Franz Waxman lives! He was an Old Master of Hollywood scores--his first was for THE BRIDE OF FRANKENSTEIN (1935). (He had started arranging and composing film scores in Berlin, but he was soon brought to Hollywood.) And he composed the score for TARAS BULBA (1962), with its fantastic "Ride to Dubno" heard here. He also composed scores for REBECCA (1940), THE PHILADELPHIA STORY (1940), SUNSET BOULEVARD (1950), A PLACE IN THE SUN (1951), and THE NUN'S STORY (1959), among numerous other movies.
i will always remember when my Mum and Dad took me to see the movie, i was 9, but will always remember, we took our seats in tbe cinema, it went dark the curtains opened and the credits started rolling along with this absolutly fantastic film score, i can't put into words how fantastic it was to hear this music against artistic scenes of cossacks in the opening titles, anyone who has never seen this music to the opening titles should watch it, its brilliant.
I Never saw the film and I'm completely surrended to this music work. This is Awsome music. They could re-record more "ancient" original film scores! Its a shame that new film scores don't have the impact and quality that older films used to have, ,except for some cases.
The reason why you don't hear any good film score coming out of Hollywood anyone is because you have a bunch of Hacks working out there Hans Zimmer in particular with the exception of a few and you know who they are. Out.
Well, look at it this way. 165 people have given this video a thumbs up, and only one person has given it a thumbs down (at this writing). No comment on this video complains about the performance (at this writing), so maybe the thumbs down was an accident.
Squadron after squadron converging in the Ride to Dubno, cavalry coming from every direction, filling the plains, an assembling tide of the brotherhood. Every damned time you think that there can be no more men and horses to join, another force, stronger than the last, hammers onto the field, an avalanche of sabers drawn to free their people from foreign tyranny. Damn. Why isn't this played with "Shche ne vmerla Ukraina," the Ukrainian national anthem?
LOL! And the end of the second movement of Shostakovich's Eleventh Symphony, which Waxman didn't hear until he conducted the West Coast premiere of the symphony in 1958, bears a striking resemblance to Waxman's chase fugue in A PLACE IN THE SUN (1951), although Shostakovich couldn't have seen A PLACE IN THE SUN, since it hadn't been shown in the Soviet Union. I've been familiar with Khachaturian's music for the ballet GAYNE since my early childhood, though, and the Saber Dance from the ballet score became world famous in the late 1940s, so Waxman could have been familiar with it, but I think the main point is that Waxman was born (in 1906) and musically trained in Germany, and he came to Hollywood with an impressive musical palate!
Just read a very convincing story in support of your impression, Gabriele Evangelista. Franz Waxman, the composer of this music, was IN the Soviet Union, studying Russian folk music, shortly before he composed this score. Well, Khachaturian based so much of his music on Russian folk music!
Jumpy music with nearly 3 hours of Yul Brynners one liners go and see the magnificent 7 film there's a parody of the two and the two actors who did T Bulba.
I shared this video with Facebook friends and one huffed and puffed and tried to blow this performance down. Couldn't make sense of what he was saying--that this conductor and orchestra are just playing the notes and not making anything of them. I feel like Carol Burnett doing a double take at a long windy explanation and tooting, "Huh?" Reminds me of a couple of musicians I used to know--they liked to claim that movie music wasn't real music. I haven't run into that claim in a while, but some music critics (professional and self-appointed) still like to criticize music performances, and it's the critic's job to explain his or her criticisms, but subjective assessments can be hard to explain, and some people just strut around spewing criticisms that they blame others for not understanding.
The late great British actor comedian and performer Kenneth Williams summed critics up so succinctly he said “Critics are like eunuchs they’ve seen it done they know how it is done but they cannot do it themselves!”
This is so enjoyable on many levels. I love the orchestra in general. The musicians are top notch and the conductor is so perfect in his craft without being flamboyant. He lets the music speak for itself. This is one piece I listen to daily. It gets me going for the day. I have come to appreciate every instrument in this performance but I especially love the percussion. I just wish it was high definition. I would buy all of their dvd studio performances like this if they were available. I also love their rendition of Duel in the Sun Casino Dance. I would pay $500 U.S. money to see them perform.
Just think of all those modern compositions post WW2, premiered once, praised - sort of - by the critics never ever to be heard of again. In the meantime, the real composers took a the money and wrote for films. Like Waxman, Malcolm Arnold and others. And, guess what, the music is lasting the test of time!
