Incidental music, your thoughts?

Do you think incidental music by nature have a 'subservient' role?

I'm thinking about the soundtrack of LOST (the TV series) - the music is in my opinion very effective - it swells in emotional scenes and is animated in action scenes, all done in a non-distracting, unobtrusive manner. But the qualities that make it successful as incidental music seem to be constraints when the music is taken on its own. That is, the music is 'subservient' to the motion picture.

Your thoughts?

Personally, I love incidental music, it was what drew me to classical music in the first place.

I don't know about subservient, the music is certainly there to SERVE to motion picture. That's what I like about it, it's like transcending music and producing something greater than the music itself.

Music for the sake of music can be dull at times, especially in classical music.

I love listening to incidental music on it's own too. If it is written with something in mind, i.e. the motion picture, it's therefore likely that I will be able to catch on to that energy as I listen, and it can be very moving.

I wouldn't say there were any constraints as such, not really, there are still an infinite number of things you could write for a particular scene, and the music shapes the way people perceive it.

Do you think people would ever cry at films if there was no music?

I think all music is kind of incidental (I should probably look up the definition of incidental before saying that, lol). Is a piece of music that comes from a person's inspiration subservient to the inspiration?

I feel that incidental music can go a lot deeper than just music for the sake of music. Like I listened to a Mozart album a while back and thought it was awful. Musically, intellectually... great, but it didn't really have anything to it, and I got bored easily. But I listen to the Meet Joe Black OST from Thomas Newman, or something like that, and it's just awesome!

:D

movies without music would mostly suck. good music sometimes saves the movie. plus they use tracks (from time to time) that are not written for the movie. maybe it should not be labeled incidental, but complementary - music complements the movie, as your imagination very often complements the music. there's movie running in all of us, when we listen to music. human brain isn't that much seperated as to let soundtracks without pictures (while nature of pictures is not necesserily graphic) so to say :)

that amounts to saying that music has always had its scene.

well, logically it comes out, that when we watch the movie with music we double it with our own images. movie is in a need for sound. and not because of purely 'sound' properties, but because, paradoxically, it (movie) lacks its moving, its image. while sound gives so much to imagination.

Incidental music is a whole new chapter in music composition. There are many different approaches to writing music for movies, and each composer does this in his/her own way.

There are movies which are 100% commercial, and thus request from the composer to write something in a very particular style, or there are movies in which the director leaves the composer do whatever they want. There are directors who want composers to write the music before the movie has been shot (based on the script), so that they can play the music to the actors while they're shooting it in order for the music to fit in more naturally with the acting, and there are directors who want to choose music tracks for themselves.

Highly commercial, mainstream films such as Hollywood films usually have a whole music crew, they have one person for the sound effects, another for environmental sounds, a third one for music editing, a fourth one for composing the music, a fifth one to orchestrate it, a sixth one conducting/playing it, and another 20 people working on that field, while that's not the usually case for low-budget or more artistic and less commercial films.

Becoming a composer for media requires many skills, one of which is to know how to write pastiche compositions in many styles, including other cultures and stuff like that, orchestrating (Ennio Morriccone is famous for orchestrating his own music, and he also says that he doesn't understand how can composers in the US compose music and someone else orchestrates it), electronic music and editing, arranging, and you must also be prepared to have little room for personal expression and to follow exactly the kind of rules that the director imposes on you, if you want to make a living out of it.

movies without music would mostly suck. good music sometimes saves the movie.

There are many artistic feature (but also short) films that take part in competitions and festivals around the world which don't have any music on them. And they are pretty damn good, I can tell you. Also, good music won't save a movie, but it may as well kill it. If a movie is good but has bad music it might as well give a horrible impression to the viewer.

music complements the movie

Music doesn't always complement the movie. There are many soundtracks out there which were written specifically for the movie's needs, creating underlying links in terms of plot and preparing the audience for things that might happen or which have happened already through the music. Music can be a very important part of the movie.

Apparently there are two very common views on incidental music, one saying that "good film music should always be able and stand on its own" and the other one saying "good film music shouldn't be able to stand on its own".

Anyway, it all depends on the kind of films you're interested in, and how much you're willing to work in order to get what you want (if there's something very specific that you want).

Also, there is no rule as of what makes a successful film composer. Santaolalla has only scored 9 movies, and he got 2 Oscars, while Ennio Morricone has done more than 500 films and TV series and was only *nominated* for an academy award 5 times, while eventually getting an Honorary Oscar for his total contribution in 2005. In my opinion, Morricone is a much better composer than Santaolalla, but some people may consider Santaolalla more successful because of the oscars.

Anyway, film scoring is something you can do entirely on your own (like Santaolalla who never had any formal music training in film scoring) or study it, but none of the ways guarantees that you'll become successful.

And pliorius, I've seen many posts by you in this forum, but I always seem to have trouble deciphering them. I think it would be much easier for all of us if you used line breaks, punctuation marks and proper grammar, it would be much easier for us to understand what you're trying to say :)

And pliorius, I've seen many posts by you in this forum, but I always seem to have trouble deciphering them. I think it would be much easier for all of us if you used line breaks, punctuation marks and proper grammar, it would be much easier for us to understand what you're trying to say :)

scraggy, man, i thought i was speaking as clear as an indian summer day :D

other than that, i just outlined general ideas about how i feel about music in films (and sound/picture relation).

short films (which are not movies) are short, this feature being the one that saves them.

by the way, you read all this from a movie hater....unless it is erotic:)

Many above me have said what I would've said, so to reiterate a point brought up by Pliorius-

good music sometimes saves the movie.

-I would've never bothered to remember Eragon if it wasn't for its music. Halfway through I got so sick of the movie that I just closed my eyes and listened to the music. :)