Shaun

Shaun, you've MET me ... as it is fully obvious just by looking at me, I am superior to each single human being in any and all respects, whoever they may be. I thought you had already absorbed that simple fact. God knows I could not be bothered to explain it to you. Perhaps you are not as bright as I hoped. Will you be running off some more CDRs for me before you have become irrelevant? (I have said too much already ...) (and now I have posted it) (perhaps I'm not quite as smart as I think) (oh now I've done it)

Hmm, we haven't played the trivia game in a while ... let me see ... How many pianos did Maurice Jarre use on IS PARIS BURNING? (I know that's a ridiculous question, but I really can't think of anything better. I've pretty much played out my pockets of trivia on other, identical threads. Come on, I've even given this answer away before! Richard Rodney Bennett told us the answer! Well, not personally, but I quoted him!)

In case that's too esoteric, I'll reprise a much older question that many of you will remember, and probably many will not: On what movie did Maurice Jarre replace Jerry Goldsmith? (Yes, we know Goldsmith replaced Jarre on FIRST KNIGHT; don't mix-and-match.)

That might sound backhanded, mightn't it? I mean you're a good fellow, not someone so worthless that you're not even worth "a little bit" of whatever consideration. (Hence I came back to edit a second time. I wonder if it will go through.)

Here's something I don't know: Was the elder McCallum a regular with the National Philharmonic? (I'm not certain whether THE BLUE MAX was done with the National, or whether the National even existed as such at the time. It's been Goldsmith's traditional favorite for so long, though.)

The Maurice Jarre piano question: I thought it was TEN pianos, but this is second or even third-hand knowledge, through an extremely acerbic late-1970s interview with Richard Rodney Bennett published in SOUNDTRACK! magazine.

Come on now, the Jarre-replacing-Goldsmith question is pretty easy. A further hint: Goldsmith did THE SAND PEBBLES instead.

David McCallum Sr. Concertmaster violinist with The Royal Philharmonic, The London Philharmonic, Sir Thomas Beecham's Symphony Orchestra, and The Scottish National Orchestra.

Also appeared on screen as "the blind fiddler" in the 1950 Alec Guinness film of the J.B. Priestley story "Last Holiday."

But I am not clever at all. I had to look up that information, instead of just "knowing" it.

Has anyone got the CD which pairs Goldsmith's The Chairman with Ransom (I think it's these)? Apparently there's something in the liner notes about Sidney Sax gathering together the cream of Britain's session musicians for the recordings, including David McCallum. Sidney's with the National, no?

Well Rocco, I am right bout Goldsmith leaving Grand Prix?

And thank you very much, Mr. Watt, for your additional info.

Sydney Sax is/was the "leader" of the National. I don't know for certain what that comprises.

Sax was credited with conducting WILD ROVERS, but in fact Goldsmith had done that job ... it was considered contractually prudent to say that Sax had done it. (Not that Sax COULDN'T have done it, it was just a money thing.)

I have the CHAIRMAN/RANSOM disc. CHAIRMAN is one of my least favorite Goldsmith scores -- I don't mean it sucks, it just doesn't have anything that really grabs me -- but the sound is decent. RANSOM is terrific, but the sound is wretched. You can't always get what you want, I suppose.

NP: A PATCH OF BLUE (Goldsmith via Intrada)

Hint: he never won an Oscar. (Perhaps this isn't a fair clue, but TECHNICALLy he never "WON" an Oscar.) (That MUST give it away.)

And if I'm not right, let me just take the opportunity to say that the Goldsmith score, all twelve and a half minutes of it, is absolutely sublime. As is North's score for the main movie.

The Sand Pebbles with an Alex North score? I can imagine that, and it would have been great, but what Goldsmith did was incredible, one of his greatest (along with The Artist Who Did Not Want To Paint).

Wow, right again? That makes twice in ten years! Anyway, to answer your question, I've been a member of "Legend" (The Goldsmith Film Music Society) since about 95. I don't know if that's when it was still a fanzine, because it still looks a bit like one (no offence to those who run it, because they've got day jobs, etc). I've contributed a few CD reviews over the last few years, plus an ill-informed piece on Gil Melle ("researched" before I had a computer), but I've been generally low-key.