Image Credits:-
Images created in Book Brush using Pixabay photos. Videos from YouTube. Screenshot taken by me, Allison Symes.
On the recent August Bank Holiday, Classic FM counted down their Movie Music Hall of Fame. This was voted on by listeners (you could only pick one theme) and I was delighted my favourite was the number one.
I voted for The Lord of the Rings soundtrack. It has everything I want in a movie score – classical music, choral, opera, and Enya! It also conjures up, whenever I play the double album, images from the film and the book. It does what a movie soundtrack should do – brings the films and the book to life.
Links Between Books and Film Music
I didn’t keep a tally of this but so many of the soundtracks played in this chart were connected to books or plays in some way. Romeo and Juliet had at least two pieces connected with them. Other scores were linked with writers such as Wilde by Debbie Wiseman. Jane Austen and Charles Dickens were represented too.
I don’t know where you stand on film adaptation of books. My view is it depends on the book and on how well the adaptation was done.
The Lord of the Rings, though it misses some scenes such as Tom Bombadil and, later, the real ending when the hobbits go back to The Shire and have to deal with Saruman there, is generally faithful to the book and the characters. Incidentally I don’t understand why Peter Jackson didn’t just film those last scenes as per the book because audiences had already sat in their cinema seats for over three hours by this point. Another twenty minutes (if it needed even that) would have counted as nothing by then!
One thing which amused me about the Classic FM chart was Paddington 2 came in at No. 100 and at No. 99 was On Her Majesty’s Secret Service, the classic Bond theme. Given Her Late Majesty appeared in skits involving both Paddington and Bond, I thought this was strangely apt!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y2Pq0h0h-UQ
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1AS-dCdYZbo
Earworms
One of the scariest film themes, Jaws, came in at No. 40. I have no wish to ever see the movie. The music is enough! I suppose in a way you could say it failed as a theme given my reaction to it.
But I recall hearing an interview with its composer, the marvellous John Williams, who mentioned about getting into the head of the lead character. He certainly does it here and I suspect many of you will now have that tune playing in your head.
Try another earworm to cancel that one out then. The only film to ever inspire a marvellous cartoon series – The Pink Panther – was in the chart too at No. 95. Would have liked to have seen that higher but was pleased it was in at all. Great music and I think it was Henry Mancini’s finest.
Plenty of children’s movies (which are equally great for adults) were in the chart too. My favourites included the themes from Chicken Run, Up,and Shrek. Chicken Run (the first movie and possibly the only film theme ever to make good use of the kazoo) has links to that other fabulous film The Great Escape. You can hear it in the music too and I have heard both themes played back to back before now. Check them out. You will hear what I mean.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_9zLwhORWK0
Strong Stories = Strong Films?
The answer to this one ought to be yes. Often it is but sometimes you do get an adaptation that is a dud. I don’t know if that then does anything to the sales of the book on which the film is based. I would hope not.
I won’t watch the films of The Hobbit deliberately. (That theme was in the chart too). Why? Because the book itself is fine and would make one great film. To get three out of it to me still seems like cash cowing so I’m not watching it. I’ll stick with the book.
As a member of the Society of Authors, I receive their journal, The Author, regularly and in the current edition they took the chance to look back at old editions, quoting from pieces going back one hundred years and more.
A piece from one of their editions from 1924 looked at how big cinematograph concerns had realised stories on film which were taken from books had a great chance of success and as a result more books were being filmed. The writer of that piece could not have envisaged how big this industry would become and that it also spawned huge opportunities for music composers too.
I like to think if Mozart or Beethoven were still with us now, they would be writing scores for the film industry. They both have done so already – check out The Shawshank Redemption and its use of Wolfgang’s Le Nozze di Figaro, specifically Sull’aria.
Also check out Beethoven’s Seventh Symphony in The King’s Speech. I did come across a web link which lists so many of Beethoven’s works being used this way but thought I’d pick this one to share here as I thought the film was great (Colin Firth was fabulous as King George VI) and Seventh Symphony is my second favourite symphony from Ludwig, only beaten in my view by the magnificent Fifth Symphony.
Now for the latter the opening few notes of the first movement are probably the most famous in classical music (da da de dum!) and probably music as a whole. I do wonder if that idea – having the imposing four notes like that – inspired John Williams for Jaws.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Hfe_1Fny-Q
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JT7wAYpK8X8
Conclusion
Books are one of the finest things humanity has given to this planet. Music (and in my view classical especially) is another such wonderful gift. I love the Classic FM Movie Hall of Fame idea simply because you do end up celebrating both of these things in one chart given so many films are based on books (which makes sense given people know the stories already work!).
It is my hope that those who know the films and their soundtracks would go on to check out the original novels and short stories they’re based on. I also know that where people may not read huge books (and this is especially true for The Lord of the Rings) they would get to enjoy the story thanks to the films and the music which helps bring them to life. They are still taking the story in and I celebrate that.
Music and books, for me, when well selected for each other are a match made in heaven.
Related Posts:-
Read interviews with Chandler’s Ford writer Allison Symes: Part 1 and Part 2.
Read blog posts by Allison Symes published on Chandler’s Ford Today.
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