The Essential Elmer Bernstein Film Music Collection

The Essential Elmer Bernstein Film Music Collection

by Elmer Bernstein
The Essential Elmer Bernstein Film Music Collection

The Essential Elmer Bernstein Film Music Collection

by Elmer Bernstein

CD

$21.99 
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Overview

The death of film composer Elmer Bernstein in 2004 made him an obvious choice for Silva Screen Records' "Essential" composer series (Gone with the Wind: The Essential Max Steiner Film Music Collection, The Essential Nino Rota Film Music Collection, etc.). Silva Screen is dedicated to creating new recordings (sometimes the first ever) of film music, generally performed by the City of Prague Philharmonic Orchestra (which doubtless works cheaper than a major orchestra in the unionized West would), and it has had occasion to apply itself to Bernstein before, sometimes with his active cooperation. In fact, of the 26 tracks included here, 15 have been released previously on such albums as The Crimson Pirate: Swashbucklers of the Silver Screen and Jazz in Film (performed by the National Youth Jazz Orchestra). The compilers and producers, primarily James Fitzpatrick, have chosen from among Bernstein's 150-plus scores with an eye toward the composer's versatility as well as his best-known work. He was typecast in Hollywood, but fortunately, with such a long and prolific career, he managed to be typecast several times for different things. Early on, The Man with the Golden Arm marked him as a "jazz" composer, and he got similar assignments, which he treated similarly (a good example being Walk on the Wild Side). Then, with the success of The Magnificent Seven and its memorable, appropriately magnificent theme (the leadoff track here), he became known as a composer for Westerns, and there is a noticeable similarity in his work on such successors as The Comancheros, True Grit, The Sons of Katie Elder, and The Shootist, even though the compilers have deliberately spread them out through the album. Later in his career, Bernstein's delightfully parodic score for Airplane! (with a suite given a premiere recording on this collection) suddenly made him the man to see for comedies, though listeners get relatively little of that work here. The compilers have gone out of their way to find scoring that falls outside of these three main threads in Bernstein's work, including horror (a premiere recording of "Metamorphosis" from An American Werewolf in London), period romance (The Age of Innocence), and musical comedy (Thoroughly Modern Millie, another premiere recording of the cue "Sky-Hi"), along with more exotic efforts such as Zulu Dawn and Hawaii. Perhaps Bernstein's greatest scores (though also atypical) get the longest excerpts: a haunting eight-plus-minute suite from To Kill a Mockingbird and a stirring eight minutes of the overture from The Ten Commandments at the end. The result may not be all of the essential Bernstein on two CDs in 110 minutes, but it is a good sampler of a lengthy and varied career. ~ William Ruhlmann

Product Details

Release Date: 06/07/2005
Label: Silva America
UPC: 0738572117825
Rank: 34511

Tracks

Disc 1

  1. The Magnificent Seven, film score~Theme
  2. To Kill a Mockingbird, film score~Suite
  3. The Buccaneer, film score~Overture
  4. Walk on the Wild Side~Theme
  5. An American Werewolf in London, film score~Metamorphosis
  6. Age of Innocence, film score~End Titles
  7. The Comancheros, film score~Theme
  8. Ghostbusters, film score~Theme
  9. Heavy Metal, film score~Taarna's Theme
  10. Johnny Staccato, television series score~Theme
  11. True Grit, film score~Rooster Cogburn / A Warm Wrap-Up
  12. Hollywood and the Stars, televeision theme
  13. Zulu Dawn, film score~River Crossing

Disc 2

  1. The Great Escape, film score~Theme
  2. The Man with the Golden Arm, film score~Theme
  3. Far From Heaven, film score~Theme
  4. The Sons of Katie Elder, film score~Theme
  5. Airplane!, film score~Suite
  6. The Shootist, film score~Main Title
  7. Hawaii, film score~Overture
  8. Birdman of Alcatraz, film score~Finale
  9. Hallelujah Trail, film score~Overture
  10. Bridge at Remagen, film score~Theme
  11. Thoroughly Modern Millie, film score~Sky-Hi
  12. The Scalphunters, film score~Theme
  13. Ten Commandments, film score~Overture

Album Credits

Performance Credits

Elmer Bernstein   Primary Artist
City of Prague Philharmonic Orchestra   Primary Artist,Orchestra
Daniel Caine   Primary Artist,Conductor
Crouch End Festival Chorus   Primary Artist,Choir/Chorus
National Youth Jazz Orchestra   Primary Artist,Ensemble
Paul Bateman   Conductor
Bill Ashton   Conductor
James Fitzpatrick   Conductor
Nic Raine   Conductor
Daniel Caine Orchestra   Ensemble

Technical Credits

Jan Holzner   Audio Engineer,Engineer
James Fitzpatrick   Audio Production,Producer,Liner Notes,Photography
John Luard Timperley   Engineer
Geoff Castle   Arranger,Orchestration
Gareth Williams   Mixing,Mastering
David Wishart   Liner Notes
Rick Clark   Producer
Mike Ross-Trevor   Engineer
John Bell   Arranger,Orchestration
Bob Dowell   Arranger,Orchestration
Jack Hayes   Arranger,Orchestration
Reynold da Silva   Executive Producer
Nic Raine   Arranger,Orchestration
Christopher Palmer   Arranger,Orchestration
John Langley   Arranger,Orchestration
Damien Doherty   Design,Artwork
Patrick Russ   Arranger,Orchestration
Leo Shuken   Arranger,Orchestration
David Spear   Arranger,Orchestration
Michael G. Jones   Recording
Emilie A. Bernstein   Orchestration,Arranger
Elmer Bernstein   Orchestration,Composer,Arranger
David Stoner   Release Coordinator
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