| Abstract By the end of the 1950’s, film scoring had moved away from the neoromantic musical architecture of ‘Golden Age’ scores by Korngold and Waxman. Scores for popular American film, such as Bebe and Louis Barron’s fully electronic score for 1956’s "Forbidden Planet", or Dave Grusin’s pop-influenced score for 1967’s "The Graduate" (mostly supporting original songs by Simon & Garfunkel) began to demonstrate the impact of non-concert music in film. In 1975, John Williams reintroduced the use of leitmotif with his notorious “shark theme” for "Jaws", solidifying the form with 1977’s multithematic score for "Star Wars". His work continues to draw heavily on musical idioms of the late nineteenth century, often with specific and discernable influence. This presentation will reveal explicit connections between the music of late Romantic-era composers such as Richard Strauss and contemporary film composers such as John Williams. We will further investigate the substantial impact Williams’ approach has had on composition for action films in the past quarter century. |
