i luv cinema

  • Facebook
  • Pinterest
  • Tumblr
  • Twitter
  • YouTube
  • Home
  • 100 “Must-See”
  • About Me
Home Movie Music Hitchcock and His Music

February 23, 2012 By iluvcinema 4 Comments

Hitchcock and His Music

Even if you have not seen Psycho, this music must ring vaguely familiar. For me, this is the ultimate example of the importance of musical scoring in the motion pictures. And no more do I feel the impact of the score then when I watch the films of one of my favorite directors, Sir Alfred Hitchcock.

13 years ago (goodness, me!) I had the pleasure of visiting the Museum of Modern Art (MoMA) in New York City and going to the Alfred Hitchcock exhibition, its arrival coinciding with the auteur’s centenary.

Among my mementos of the trip were a museum print and a compact disk, Alfred Hitchcock: Music from his Films. All these years later, the music from this CD still gets constant rotation on my iPod.

While the composer most closely aligned with Hitchcock is Bernard Herrmann, over his career he also collaborated with the likes of Miklós Rózsa, Franz Waxman and John Williams. Here is a really cool interview in which Williams talks about his collaboration with Hitchcock:

Although this music is not on the disk, I thought it was just lovely; it is a score by Neil Brand, which he composed to accompany the British Film Institute’s restoration of Hitchcock’s 1929 film Blackmail.

I close with the words of Bernard Herrmann himself, talking about music and its importance in cinema.

[haiku url=”https://iluvcinema.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/02/23-Bernard-Herrmann-speaks-on-film-music.m4a” defaultpath=disabled]

Share your thoughts below.

Filed Under: Movie Music Tagged With: alfred hitchcock, bernard herrmann, movie music, score, soundtrack

Comments

  1. Sergio (Tipping My Fedora) says

    February 23, 2012 at 6:25 pm

    Some great clips you’ve got there, well done. I was at a performance of Brand’s score for BLACKMAIL played by the BBC Symphony at the Barbican Centre in London last year and it works superbly well, especially as he throws in many knowing references to Rozsa (and even a little Herrmann) as you can hear in this clip. Hopefully the picture and his score will eventually get married on home video – i think it was first performed in 2008 for the silent cinema festival of Bologna, who commissioned it. There is more info at Neil#shomepage here: http://www.neilbrand.com/review6.shtml
    Sergio (Tipping My Fedora) recently posted..Crescendo (1970) – Tuesday’s Forgotten FilmMy Profile

    Reply
    • iluvcinema says

      February 23, 2012 at 6:31 pm

      Thanks for the comments, Sergio … you are SO lucky to have seen it performed live. I am officially jealous!

      Reply
  2. ruth says

    February 24, 2012 at 5:38 pm

    Hitchcock definitely has distinct music style for his films. I believe Miklós Rózsa worked on the Spellbound one and it really adds to the suspense and psychoanalysis theme to the movie.
    ruth recently posted..Double Clooney Reviews: The Ides of March and The DescendantsMy Profile

    Reply
    • iluvcinema says

      February 24, 2012 at 8:07 pm

      Yes he did 🙂

      Reply

Leave a Reply Cancel reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

CommentLuv badgeShow more posts

Search

Recommended Read

Captain of Her Own Soul

UC Press

Added to My Video Library

Imitation of Life (1934)

Centers of Film Study

  • JBFC
  • MoMA Film Screenings
  • The Picture House
  • University of California Press (Cinema and Media Texts)

Fast Film Resources

  • Alfred Hitchcock Wiki
  • Alfred Hitchcock-Master of Suspense
  • Film | The Guardian
  • Kermode & Mayo's Film Reviews
  • Park Circus
  • Rotten Tomatoes
  • The Internet Movie Database
  • Tribeca Film

Film Societies

  • BAMcinématek
  • Film Society of Lincoln Center

This is How We Blogroll

  • BBC Film: The Bulletin
  • Cinematic Corner
  • Comet Over Hollywood
  • Critical Women on Film
  • FlixChatter
  • Future of Flim (Tribeca Film Blog)
  • in so many words …
  • Kermode's Film Blog
  • Paula's Cinema Club
  • Roger Ebert
  • Sobriety Test Movie Reviews
  • Superhero Movie Talk
  • Sweet Freedom

Archives

Tweets by @iluvcinema
  • Terms of Use
  • Privacy Policy
  • Contact iluvcinema
totalfilm600movieblogs

[footer_backtotop]

Copyright © 2025, iluvcinema ·Streamline Pro Theme · Genesis Framework by StudioPress · WordPress · Log in