this release, but some of the present music is intended to provide more examples from the classic Alcoa LP that has popped up from time to time.

     

    Those who recall the music from these series will find that this collection holds some quite evocative music.  The first sixteen tracks present a number of tracks from One Step Beyond.  Often adding a theremin to the mix, though blended well with the orchestra, adds the proper eerie quality, nicely in the first few tracks featuring versions of “Fear” and “Weird”.  One of the better highlights is the extended “Tragic Overture” full of tragically romantic thematic writing and dark orchestral colors including the use of a mournful English Horn.  A sort of throbbing string effect often helps set the stage for the gothic music that follows.  “Pastoral Drama” provides some nice contrast with more impassioned romanticism.

     

    As a “bonus”, there are four selections from the second season of The Outer Limits.  The first of these is a tense selection of moody atmosphere, “Hostile Galaxy”.  The female vocalise/theremin sound created in “Celestial Bodies” and later for “Call of the Sirens” are other excellent examples of Lubin’s beautiful lyric writing all equally mesmerizing.

     

    Essentially the music tends to be a wonderfully tuneful, dark, blend of Herrmann and dramatic Alfred Newman in style.  This is all well-crafted music with often excellent thematic ideas cast in gorgeous orchestral dress.  Interesting melodic assignments help create the proper unsettling moods as needed.

     

    While this is certainly music worth exploring for fans of classic mid-20th Century television science fiction scoring, the release itself is fairly barebones.  Packaged with a cardboard cover and plastic disc holder, there are very few notes to be had here.  The two “unreleased” tracks, at least from what one can discern from the back cover appear to both be from One Step Beyond (a second version of “Weird” and “The Needy”).  It is also unclear just where one finds this release as it does not come up with the same tracks in what was currently available at Amazon nor does it show up at APMmusic.com one of the producers of the disc.