N.E. Brigand Posted July 23, 2020 Share Posted July 23, 2020 On 7/21/2020 at 10:12 PM, kdaddy said: Blue Stars played a little snippet of Le Tombeau de Couperin in 2008, but there are so many more melodies in there... "Le Tour" remains my favorite Blue Stars show since their return to World Class. 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
N.E. Brigand Posted July 23, 2020 Share Posted July 23, 2020 It may be just because I'm from Cleveland, but the theme from Ben Casey, an early 1960s TV show I've never seen, has always appealed to me. This is how the show opened: Just five words -- although Clevelanders will add a dollar sign at the end, which is "Crazy." Here's David Raksin's theme from the show: Very much of its time, perhaps, but I really like it. Drum Corps X indicates that it has been played before, by the Tri-City Columbians back in 1963. Anybody here see that show? The composer, Raksin, is surely best known for his theme to the 1944 film Laura, which was Blue Devils' ballad in 2010. Speaking of which, here's the theme from Laura, in all its lushness, played over a clip from the movie; the actor is Dana Andrews: Mirrors! Later in the clip, you'll see Clifton Webb and Gene Tierney. Also in the cast: Vincent Price, not playing a figure of horror. I think the music is better than the film, a fairly simple detective story. I see the Blue Devils have posted the audio of their Laura on Youtube; they also quoted this theme again in their 2018 show, "Dreams and Nighthawks." Which show do you like more? I find it curious that, according to Wikipedia, "[d]uring Raksin's lifetime, 'Laura' was said to be the second most-recorded song in history following 'Stardust' by Hoagy Carmichael and Mitchell Parish." For one thing, no source is given for that claim. But more to the point on this forum: neither piece seems to have been performed by many drum corps (and "Stardust" is indeed a great song). Wikipedia also reports that Stephen Sondheim said another of Raksin's themes, from The Bad and the Beautiful (1953), aka "Love Is for the Very Young", was one of the best compositions ever written for film. Judge for yourself: That film was directed by Vincente Minnelli, the father of actress Liza Minnelli. But I've gone on enough tangents, so we'll skip a clip from Cabaret. Although all can think of is Kevin Spacey's line in L.A. Confidential. No, not "Rollo Tomassi." I mean: "She is Lana Turner." Trivia question: which real-life actor is Spacey's character said to have arrested? Hint: the actor really was arrested and convicted in 1948 (but returned to a long career in Hollywood). And now: without scrolling back up to the first video: what were the five words, in order? Give us that again. Can you do that again? If you get it in order, you get extra points. They say nobody gets it in order. It's actually not that easy. That's not an easy question. In other words, you have to repeat them. And that's OK. If you repeat them out of order, it's OK, but, you know, it's not as good. Go back to that question. And repeat them. Can you do it? If you can, that's amazing. "Have ye a valediction, boyo?" What would you say is the most famous line by the actor who said that? 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
N.E. Brigand Posted July 27, 2020 Share Posted July 27, 2020 On 7/23/2020 at 12:56 AM, N.E. Brigand said: "Have ye a valediction, boyo?" What would you say is the most famous line by the actor who said that? Hint: Randy Newman and Peter Gabriel. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
N.E. Brigand Posted August 2, 2020 Share Posted August 2, 2020 Has any corps played the spoons? (That's a great source for cool videos of old music clips in a variety of genres, by the way.) Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
N.E. Brigand Posted August 2, 2020 Share Posted August 2, 2020 Trying to figure what it would take for a corps to do something like this: Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jurassic Lancer Posted August 2, 2020 Share Posted August 2, 2020 15 minutes ago, N.E. Brigand said: Has any corps played the spoons? (That's a great source for cool videos of old music clips in a variety of genres, by the way.) In 1977 Windsor Guardsmen played with pots and pans. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
N.E. Brigand Posted August 2, 2020 Share Posted August 2, 2020 A whole bunch of newly-composed music here, written with quarantining or social distancing in mind: I wonder if anything in that collection will be remembered as a standard work in the future. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
kdaddy Posted August 2, 2020 Share Posted August 2, 2020 7 hours ago, N.E. Brigand said: I wonder if anything in that collection will be remembered as a standard work in the future. Breaking into the the standard orchestra repertoire is next to impossible, so here's guessing not. Similar to the above, John Mackey and others are collectively working on new pieces and transcriptions that are amenable to reduced (and weird collections of) instrumentation. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
N.E. Brigand Posted August 4, 2020 Share Posted August 4, 2020 Corps should perform more marches. This Sousa march, for instance, is a favorite of mine, although I mistakenly believed... ...that it was named for the famous granite monolith in the well-known national park in California. You know the one I mean: (And you probably know how to pronounce it, too!) But I was wrong! It was actually from an operetta that Sousa wrote that has nothing to do with Yosemite: Speaking of the original El Capitan, I highly recommend this 2018 documentary: Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JimF-LowBari Posted August 8, 2020 Share Posted August 8, 2020 (edited) Been watching some vids I got when I was in a “really something different” stage. Last night watched Alexander Nevsky (1938 Russian with English subtitles) by Sergei Eisenstein. Music by Prokofiev and some really interesting uses of music and music as sound. Wondering if a corps could use any of this or Prokofievs other music. Could have some great uses of “thunderous goo” in the music as sound category. Tonight and tomorrow Ivan the Terrible Parts I and II (two separate movies early 1940s) by Eisenstein and Prokofiev. Edited August 8, 2020 by JimF-LowBari 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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