Some interesting points you raise here. Thanks! What you mention about Danny wanting music for specific scenes and not all scenes is a common practice. In the 'spotting' session, the director and composer get together to decide where they want music and what it should convey. It is not often that films have 'wall-to-wall' music (however for epic films like LOTR and Jodha Akbar it's quite common). So even if the composer doesn't have a rough-cut to view (end-to-end or even partially), he has an outline of what kind of music is needed and where. It's usually at this stage when they start to think about themes, development and orchestration. So I'm saying that it's still possible without requiring music in all scenes. But like you pointed out, SdM was scored in under 3 weeks (though I think I saw some interviews mention that he had a month of discussion and a few weeks of the real work) and perhaps Danny asked for specific things, in which case yes, that doesn't give much room to think about development.
As for ARR's other movies, the only development that I've seen commonly is that of a theme being played in different tempi (a fast/happy version, a slow/sad version) or orchestral color (same theme but rendered by different instruments). I kind that I'm looking for is tinkering with the theme structure itself. Think about a bunch of musical ideas and incorporate them in some fashion for one instance and adapt them for another. Have bridges between cues! You don't have to go all leitmotif-based (like Star Wars where every character has a theme and every scene has those themes interact as the characters would interact on screen). Bose: The Forgotten Hero is a sterling example in ARR's oeuvre where there's some real development. It's an excellent soundtrack + score, but cruelly unpublicized and neglected by the general public. Perhaps only ARR fans have listened to it. Ah well, I don't know. Maybe I'm being very finicky. Nevertheless it's nice to be able to share opinions on this. BTW on the subject of seeing the movie end-to-end for thematic development... most of the Sergio Leone - Ennio Morricone collaborations were done by Morricone writing music purely by looking at the script. And then Leone would play the music when shooting the film so as to inspire the actors. How awesome is that! ________________________________ From: "[email protected]" <[email protected]> To: [email protected] Cc: [email protected] Sent: Wednesday, December 17, 2008 2:10:43 AM Subject: Re: [arr] Oscar Watch: Composer I appreciate your well drafted mail clearly explaining why in your opinion sdm does not match upto others but would disagree on the thematic bit...Pls undrstand that whether a film score needs to be thematic or no t dpends on a host of factors starting with the script and ending wth the directors consent. In interviews a r himself has said that danny was clear about whch scenes he wantd music for unlike jodha akbar whch had music in every scene. I knw for a fact that he saw jodha several times frm end to end to get a feel. On the other hand in sdm, he only workd on parts he was told to so there was no way he could visualise end to end and make it thematic. Having said that i must add that he reamains one of the most sensitive and eye for detail composer even if we r talking of scores. Take films with subplots or a large number of characters where it becomes necessary to identify with a particular theme......Thiruda 2, kadhalan, bombay, yuva, bose, taal, tlobs, rdb are just a few examples of what i mean...Sure the movie visuals add to the effect but you cnt look at that in isolation ...For example the jurassic park theme by john williams.... Wondrful piece to listen to....Add the visuals on a 40inch lcd t v and u are transportd to another world..
