Sir Malcolm ARNOLD
Classic film scores
The Roots of Heaven (1958)
David Copperfield (1970)
Moscow Symphony Orchestra/William
Stromberg
Recorded at the Mosfilm Studio, Moscow, 4-7 April 2000
MARCO POLO 8.225167
[62:09]
Crotchet
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recommendations
I recently gave a warm welcome to a Chandos disc of
Arnold's film music which presented
a wide-ranging selection of self-contained excerpts from his vast
output for cinema: in essence, the music was more important than the films
for which it was written. Here, Marco Polo presents, what I take to be, all
the music Arnold wrote for The Roots of Heaven and David
Copperfield. Its brilliance as film-music is beyond question; but hearing
it in this fashion as music per se is an unrewarding experience. The
Roots of Heaven is particularly unsatisfactory: of the twenty tracks
(lasting 33:59 minutes in total) only four exceed two minutes in length,
and many of them come to an abrupt end. The David Copperfield music
is slightly less fragmentary (13 tracks occupy 28:04 minutes), and Arnold's
mastery of miniature forms is here more fulfilled.
I think I'm right in saying that Arnold churned out his film scores (something
like five a year for over 20 years) because he needed the cash. Knowing his
great achievements in the larger forms of symphony and concerto, one is not
surprised to find that when his financial circumstances at last permitted
him to do so, he deserted the cinema in 1970, never to return. For one of
the frustrations of writing for the cinema must be the tyranny of the stopwatch.
Arnold was unsurpassed in submitting to this tyranny, but his muse must have
suffered in the process.
Still, this is a disc to recommend for two reasons. It comes with by far
the lengthiest and most informative booklet I have ever encountered: the
making of the two films is described in great detail, as is Arnold's involvement
in the process; and the biographical information goes much beyond the subject
immediately in hand. The second reason is this: the disc is as comprehensive
a guide as you could wish for to Arnold's unique melodic, harmonic and orchestral
world.
Performance and recording: excellent.
Adrian Smith
See also
reviews by Ian
Lace and Gary Dalkin on Film Music on the Web
Visit the Malcolm Arnold
Website
