Dan Jones has two major feature scores to his credit. One - MAX - was an elegant Germanic-tinged work that won the Ivor Novello award, an achievement that puts it in excellent company. This score has never been released sadly, though there was talk of Mellowdrama Records doing it a couple of years ago that has since died off.

The other is SHADOW OF THE VAMPIRE, a curious film. Murnau's NOSFERATU had already received as good a remake as it was ever likely to, with Werner Herzog at the helm. So Elias Mehrige made a film about the making of NOSFERATU, based on the premise that the horror story in the film was merely a tame version of what went on behind the scenes. I can't say I was a huge fan of the film, but it was interesting, well-acted for sure. I must watch the film again some time to appreciate the score in context, if only to figure out what order the music was meant to play it. (The album sequencing is somewhat unusual - very non-linear.)

Dan Jones score is a real treat though, a blend of avante-garde and romantic idioms with some truly gorgeous melodies. The waltzes for Greta and 'the shipbuilding' cover very different moods - the former unwieldy and drunk with excess ('Greta's Waltz'), the latter more controlled and melancholy ('The Lonely Voyage', 'The Ship-building Waltz'). There's a dark-hued tango that recurs throughout ('Wagner arrives', with shrill jazzy trumpet and fiddle), and the foxtrot (?) given cynical lyrics under the title 'Herr Doktor (Laudenum Domine)'. And Jones works the source piece 'The Sweet Days of Summer' into his score, presenting it as a duet for violin and piano in 'A Concert in Wismar', reminiscent of the popular songs of the era whose English equivalent played such an important role in GOSFORD PARK.

The action music, full of scratchy fiddle soli frequently gives the album spirited jolts. 'Shreck kills Peter' and 'The Bunker' (so good they played it twice) are probably the best of these.

Surrounding this spirited material is a rather atmospheric orchestral score with emphasis on strings, harp and woodwinds. *(Some would say in the spirit of Bernard Herrmann, but the similarity is not very strong once you get past the general tone of the material.) 'Shreck and the Locket', 'Murnau's Vision'. The off-kilter feeling is never far off even in these tracks, as Jones mixes distant unusual sounds (mostly acoustic from what I can tell) into the music. More familiar unconventional performance techniques are also present, hence the scordatura violins of 'The Woods' and the opening of 'Light of the Sun'. (When the latter cue expands into the full string section, I challenge any man who claims to be sensitive to resist the melancholy of that music.)

The highlight is probably 'Title Music', which comes toward the end of the album. It starts with what sounds like a diegetically-located small ensemble playing 'The Sweet Days of Summer' (no vocal). A more acoustically-enveloping score piece gradually takes over the track, journeying from softly-intimidating impressionistic colours to an almost Romantic triumph.

There is some dialogue and effects mixed throughout the album (thunder in 'Music at the Inn', Malkovitch and Defoe talking 'Shreck eats'), but its not an album killer and probably adds to the atmosphere more than anything. Another weird thing - many of the track titles seem off, and it's hard to find a consistent pattern to the errors. (E.g. 'Wagner Arrives' is a tango, but 'Tango au lupins chaude' is not!)

This is the score I wish Herzog's film had.

In this sense, if you are bored today, I would suggest changing your homepage to the following page:
http://www.moviemusic.com/cgi-bin/mb/search.pl

Maybe some people like interesting conversations to find them, instead of them finding the interesting conversations. The search homepage won't go out and find things for you, but if you do have an interest in something from the past, do a search on it.

There are hundreds and thousands of posts here, so much good stuff.

It's something of an exaggeration to say '1000s' as well. If there were 40, I'd be surprised, since 4 of the 4 threads that contained the title of the film didn't run on more than a few posts.

I do wish there was an easier way to discover some of the discussions in a more accidental manner. There's something fresh about it, even though the discussion might be 6 1/2 years old!

Truly finding in depth analysis on anymore than a good handful of scores is a tough quest. I wish there were more of us who could do this, but it seems with all that distracts us, we really need some serious discipline.

Thanks for the original post up top, though, franzie. Next time someone searches for the soundtrack through the forum search, there's a little something more!

Burwell's Gods and Monsters
Danna's Regeneration
Iglesias' Talk to Her

... now Jones' Shadow of the Vampire

Thanks for the intelligent insight into the score. I've only seen this movie on DVD when it was first released, so I don't remember the music. It looks as though it's better than the film!

Can I nominate Nathan Johnson's score from 2005's Brick? Maybe I'll have to write that one up.

quote:

---

Originally posted by nuts_score:
Can I nominate Nathan Johnson's score from 2005's Brick? Maybe I'll have to write that one up.

---

Indeed you will, as I've neither heard the music nor seen the film. I imagined anything in the post-modern noir vein would probably be full of references. Is it so?

quote:

---

How about you do Patrick Doyle's Great Expectations? I'm curious to hear your thoughts there.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by franz_conrad:
Can I nominate Nathan Johnson's score from 2005's Brick? Maybe I'll have to write that one up.

Indeed you will, as I've neither heard the music nor seen the film. I imagined anything in the post-modern noir vein would probably be full of references. Is it so?

---

Only aesthetic references, as Brick was one of the most refreshing and original neo-noirs since Body Heat or The Last Seduction. It was certainly the best debut film I've seen since Blood Simple. I'll go into detail about the score on an upcoming "cousin" thread similar to yours'. The score certainly owes a bit to The Third Man (and it even includes an Anton Karas piece, and quite a good one, too).