European Film Music

Description

The vast majority of writing on film music is concentrated on Hollywood in particular and on a canon of North American scores and films more generally. Recent scholarship acknowledges other traditions of film scoring but little has been written about European film music specifically. Miguel Mera and David Burnand present a volume that redresses the balance by exploring specific European filmic texts, composers and approaches to film scoring that have hitherto been neglected. Films involving British, French, German, Greek, Irish, Italian, Polish and Spanish composers are considered in detail. Starting from a study of the influence of propaganda on musical aesthetics in Nazi Germany the book includes an analysis of Italian neo-realist cinema, a consideration of the Ealing Comedies, experimental music in contemporary. Spanish_scoring, the invocation of traditional music, the portrayal of classical music performers, the use of space, silence and manipulation of time, and the depiction of the processes of scoring Lm independent film-making. Important issues that permeate all the essays involve the working relationship of composer and director, the dialectic between the diegetic and non-diegetic uses of music in films, the image synergism and the levels of realism that are created by the Tele visual mix. The book will appeal to those working in film studies, popular music studies, musicology, media studies and cultural theory. Figures and tables vii Music examples vill Notes on contributors ix General Editor’s preface xii Introduction 1 Miguel Mera and David Burnand 1 Per aspera ad astra and back again: film music in Germany from 1927 to 1945 13 Reimar Volker 2 Music, people and reality: the case of Italian neo-realism 28 Richard Dyer 3 Contemporary Spanish film music: Carlos Saura and Pedro Almodévar 41 Kathleen M. Vernon and Cliff Eisen 4 Miusicas a satirical device in the Ealing Comedies 60 Kate Daubney 5 Screen playing: cinematic representations of classical music performance and European identity 73 Janet K. Halfyard 6 Outing the synch: music and space in the French heritage film 86 Phil Powrie 7 Sean O Riada and Irish post-colonial film music: George Morrison’s Mise Eire 100 David Cooper 8 Angel of the air: Popol Vuh’s music and Werner Herzog’s films 116 K.J. Donnelly 9 Modernity and a day: the functions of music in the films of Theo Angelopoulos 131 Miguel Mera 10 Preisner—Kieslowski: the art of synergetic understatement in Three Colours: Red 145 Jon Paxman 11 ‘The Rhythm of the Night’: reframing silence, music and masculinity in Beau Travail 163 Heather Laing 12. Scoring This Filthy Earth 178 David Burnand Bibliography Index