IMHO

Also, his East of Eden and Rebel Without a Cause scores are great, mixing his usual bombastic atonal modernism with big band and jazz stylings.

To get to the LOTR review, just click on Reviews by Title, and scroll down to Lord of the Rings.

Personally, I would say that "Robocop 2" is one of the cleverest action scores ever written, and I prefer the "Robocop 2" score over either "Robocop" and even "Total Recall". The overture alone (in the movie the end title), with it menacing rhythmic drive, and its campy allusions to the original "Batman" TV series theme is in a class of its own. "RoboCop 2" may be Leonard Rosenman's most underrated feature film score.

NP: Bela Bartok "The Miraculous Mandarin"
Sir Simon Rattle conducting the City Of Birmingham Orchestra (EMI)

One witness at the ROBOCOP 2 sessions observed Rosenman listening to a playback of the "Ro-bo-cop!" song and grinning, "That's what ya get when ya hire a REAL composer!" I am less offended by that than by Rosenman's implicit contempt for the project, using the voices -- I really felt he was trying to make fun of the whole thing, and it strikes me as unprofessional to talk down to your own movie as I thought he was doing. It was like a mickeymouse version of his brilliantly distorted arrangement of "All Things Bright and Beautiful" in BENEATH THE PLANET OF THE APES. And why such a cynical approach to ROBOCOP 2 when he did such a great job on a much worse movie, BATTLE FOR THE PLANET OF THE APES? The business wears you down after a while, I guess.

And as far as the soprano voices in "Robocop 2" are concerned, I thought they were a rather funny reference to Robo's comic book inheritance. (While the original Robocop was not directly based on a comic book, he was deliberately designed as a comic book charakter).

In the mid 90's I pulled out the Lord of the Rings LP again, and gave it some more listens. It started growing on me, which probably best describes how I feel about Rosenman's music. I thought, okay, well maybe my tastes have changed since 1978. I put it on tape and listened to it on car trips. Then in 1998, I picked up the Intrada re-release/re-master. This time, I was hooked. I thought it was brilliant. Then FSM released Fantastic Voyage. To finally hear the score to one of my favorite childhood films (which for a time had been a restricted film by my mom, something about not being old enough to watch Raquel Welch), was a revelation. It was great, brilliant, a masterpiece. It, along with Lord of the Rings, opened my eyes to Rosenman. A totally underappreciated composer, working at his prime, but mostly neglected since. I've since picked up the re-recording of East of Eden/Rebel Without a Cause, which is also brilliant.

I'm currently holding out for an FSM release (since they have access to the Fox vaults) of Beneath and Battle for the Planet of the Apes on a double album. Lukas, are you reading this?

NP: King's Row

Goldsmith's ESCAPE FROM THE P.O.T.A. was set to be released by Columbia Records, but Columbia was underwhelmed by the boxoffice performance compared to what the union fees would cost, and pulled the project. After that, I'm sure no one even considered albums for the next two sequels.

Actually, I already liked the whole score as a child. I recorded the end titles!

It's an extremely complex score, and surely no easy listen. But in my opinion, it DOES stand on it's own (although the original release can't keep you interested in the second half of the CD because of the weird track order; the re-release is much better). A true masterpiece.

Obviously, if one does not like modern dissonant, atonal, 12-tone composition then you won't like Rosenman.

I have no problem if someone doesn't like modern, avant-garde composition, but you can't judge a composer for that reason alone. Music never remains stagnant and will aways be changing (and thank God for that).

There certainly is one thing that I can't agree with, and that is the supposed lack of thematic material in Roseman's work. There is plenty of beautiful thematic material there, if you are willing to make the effort to look.

I'm not sure if that kick was aimed at me, but what I tried to say in that FSM post was that Rosenman indeed is a good composer, and I love avantgardistic scores.

What I mean is that a certain humility should be deemed essential, especially if you're someone with talent. I don't think Rosenman needs to "behave" as he does, since he's fairly respected enough already.

Of course, a nice person is preferable to a raving egomaniac, but it is the final product that we must judge in the end.

Bernard Herrmann was apparently a very nasty person indeed, yet much of his music is filled with elegiac beauty and love. What's on the outside may not necessarily reflect well on the inside.

Rosenman has most certainly written more than his share of awful music, but in the end, I think the good stuff more than compensates for the bad.

Whatever, I wasn't aiming this at any one person, and most certainly not you.

There is nothing special about modern, avant-garde music that makes it any better than any other music, but I just don't think that kind of music should just be dismissed because someone doesn't like dissonance and atonality. Beethoven, Wagner, and Mussorgsky, were all reviled at one time or another in their careers for being too modern and dissonant, but now they are pantheon composers. This last paragraph is not directed at any single person, it's just a comment.

I just noticed your comment about Richard LaSalle. I actually knew this guy. While some of his stuff can be lame and imitative, he could be very inspired at other times. He certainly was a nice guy and he was kind enough to send me copies of some of his better scores: ARIZONA RAIDERS, DIARY OF A MADMAN, TWICE-TOLD TALES and HANDS OF A STRANGER, CITY UNDER THE SEA and some of his television work, including the TIME TUNNEL and LAND OF THE GIANTS (Irwin Allen was very fond of him). Few people know that he ghost scored ALICE DOESN'T LIVE HERE ANY MORE and that Michael Crichton movie with George Segal where Segal gets a chip implanted in his brain to stop his epilepsy and winds up going beserk and killing people. For the life of me, I can't remember the title: THE ________ MAN or something like that.

I didn't know any of the rest of the above. Muchas gracias.

A wonderful CD, one that Goldsmith fans might want to check out and Bartok fans should absolutely not miss is the highly powerful performance of Bela Bartok's "Cantata Profana" and "The Wooden Prince" by Pierre Boulez and the Chicago Symphony Orchestra on Deutsche Grammophon. If you have any affinity for Bartok (or Goldsmith) you might want to give this album a try. Bartok's "Cantata Profana" is much more in the style of Goldsmith's "Omen" than the "Carmina Burana", and "The Wooden Prince" is a wonderful Bartok composition, one of his least known, not quite violent as "The Miraculous Mandarin", at times even enchantingly lyrical. Both compositions(!) you'll find on the 1992 Deutsche Grammophon release in the best performance of either piece on record today (and I've just about heard ‘em all).
I even got tickets for a performance of "The Wooden Prince" with the London Symphony Orchestra conducted by Boulez. I'm sure looking forward to that.

One reason I got on this kick -- apart from the Goldsmith connection -- was because on another thread, someone told me that the amazing Horner opening to THE LAND BEFORE TIME was cribbed from Bartok -- "Wooden Prince," I think it was, though I haven't tracked that one down yet. Soon enough.

I'll point out that the Goldsmith-Stravinsky connection WAS noticed by at least one American critic: the faintly evil John Simon, who wrote of THE OMEN, "that pretentious hack Jerry Goldsmith, who cannibalizes Stravinsky without credit." I don't think Goldsmith borrowed as much from Stravinsky, though, as Philippe Sarde did in LORD OF THE FLIES ... but that's just me ...

Simon DID give Goldsmith a halfway decent review for PAPILLON, although Goldsmith bitterly observed, "I've never gotten a decent review from John Simon and I never will." Don't blame him for forgetting about the damning-with-faint-praise PAPILLON review, though.

Simon also mixed up Goldsmith with Fielding, at least once -- roasting THE CASSANDRA CROSSING, he referred to how much he hated the score by "Jerry Fielding."

As if anyone could take Mr. Simon all that seriously. (I don't. And you can't make me.)

Best as usual,

He can't even get his composers right. If THE OMEN owed any other composer, it would be Carl Orff, not Stravinsky (I'm not suggesting Jerry owes anybody here).

One of my happiest Oscar memories is when Jerry got the Oscar for THE OMEN. I was literally applauding in the living room with my parents watching on perplexed. When I explained this was the same guy that wrote the BLUE MAX music, both of my parents joined in. THE BLUE MAX was one of their very favorite pictures and they loved the music.

NP: THE SUN TREADER -- Carl Ruggles

What was the live version of "Ave Satani," as performed by Tony Vivante on the March 1977 Oscars show, like?

I've wondered about that for the longest time. One day I'm certainly going to check in at Manhattan's Museum of TV & Radio to watch that very show, just to see "Ave Satani" performed live, and to see Mr. Goldsmith pick up his statuette.

In the interim, anyone who actually saw the thing is invited to tell me what it was like! I've read accounts of it, but that's hardly the same thing.

Your pal,