Posts in Category: Movie Music
Our Other Music
George M. Cohan
Virtuoso acoustic
- John Fahey: On the Sunny Side of the Ocean
- Bert Jansch: Reynardine/Angie
- Leo Kottke: Vaseline Machine Gun/Last Steam Engine
Historical
- “The Original” Bessie Brown: Song from a Cotton Field/St. Louis Blues
- George M. Cohan: Over There
- Georgia Field Hands: Mary Don’t You Weep
- Madrigals: Fine Knacks for Ladies/Madrigal de Nîmes
- Music of the Civil War
- Randy Newman: Louisiana 1927
- Paul Robeson: Vi Azoy Lebt der Kayser? and Ol’ Man River
- Jay Ungar: Ashokan Farewell
Science
- Alpine Kat: Large Hadron Rap
- Richard Feynman Talks About Light
International
- Amsterdam Klezmer Band: Op een Goppe/A Chassid in Amsterdam
- Black 47: Funky Céilí
- The Clancy Brothers: Finnegan’s Wake
- Juan Luis Guerra: La Guagua/Bachata en Fukuoka
- Carlos Antonio Jobim: Águas of Março
- Yu Hong Mei: Nostalgic Dreams of Beijing/There’s a Golden Sun Over Beijing
- Parov Stelar: Chambermaid Swing
- Proclaimers: King of the Road
- Damien Saez: On a Pas la Thune/J’accuse
- Seu Jorge: Changes/É isso Aí
- Compay Segunda and The Buena Vista Social Club: Chan Chan
- Slim Dusty: Waltzing Matilda
- Jimmy Sturr: Clarinet Polka/Pennsylvania Polka
1950s
- LaVern Baker: Jim Dandy Got Married/Playing the Game of Love
- Fontella Bass: Rescue Me/Don’t Mess Up a Good Thing
- The Cadillacs: Speedoo
- Lee Dorsey: Working in the Coal Line/Ya Ya
- Little Eva: Let’s Turkey Trot
- Phil Phillips: Sea of Love
Gospel/Spiritual
- The Blind Boys of Alabama: Run On
- Al Green: Jesus is Waiting
- Happy Passover/Happy Easter
- Mahailia Jackson: Didn’t It Rain/Joshua Fit the Battle of Jericho
- Alison Krauss: Down to the River to Pray
- Odetta: This Little Light of Mine/Glory, Hallelujah
- Sister Rosetta Tharpe: Up Above My Head
- Albertina Walker: I Can Go to God in Prayer/This is the Way to Sing Praises
Rap/Hip-Hop
- Blockhead: None Shall Pass
- Estelle: American Boy/Wonderful Life
- House of Pain: Jump Around
- Run-DMC: King of Rock/Christmas in Hollis
- Jimmy McMillan: The Rent is Too Damn High Anthem
Comedy
- Victor Borge: Hungarian Rhapsody No. 2
- Tom Lehrer: We Will All Go Together When We Go/The Elements
- The Leningrad Cowboys and The Red Army Choir: Sweet Home Alabama
- Allan Sherman: Shake Hands with Your Uncle Max
Reggae
- Burning Spear: Slavery Days/Old Marcus Garvey
- Bob Marley and the Wailers: Stir It Up
- Polemic: Svetlá Mesta/You Can Get it if You Really Want
- The Skatalites: Phoenix City/The Guns of Navarone
- Toots & The Maytals: Funky Kingston/Fine & Dandy
- Peter Tosh: Johnny B. Goode
Folk
- Harry Chapin: Sniper
- Leonard Cohen: Everybody Knows
- Stompin’ Tom Connors: The Hockey Song/Bud the Spud
- Elizabeth Cotten: Freight Train
- John Fahey: On the Sunny Side of the Ocean
- Steve Goodman: City of New Orleans/Talk Backwards
- Woody Guthrie: Hard Travelin’
- Burl Ives: Medley with Johnny Cash, Scene from Cat on a Hot Tin Roof
- Gordon Lightfoot: TheWreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald
- Kate and Anna McGarrigle: Love Over and Over/Going Back to Harlan
- Ann Rabson: One Meatball/Hopin’ It Will Be All Right
- The Rooftop Singers: Walk Right In/Mama Don’t Allow
- Pete Seeger, Bruce Springsteen: This Land is Your Land
- Bruce Springsteen: John Henry
Zydeco
- Clifton Chenier: Bon Ton Roulet/Calinda!
- Rockin Sidney Simien: Don’t Mess with My Toot Toot
- Buckwheat Zydeco: Hey Ma Petit Fille I’m Going Now/Creole Country
TV/Movies/Shows
- Howard DaSilva, Tom Bosley: Little Tin Box
- Anton Karas: The Third Man Theme
- Dennis Potter: Pennies from Heaven (Anything Goes)/The Singing Detective (Dry Bones)
- Mohammad Rafi: Jaan Pehchan
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Paul Robeson: Ol’ Man River and Vi Azoy Lebt der Kayser?
Here is the beginning of Encyclopedia.com’s profile of the multi-talented Paul Robeson, one of the most important figures — musical and otherwise — of the twentieth century:
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Sergei Prokofiev: Peter and the Wolf
Both the music and the text of Peter and the Wolf, which was an effort to teach children about orchestras and instill a love of music, were written by Sergei Prokofiev. It was released in the Soviet Union in 1936. This version, narrated by actor Sterling Holloway, is perhaps the most famous of many because it was produced and released as a Disney cartoon. It was part of the 1946 animated feature Make Mine Music.
Here is more on Prokofiev:
In breathing new life into the symphony, sonata, and concerto, Sergey Prokofiev emerged as one of the truly original musical voices of the twentieth century. Bridging the worlds of pre-revolutionary Russia and the Stalinist Soviet Union, Prokofiev enjoyed a successful worldwide career as composer and pianist. As in the case of most other Soviet-era composers, his creative life and his music came to suffer under the duress of official Party strictures. Still, despite the detrimental personal and professional effects of such outside influences, Prokofiev continued until the end of his career to produce music marked by a singular skill, inventiveness, and élan. (Continue Reading…)
Prokofiev died on March 5, 1953 — the same day as Josef Stalin. Part I of Peter and the Wolf is above and part II is below.
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Happy Passover, Happy Easter
Above, of course, is Judy Garland and Fred Astaire singing Irving Berlin’s Easter Parade, from the 1948 movie of the same name. Below, the Philadelphia Biblical University Institute of Jewish Studies’ class of 2000 sings the Passover song Dayenu.
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Burl Ives: Great Singer, Great Actor
Burl Ives, who had one of the great voices of the twentieth century, was identified with old ballads and other forms of Americana. He was a folk singer, but not in the mode of the protest music that arose during the 1960s.
Above he sings A Little Bitty Tear alone and is joined by Johnny Cash for a medley on the latter’s show.
Ives also was an accomplished actor. Since there isn’t too much video of him singing, I’m embedding a scene featuring Ives and Paul Newman from the film version of Tennessee Williams’ Cat on a Hot Tin Roof. It’s evident that Ives was a talented guy.
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Dennis Potter: Pennies from Heaven and The Singing Detective
Dennis Potter was an English screenwriter/playwright known for mixing fantasy and reality. His best known works — Pennies from Heaven and The Singing Detective — were BBC productions. The method is the same: The drama is interrupted by the cast spontaneously breaking into elaborately choreographed productions numbers that use scratchy recordings of contemporary pop tunes, to which they lip sync. The songs hint at the underlying tensions and sadness of the lives of the characters, as if they are coming from their unconscious. Potter at the same time is commenting on the growing influence of the media in everyday life, even then. It’s hard to describe other than to say that it’s brilliant.
The title character of The Singing Detective suffers from a horrific skin disease — as Potter did — and spends his days hallucinating from a hospital bed. The lead character of Pennies From Heaven (played in the BBC production by Bob Hoskins, who retired earlier this year after being diagnosed with Parkinson’s disease) is a traveling sheet music salesman. Steve Martin played the role in the American production, which got mixed reviews.
The song in the clip below starts at about the 6 minute mark.
Dry Bones
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The Good, the Bad and the Ukulele
This Day in Music History notes that the sound track of the great spaghetti western The Good, The Bad and the Ugly was number one on the U.K. charts on this day in 1968.
Here is The Ukulele Orchestra of Great Britain’s take on the title track. The title of the orchestra’s DVD, Anarchy in the Ukulele, hopefully won its own prize.
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Deodato: Also Sprach Zarathustra and Rhapsody in Blue
Also Sprach Zarathustra
As the bio below suggests, Eumir Deodato is by far best recognized for his version of Richard Strauss’ Also Sprach Zarathustra in 2001: A Space Odyssey. But his career obviously goes far beyond that great and agonizingly slow movie.
Widely regarded as one of the most respected and sought-after musicians in the music world, Brazilian-born Eumir Deodato has racked up 16 platinum records to his credit as artist, arranger or producer with combined sales of well over 25 million records in the USA alone. His discography, including compilations and all his work as arranger, producer and keyboardist, surpasses 450 albums. He has also had the honor of performing with the St. Louis Symphony (which backed him on his superb Artistry album), the Cincinnati Symphony, the New York Philharmonic and the Orchestra di Musica Leggera dell’Unione Musicisti di Roma. In addition, several artists over the years have covered his songs, including George Benson, Lee Ritenour, Sarah Vaughan and The Emotions to mention just a few. And yet, in spite of all of his varied triumphs, honors and distinctions over the years, the multi-talented, multi-instrumentalist will probably forever be associated with one song – his innovative rendition of Richard Strauss’ classical opus Also Sprach Zarathustra (or more commonly known as the theme to 2001: A Space Odyssey).
Here is the classical versions of Also Sprach Zarathustra and Rhapsody in Blue (featuring Leonard Bernstein). A bit of trivia: Deodato’s daughter is married to the actor Stephen Baldwin, according to Facebook.
Rhapsody in Blue
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