La-La Land to release 15-disc original series score set

Well, my favorites are still my favorites (and there are many), but I'm actually amazed at how much I am enjoying "Spock's Brain". Granted, I am not one of those that hates it and just dismisses it outright because of its obvious flaws, but the music is really pretty stand out to me. Then again, Fred Steiner set the bar pretty darn high.

I'm also enjoying finally having the source music for all my favorite episode finale 'play-offs' (as I am learning they are called). They are some of my favorite Trek music, especially how they range from somber and curious to bombastically triumphant as the Enterprise typically swishes by and shrinks away into the star patch.
I've had a small collection of ripped finale clips on my MP3 player for years. They were complete with sound effects and dialog from both stand alone endings and other original finale pieces eventually tracked into other episodes, some even combine edited with other music for effect. I had narrowed it down to the best examples (multiple examples for a few) with the least non-musical interference, but I was never entirely certain what episode was the actual source piece for what. I was equally surprised to learn that one of my favorite sad endings (from "A Private Little War") was some of that interesting library stuff.

Now that I know for sure what is the genuine source music, I can clear out my old example rips and replace them with pristine originals. I'm not sure I'll bother this early with editing any two distinct pieces together, but I do have a short cue sheet now that explains the source material for the balance of those rips. I'll retain the rips on my HD for reference I suppose.

Also, some other great scene openers, filler, and source music are starting to reveal themselves. "Go for Baroque" is one of my favorite pieces, even sandwiched between two other segments of music (a 'sweet'ner' and another 'play-off' I'm told) as it always has been at the beginning of "The Conscience of the King." It never once occurred to me that it was the same music playing later during the Karidian company's performance aboard ship. Guess I'm too into the story at that point. Having it here in its entirety though is just perfect!

I actually adore "Beyond Antares" sung by Nichelle Nichols but my brain about exploded when I heard a whole extra verse/chorus of that song I'd never heard before! I'm really just having a blast with this set!

 

That's the one I've been trying to remember. I've been talking earlier in this thread about this mysterious sad cue that some episode ended with, but I thought it was a third-season episode. Which cue is it? Looking over the S2 library titles, I'd guess "Captain Playoff No. 3 (Sad and Alone)."

 

That's it!

 

I was never a huge fan of Shore Leave on the GNP disc, but I remember one time watching the episode and hearing the music when (iirc) Kirk and the gang are running towards gunshots. I thought "Wow! How did I miss THAT one the CD?!?" Then I thought "How did THEY miss that on the CD?!?!?" Now I find that it's a Joseph "I love Courage's MT Theme" Mullendore library cue! I don't know if it was used anywhere else.

Christopher, to me "Finale" will always be the end of City on the Edge of Forever.

 

It's curious that you don't recognize it. While it's not used in "Balance of Terror" it was previously released on one of the "Best of" albums from GNP years ago.

It also turned up in "The Alternative Factor".

Neil

 

I just checked the booklet for that Best of album and I didn't see "Agitato" among its BoT cues.

So it wasn't used in the episode? Unfortunately the listings here don't seem to specify what was used and what wasn't, which is unusual.

 

It opens the suite on "Balance of Terror", found on the volume 2 release.

Neil

 

^The first cue there is listed as "Romulan Warship." Is that an error?

 

I didn't work on that release, but I would say so. Use your ears. What do you think?

Neil

 

Finally got the set imported into itunes.


-Chris

 

Done with Disc 4. I'm going to have to readjust to the original version of "The Enemy Within," since I've gotten so used to the Bremner/Label X suite version over the years. I mean, intellectually I know the difference between the suite version and the episode version, but I listened to the suite version a lot and it influenced my expectations.

"The Conscience of the King" is a really good, underrated score. Lenore's theme is one of the best ST love themes, and there's a lot of other interesting stuff too. One thing that struck me, looking at the orchestra list: it has no percussion, and no brass except a single French horn. That's unusual. It's interesting how the different composers economized by choosing different ensemble variations.

And it's a nice touch how "Poison" sort of paraphrases the last bars of "Beyond Antares," which it immediately follows. The song holds up pretty well. Anyone have a transcription of the lyrics?

Mullendore is also distinctive for his use of the "long-line" portion of the main title theme, or what I tend to think of as the "song" portion (since it's the part the lyrics accompany). I'm pretty sure he's the only TOS composer, including Courage, who used that motif in an episode score proper as opposed to just titles. In fact, the only other instance I can think of where that motif was used outside of the titles was in Courage's log-entry cues for ST:TMP. Am I missing any?

And what the heck is the deal with that "5 Sex and 1/2" cue? I know I read or heard something about it somewhere, explaining what it was (since it sure wasn't in the episode), but I can't remember now.

 

"Five Sex and a Half" is not used in the episode but was heard in the second season blooper reel. I was asked what funny cue names I found on this set and that was the one I mentioned. The cue also lines up perfectly with the episode (it's meant to underscore Lenore beaming onboard the Enterprise).

Neil

 

Any idea when moviemusic.com will be getting their stock of this set? I'm sure La-La-Land's orders take precedence...

 

Having a GREAT time listening to season one's discs. There's so much to that music to discover beyond what we merely thought was performed by listening to the TV versions.

This is a first rate box set worth every penny.

 

“I had this kind of funny thing going on with the bass guitar.”

I'll say! Season 3 disc2, the Elaan of Troyius score. You can hear it in track 9 “Realization-Battle Stations” from about 1:18 to 1:45. Also in track 10 “Close Call” from 0:19 to 0:30, and again from 1:00 to 1:05.

What's he doing with it? Sounds like someone's playing it with a bow, or sliding a guitar pick along the strings, or something.

 

To this day "Fight with TIE Fighters" from Return of the Jedi sounds too fast to me because of a re-recording.

Yep, you missed two. Horner used it at the end of Search for Spock and Rosenman used it at the end of The Voyage Home (tied for my favorite with quote TMP). Interestingly TMP is the only time COURAGE used it.

But Mullendore is the only one who used it in the series. Too bad. I think he showed (especially in Impension) that it could be a versatile theme.

Interesting that it was Justman who insisted on the fanfare whenever the Enterprise was seen. How many shows these days use thier title music at all? (If they have any.)

 

Giacchino did use it in ST'09, but only as end-title music, so it doesn't really fit my question.

Actually I did miss one more in-series use: Wilbur Hatch's "Humoresque" library cue, used in "City on the Edge" when Kirk swipes the clothes, is a variation on the long-line motif.

Arrow's brief main-title theme does show up in the episode scores as the title character's leitmotif, I think. Person of Interest and maybe Elementary have used their title motifs in scoring as well. And pretty much any Bear McCreary-scored series is going to use its main-title theme in the episode scoring. McCreary's one of the main people who's brought back a more melodic, orchestral sound to TV scoring.


Just finished the final Season 1 disc. The unused "City on the Edge" cues are kind of interesting. Was "Edith's Vision" also unused? I didn't recognize it.

There's no vocalist credit for the brief sung portion of "Goodnight Sweetheart." Was the singer not identified in the music documentation?

Finding out about Steiner's library versions of his episode cues has really cleared a lot up for me. I often noticed over the years that tracked versions of Steiner's cues sometimes had elements missing -- like the version of "Zap Janice" that doesn't have Rand's flute motif over the cellos, or the version of "Charlie's Mystery" that just trails off on a sustained cello note instead of going into that up-tempo falling-and-rising bit I like so much. Ages ago, I mentioned that to my father, who was in the broadcasting business and very knowledgeable about music; and his assumption, based on my descriptions rather than actually hearing the cues, was that they'd been multitrack recordings with the various instruments acoustically isolated so that one part or another could be dialed out from the recording. I accepted his explanation, but now I realize it didn't entirely explain some of the variations, like the long sustain on the alternate "Charlie's Mystery," or the version of "Standoff" that's a bit more up-tempo than the original. Knowing that Steiner did separate library versions, and experimented with these kinds of variations that I'm hearing here, explains so much.

I wish my father were still alive so I could show this set to him. He wasn't a big Trek fan, but he loved music and music scholarship. He would've probably been interested to learn about this behind-the-scenes stuff and see the orchestra member lists. I bet he would've recognized some of the musicians' names and could've told me something about them.

Was the audio for "Charlie Is My Darling" recorded on set? It does include a lot of ambient sounds and Nichols did seem to be moving around relative to the mike. But I'd assume the instrumental portions were recorded in the studio. Maybe the whole thing was done in the studio after the fact to match the film? That would be an unusual way to do it.

Were the "Squire of Gothos" cues really played on a harpsichord, or was it the Hammond organ faking a harpsichord? Can Hammond organs do that? Because the tone quality of that instrument was not very pleasant to my ear, and I'm wondering if it's because it was a substitute for the real thing, or because the real thing genuinely sounds like that.

Hatch's "Vina's Dance" was interesting -- not as good as Courage's, but it didn't have to be, and I can tell how it was an influence on Courage's version.

Some of the sound effects and outtakes are more interesting than others; some get a bit tedious. I didn't really need 2 whole minutes of Planet Atmosphere Alternate #4. But it was neat to hear the origin of the sickbay heartbeat sound, and actually hearing the moment when the transporter sound was invented was really something.

Track 73, the Courage-conducted outtakes of the electric-violin main title arrangement, are interesting in that they seemed to be tweaking it as they went, trying different variations. There's some of that in the next track too; I like the louder cymbal accompaniment to the fanfare on Track 74, take 2; it reminds me of the TAS theme. But the Steiner end title outtakes have a lot more consistency to them. They're just playing the same arrangement several times to get the best performance, without the same kind of experimentation.

On to season 2! But first, lunch.

 

My problem with the Bremner recording of this score was, I thought they did not handle the main danger themes very well. For example "Confrontation" from about 1:35 on in the new set: in the Bremner they messed up the tempo or something. I loved the writing of the suite, but my enjoyment of the performance was always tempered by those sections.

(However the solo cello bit [from "Spock Takes Over"] is played very very well on the Bremner. Possibly even better than it's done in the original.)

So it's wonderful to hear Kaplan and the studio orchestra handle it "right". Great stuff.

However, now that I have the music "played" correctly, I find that I miss having it be one coherent piece of music, the way the suite is.
The score is herky-jerky and interrupted the way a TV score has to be, with scene changes and Enterprise flyby's etc. I guess there is no pleasing me. ;-)

Yeah. It's funny, I find the "flybys" an annoying interruption when I try to listen to the scores now. I've put together mixes of episodes (with the stuff that was available prior to the box set) where I've edited WAV files to get rid of them. But I'd still have to say that Justman was right, it's an arresting signature when you actually watch the show. A powerful scene-setting element.

 

True. But I think Giacchino and Horner are the only two to use the opening notes before the fanfare in the score proper (outside of the series).

Yes it is. I missed that that was Hatch and not Mullendore. Love that cue.

Fair enough. But as much as I love McCreary and he does use lots of motifs, when did he ever use the second season (first season in the UK) title music in an episode? The first season US credits were tracked FROM an episode IIRC.

And I love Person of Interest.

The big thing for me was hearing that the "flatline drone" in WNMHGB when Gary plays dead actually was a part of the score.

Enjoy lunch. Catspaw is waiting for you.

 

Umm, second season of what show? I'm guessing you mean Galactica. I never paid much attention to its main-title music. I was thinking more of other McCreary-scored shows like Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles, The Cape, and Caprica.