Classical Composers & Movie Soundtracks

dh

I love all kinds of music and mostly listen to Classic FM when I drive in the UK, being away a lot I have to rely on my .mp3 collection most of the time, or tune in online.

Anyway I recently discovered a composer by the name of Ludovico Einaudi and I think his music is absolutely awesome, listening to it is like learning to breathe again, it's beautiful. Anyway I like a few other composers of contemporary classical type music such as John Williams who does mostly movie soundtracks and a few others, and I wondered if anyone else out there was really into any contemporary classical music, movie compositions or full on classical compositions or anything like that?

Who are your favourite composers and what are your favourite movie soundtracks?

Sam Beli

Yes, I love some of the classics. I am not familiar with your modern composer.

Two of my favorites are Bizet, for his Camen, and Ottorino Respighi for his Roman Festivals along with his Pines and Fountains of Rome.

CaptainSchmideo

I used to really like Williams, because of Star Wars and Indiana Jones, but lately I've started to repent. His new stuff for SW has it's moments, but he's gotten into a rut musically. The other day, I was watching an old movie he scored, "Family Plot". The main theme was WAAAY overdone (lots of heavenly chorus, spectral swirls), and in the middle of the movie, I caught a "military motif" that was re-used note for note in "Close Encounters of the Third Kind" (if you know the movie, you know this music. It's the real stirring martial segment where the military is shipping out all the "mystery" equipment in disguised trucks.)

I liked a lot of stuff Jerry Goldsmith had done (Planet of the Apes, Alien). He died a couple of weeks ago. I actually got to shake his hand at a concert he conducted in my city many years ago.

Howard Shore's score for Lord of the Rings was just fabulous. My favorite score of recent years. He's come a long way since being the music director for Saturday Night Live.

Han Zimmer is good.

I used to like James Horner, but he repeats motifs too much. I can tell a Horner score by listening to it, because he falls back on too many easy tricks in his music.

dh

Hi Captian,
I agree with a lot of your sentiments about composers getting stuck in a rut, but John Williams has done so much work, like Schindlers List was Williams and that is regarded as one of the best scores of all time but i know what you mean, there's only so much he can do.

I really liked the James Horner score for Legends of the Fall, the piano solo from that movie is one of my favourites, but i love that sort of tempo piano music and strings.

Likewise the Lord of the Rings soundtrack is great, but for me when I think about a sound track, I always have to ask myself if the music is so strong on its own without the movie, that I can just listen to it as music and not think just of the film, that's why some soundtracks I take no pleasue in listening to without the movie being on, Star Wars & Indiana Jones are perfect examples!

but Einaudi is where it's at... Le onde!

viva

Nosferatu

Two of my favorite movie soundracks are "Bill & Ted's Excellent Adventure" and "Heavy Metal". Sorry, there's nothing classical on either of those.

Larry

Favorite Movie Soundtracks:

Philadelphia

Dead Presidents

Mo Better Blues

Love Jones

sunshineToo

I haven't explore more contemporary classical composers these days. Since my focus is on piano, I like Samuel Barber, and I thought both Morton Gould and William Bolcom wrote very interesting pieces for piano for the Van Cliburn Competition. Prokofiev and Rachmaninoff are some of my favorites. I know that they are older than John William, but they are still 20th century composers.

For movie sound tracks, my fovorite is Cinema Paradiso.

Farkel

sunshinetoo,

: Prokofiev and Rachmaninoff are some of my favorites. I know that they are older than John William, but they are still 20th century composers.

While you are mentioning Russian composers, do not leave out Shostakovitch. His 5th symphony is awesome. So VERY Russian!

My favorite movie sound track is from "Dr. Zhivago." The composer was Maurice Jarre. My second favorite is the sound track from "Gone With The Wind." The composer was Max Steiner. I like most of what John Williams has done, also.

Farkel

MegaDude

I have to say my favorite film composer of all time is Thomas Newman. Favorites of mine that he scored were:

The Shawshank Redemption

The Road to Perdition (his best in my opinion)

Meet Joe Black

American Beauty (another amazing work)

The man is a musical genius.

Big Tex

Who are your favourite composers and what are your favourite movie soundtracks?

I'm not familiar with Einaudi, but now I'm going to have to check him out.

Favorite composer is Mozart; "Requiem" is something I play when I'm down or alone. Although "Fantasia" gave me some interesting and fun images to think about when listening. "Bolero" will always remind me of a tank battle in the desert.

I love soundtracks, more for the feelings they evoke in me than the musical quality. I'm cursed not only with terrible taste in music but no ear for music as well.

Having said that I love the entire album from "Somewhere in Time" and "Peggy Sue Got Married"; the music (not song) from "Titantic"; most of "Love Story"; a variation on the title from "Starman" and a little piece of music from "Lady Jane".

There is a variation on Pachebel's Canon in "Ordinary People" that I fell in love with, unfortunately there was never a soundtrack made.

Classical Composers & Movie Soundtracks

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