Great Moments in Hamburger Commercial Jingles, Vol. III

Willy Wonka meets Woodstock...

Great Moments in Hamburger Commercial Jingles, Vol. II

Great Moments in Hamburger Commercial Jingles, Vol. I

Phony Composer Quotes in History, Part I

"A good composer does not imitate, he steals." - Igor Stravinsky

You can find this quote attributed to Stravinsky around the web, but the source of it is hard to find.

I wanted to use the quote, but thought I should double-check the source. Well, he didn't say it. This Google Books result spots it in a T. S. Eliot essay about literary debts. The original quote:

"Immature poets imitate; mature poets steal; bad poets deface what they take, and good poets make it into something better, or at least something different".

And why it gets attributed to Stravinsky:

Due to a spoof feature in Esquire magazine in 1962, "Immature artists imitate; mature artists steal" is sometimes misattributed to Lionel Trilling. Pablo Picasso has been credited with "Mediocre artists borrow, great artists steal" and Igor Stravinsky with "A good composer does not imitate; he steals".

Ah, so it was a joke. So I'll quote the Eliot version from here on.

I love the sentiment of it. Indie directors often say to a composer "we want something like a John Williams, or Ennio Morricone, or Nino Rota..." Which is all good. But is the director seeking to imitate the source, or to build on it?

For example, many folks like to criticize Quentin Tarantino's borrowings from earlier films, but he certainly doesn't set out to imitate:

Great Moments in Film Reviews that Mention the Score, Part I

Getting your music score mentioned by Roger Ebert? Priceless.

If you want to save yourself the ticket price, go into the kitchen, cue up a male choir singing the music of hell, and get a kid to start banging pots and pans together. Then close your eyes and use your imagination.

I dunno, the music sounds pretty good to me:

TRANSFORMERS Original PV Part 1 - Steve Jablonsky
by Ex5000

A Little Bit of Bass Playing

My friend Tommy Osuna has finished an album I made a contribution playing bass. You can check out my bass playing, but Tommy's guitar playing is the main attraction - especially on Tribal and Eagle.

Did Gustav Mahler Write the Star Trek Theme???

Since everyone's claiming to have written Viva La Vida, why not get some more people into the act?

There is a striking similarity to the opening of Star Trek and the opening of Mahler's Titan Symphony.

Could Mahler be the secret author of the Star Trek theme???

Listen to the first 20 seconds of Star Trek: TNG:




and the first 30 seconds of Mahler:




Here is the theme again, this time from the original Star Trek series:



Here is an interview of Alexander Courage about writing the theme - he mentions a radio tune by Richard Whiting as an influence, but not Mahler.

The interview has an interesting bit in the final minute about how they recorded the sound effect for the Enterprise whooshing by in space....



(Another blogger Superconductor spotted this some time ago, also noting that the fanfare is a quote from Mahler's 7th...)

Slumdog Millionaire Wins Best Song and Best Score

The montage for the Best Score was done well - it's nice to get a decent listen to the music before the award is given out.

After all that controversy over the Dark Knight (which wasn't even nominated), A.R Rahman won both Best Song and Best Score.

My choice for the score would have been Thomas Newman for Wall*E. I thought he gave the story grace.

Slumdog Millionaire certainly appeared to the favorite before the show. It certainly has the most entertaining and original score. I thought folks voting would be discounted somewhat for musical simplicity and a bit of a soundtrack-like approach, but it was Slumdog's and ARRahman's night.