Music:
Member Since: 11/26/2006
Band Website: posterfix.com
Band Members:
Some Herrmann Quotes:
"Your views are as narrow as your tie."
"In California, they like to pigeonhole you. From the time I began working for Hitchcock, they decided I was a big suspense man. On other occasions, I've had fantasies of bittersweet romantic stories. I think I'd enjoy writing a good comedy score, but I've never had the luck to be offered such films. Mancini gets the cheerful ones."
"I wrote the main title to 'Psycho' before Saul Bass even did the animation.... After the main title, nothing much happens for 20 minutes or so. Appearances, of course, are deceiving, for in fact the drama starts immediately with the titles.... I am firmly convinced, and so is Hitchcock, that after the main titles you know something terrible must happen. The main title sequence tells you so, and that is its function: to set the drama. You don't need cymbal crashes or records that never sell."
"[Good film music] ...can invest a scene with terror, grandeur, gaiety or misery ... propel narrative swiftly forward, or slow it down."
Influences: In The Classical Tradition, Herrmann erupted onto the American Music Scene with The Moby Dick Cantata . His chord progressions and Harmonies are unique to him but sit well in the direction of Late Nineteenth and Twentieth Century Trends. Richard Wagner, Richard Strauss, Stravinsky, Charles Ives, etc.
TRIVIA
Not one of Herrmann's scores for Alfred Hitchcock was nominated for an Academy Award.Among his early radio work, he scored Orson Welles's infamous War of the Worlds broadcast.Was known to be a staunch Anglophile.Regarded The Ghost and Mrs. Muir (1947) as his favorite of his own film scores. Some of the main thematic material in the score turned up in Herrmann's only opera, "Wuthering Heights."Was supposed to score Brian De Palma's film Carrie (1976), but he died just before that movie's post production was started, so the job was taken over by Pino DonaggioConductor for CBS Radio's "Crime Classics" (1953-1954).Was the #1 inspiration and role model to composer Danny Elfman.Is portrayed by Kerry Shale in RKO 281 (1999) (TV)
Sounds Like: The Films:
Citizen Kane -
The Devil and Daniel Webster (1941 aka All that Money Can Buy) - his one Oscar for this early score, a track called "the devil's concerto" is a wicked version of "pop goes the weasel" for violin and strings
The Magnificent Ambersons - another Orson Welles classic
The Ghost and Mrs. Muir - this re-used some material that Herrmann had earlier composed for an Opera version of "Wuthering Heights"
The Day the Earth Stood Still - has the recognisable intensity of Herrmann with the inspired use of Theremins to produce the eerie electronic sounds which have influenced sci-fi music ever since
Anna and the King of Siam - with some dramatic oriental music
The Egyptian - it's not often that composers collaborate on a score, but Herrmann worked with Alfred Newman on this one
Beneath the 12-Mile Reef
The Man in the Grey Flannel Suit
Hangover Square
Five Fingers
On Dangerous Ground - although much of the soundtrack is sweet and innocent, in places Herrmann subverts the traditional classical cliche of counstryside musical associations with an ominous pastoral figure, and then there's some demonic hunting horns for the pusuit scenes
The Wrong Man - of course Herrmann uses a Double Bass to reflect the occupation of the main character played by Henry Fonda
The Snows of Kilimanjaro
The Kentuckian
The Bride Wore Black - dark in places and includes ironic use of Mendelssohn's Wedding March
The Man who Knew too Much - Doris Day sings the song "Que Sera Sera" by Jay Livingston and Ray Evans, and there's an appearance by Bernard Herrmann himself as the Conductor for the concert scene
The 7th Voyage of Sinbad
Vertigo - reused on a recent car advert in the UK with David Duchovny
Journey to the Centre of the Earth
North by Northwest - instantly recognisable and very atmospheric
Psycho - famous for the screaming strings in the shower scene, but the tension really mounts during the car journey through the rain
The Three Worlds of Gulliver
Mysterious Island - the music changes completely in character when the adventurers arrive at the island
Cape Fear - the original and the remake as used by Elmer Bernstein.
The Birds - Herrmann was a musical consultant on this, the bird noises described as "sound construction" created using an early electronic instrument
Jason and the Argonauts
Obsession
Marnie
Fahrenheit 451 - strings and tuned percussion and a wonderfully surreal fire-engine sequence
It's Alive 1, 2, 3 (posthumously)
Taxi Driver - his last score and highly recommended
Record Label: Posterfix
Type of Label: Indie
