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Soundtracks!


Kari S

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It's a common fact that O.S.Ts these days are just hit compilations with little to do with the film in question.

Quite a few of my personal favs seem to be from the blaxploitation era.

- Marvin Gaye - Trouble Man

- James Brown - especially "The Boss" from Black Caesar

- Johnny Pate (+The Four Tops) - Shaft In Africa...

Of the more recent ones, I find David Holmes' soundtrack to Soderbergh's Ocean's 11 quite good.

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Of the more recent ones, I find David Holmes' soundtrack to Soderbergh's Ocean's 11 quite good.

:tup:tup:tup

YES! "Ocean's 11" was the first soundtrack that came to mind when I saw this thread. Other recent favorites:

Lord of the Rings

The Talented Mr. Ripley (not just for the jazz, either!)

The Star Wars Prequels

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Yes, the recent imported series of soundtracks from French films is quite revealing; some great Getz on one!

I'll have to track down the "Oceans 11" soundtrack because I do remember the original music for the film being pretty nice, it was an okay film with pretty good music.

"Monsoon Wedding"'s soundtrack is way up there on my list.

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Jackie Brown, L'ascenseur pour l'echafaud, The man with the golden arm

Delerue (also his Godard soundtracks, such as Le mépris), and many of the the more recent Godard soundtracks, where the soundtrack alone can be heard as sort of an "audio-film" (similar to what some releases on the Winter&Winter label achieve)

almost anything by Morricone, Max Steiner

my perrennial favorite: Nono Rota (8 1/2, La dolce vita, Godfather, Il gattopardo etc)

ubu

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Here are two that have stood the test of time for me: "Peter Gunn", by Henry Mancini, and "The Benny Goodman Story" (Mancini was also in on that film for the incidental music, but not for the soundtrack albums).

The "Peter Gunn" music appeared on two LPs, both of which have been reissued on CD. The first LP, especially, is a real classic, almost canonical. The compositions and arrangements are superb, and Mancini had them make a lot of takes as he carefully crafted the performances. There are many fine soloists, such as Pete Candoli and Victor Feldman. One Johnny T. Williams, on piano, also turns out to be a very competent jazz soloist. (The tedious bombast of most of his movie scores was still well in the future at that stage.)

The Goodman soundtrack was issued on two Decca LPs, and later Capitol put out two LPs which also claimed to be soundtrack albums, but weren't. This problem persists today, as there is a Capitol CD with most of the contents of the two bogus LPs, but no CD version of the Deccas. To get the real Hatfield, you will have to search for used Decca LPs - they can be found on the Gemm website. Anyway, the real soundtrack recordings are a great encapsulation of the BG orchestra's personnel and sound from about 1938, when the original stars such as Harry James and Gene Krupa were still aboard. Nearly all the guys from back then were brought back for the movie, and the band was actually made even better by adding Stan Getz (who did play in a BG lineup after 1938) and Urbie Green. There's even a cameo appearance by Buck Clayton. The original trio and quartet are also well represented. I'm pleased to say that the sax section, led by Hymie Schertzer, managed to re-create that wonderful, smooth sound that it had back in the 30s - easily the finest sax section sound ever. (Not having a baritone is a big advantage here.) You could safely describe these performances as being just as good as the originals, but with better studio engineering. This music really is a soundtrack, as what is on the LPs is precisely what is heard in the movie.

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Here are a few I like:

Glengerry Glen Ross

Schindler's List

L.A. Confidential

The Firm

Catch Me if You Can

Little Man Tate

And of course, some of the obvious choices like:

The Gauntlet (was that the one that Art Pepper was on?)

Sharkey's Machine (that one had a great Fontana-Watrous moment during a forensic scene w/no dialogue)

I Want To Live

I always thought it was funny in movies like It's A Wonderful Life that when they show the what-if bizarro Bedford Falls there's always "hot jazz" everywhere. I'd much rather live there than the "real" place. Donna Reed looked hot as the spinster librarian.

The main drag looks like 52nd street in its heyday. That jazz is so EVIL! :rmad:

Edited by Free For All
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Some I like:

- any Bernard Herrman score (my favorites are the scores he wrote for Alfred Hitchcock),

- the Henry Mancini score for Orson Welles' Touch of Evil, excellent early Mancini music with a very pronounced West Coast jazz ensemble sound,

- music from somne Jean-Luc Godard films (Martial Solal's music for 'A Bout de Souffle', Georges Delerue's music for "Le Mepris')

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How about Blow-Up, most of the music was arranged and conducted by Herbie Hancock.

I bought this album in 1985 - admittedly, at that point it was for the performance of "Stroll On" by the Yardbirds - but I really enjoyed the rest of the music on it and you could say that this was my very first jazz album! :g:g:g

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The Sonny Rollins music for Alfie. (One of my favorite Rollins' albums actually.)

Vibes' icon.

I rather like some of the stuff on the Metropolitan and That Thing You Do soundtracks.

I like a lot of the things already mentioned in this thread, but just have to give a huge thumbs-up for Bernard Herrman. Yaye!! :tup:tup:tup:tup:party:

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My favorite soundtrack has to be Spike Lee's "She's Gotta Have It"..........great line-up w/Harold Vick, Cedar Walton, Stanley Cowell, Joe Chambers, Virgil Jones, Bill Lee & Kenny Washington. The songs "Nola Instrumental" and 'Nola Cleans Up" (w/Bill Lee) and "End Credits" (some nice Vick)are all keepers......as is the melancholic "She's Walkin'".

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Actually, Free For All, I think not. My understanding is that the Rollins' "Alfie" is more in the nature music-inspired-by-themes-from-the-movie, although I'll have to consult the liners to be 100% sure. Not that it matters to me one bit.

Come to think of it, Walt Dickerson's "Patch of Blue" album is the same deal, which is why it's called "Impressions of..."

Edited by BruceH
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Actually, Free For All, I think not.  My understanding is that the Rollins' "Alfie" is more in the nature music-inspired-by-themes-from-the-movie, although I'll have to consult the liners to be 100% sure.  Not that it matters to me one bit.

It just seems so much like an "official soundtrack" the way it is packaged.

I agree, this doesn't matter- it's a GREAT side!

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Free for All,

I own the movie, so I think I can answer your questions.

Sonny Rollins is credited in the film as the composer of the music, except for the title song which is a Bacharach/David composition.

I don't think any of the Impulse CD is directly on the film, the Impulse CD contains the same band doing slightly different and often more extended versions of the tunes done in the movie.

I don't know if there is an actual Alfie soundtrack, but based on my hearing of it (just the other night anyway), I think the Impulse CD is much better. In the movie some tunes are only very brief, as little as 30 seconds to a minute. These same tunes get much longer treatment on the Impulse CD. My impression is that the sound quality on the Impulse CD is superior to what I hear on the film.

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I don't think any of the Impulse CD is directly on the film, the Impulse CD contains the same band doing slightly different and often more extended versions of the tunes done in the movie.

Wasn't the movie soundtrack recorded with UK musicians? I seem to recall hearing that Ronnie Scott and Keith Christie were on it..

Edited by sidewinder
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Hmmm. Other than Shrdlu's mention of Peter Gunn, I'm afraid the soundtrack discs/LPs on my shelves aren't getting much mention here. As for jazz or jazz-like, the only other I have is Black Orpheus. Other than that, my soundtracks run more to Oklahoma!, South Pacific and Damn Yankees...

And I still haven't picked up Anatomy of a Murder or I Want to Live; somebody kick me!! :angry:

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I don't really go in that much for Soundtrack cd's. Usually I find certain scores works best within the context of the film. There are some notable exceptions though though. Phillip Glass' works for the Reggio films and Peter Gabriel's music for Last Temptation of Christ Passion.

Two of my personal favorite films that have great soundtracks to boot are such as Get Shorty and The Big Lebowski.

Also another personal favorite is the music to Grosse Pointe Blank...if you are into that sort of thing that is! :)

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Weren't most soundtrack LP's back in the day rerecordings dun specifically to make an album out of it rather than just a cinema verite release of the music actually used in the film? Otherwise they'd have all been full of little 30 second snippets, with lots of repeats...the current version of the Last Tango In Paris soundtrack has both the album as originally released and the "cues" (as they call them) actually used in the film. I'll never think of butter the same way again...

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