Hello, I was contacted to play hurdy gurdy for this movie. By this time they had already faked some kind of sound for the hurdy gurdy. I was told it was Tom Hanks who wanted a hurdy gurdy in the film. They wanted me to play the tune Good King Wenceslas on Tom Hanks own hurdy gurdy. His hurdy gurdy turned out to be an old Camac kit which he got from Lark In The Morning. When I turned it on its side to play it, all the keys fell into the keybox as they had been made too short. This instrument had many other problems. I worked on it for a few hours and was able to get it playing.
So when I went to the recording session I brought Hanks instrument and also one of my own,a beautiful old Baroque vielle by Caron of Versailles. The first thing they did was film me with a process called motion capture so they could have the correct way of playing the hurdy gurdy. The Camac sounded so dredful that they wanted me to play my own one instead. It was really wonderful to work with the music director Alan Silvestre. When we were done we had some really nice takes of Good King Wenceslas. So then the director Robert Zemekes came in. The first thing he didn't like was the trompette. So we did it again without trompette. Then he said it did't sound sad enough and could I play it two and a half octaves lower. There was no way to do that so that was the end of the session. I still havn't seen the movie but from what I hear It dosn"t sound much like a hurdy gurdy and the did not bother to correct the improper image of playing. Curtis Berak --- Gary Plazyk <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > Hi! > > I tried to find more on why the hobo and the hurdy > gurdy were added to the original story, and didn't > come up with much. > > I did find a comment on > http://www.everythingdulcimer.com/ that said: > "Tom Hanks is another very accomplished musician. He > plays guitar. He also has a interesting side note in > that he owns and plays a Hurdy Gurdy (not the monkey > organ grinder thing, but a true hurdy gurdy). If you > have seen "The Polar Express", you might have > recognized that the hobo on top of the train was > playing a hurdy gurdy. Side note: during filming > they made wire mock ups of everything the actors > would interact with for the animation. Tom asked the > prop guys to mock up a hurdy gurdy, and of course > they had no idea what he was talking about. After a > bit of internet research they did his mock up). > -Paul Bostick, Stillwater Oklahoma" > > So perhaps it was Tom Hanks that wanted the hurdy > gurdy included in the movie. > > I also found a credit for Russell Johnsen on fiddle > & hurdy-gurdy (is he on this list??? - could he > maybe provide more details?). > > Best regards, > > -Gary P. > > > Michael Gaschler wrote: > > Although I am sure most on the list are well aware > of it, the gurdy gets a nice spot in the most recent > make of The Polar Express. It's unfortunate that it > is being played by a creepy bum and is thereby cast > into an unpleasant light. > > ____________________________________________________________________________________ Looking for last minute shopping deals? Find them fast with Yahoo! Search. http://tools.search.yahoo.com/newsearch/category.php?category=shopping
