After over six months of researching, reviewing, and building it, and contacting all the composers, yesterday night I premiered it: http://www.btasscores.150m.com Of course, about 12 hours later the 150m.com company is servers promptly went down, so try the site tomorrow. The site is devoted to the scores from the first three seasons of "Batman: The Animated Series". What you will find: Art, music samples, interviews, and more.
Sounds interesting. I just finished watching the full B:TAS DVD collection I recently bought, so I've heard all that music over the past couple of weeks. I only regret it isn't available on CD. And how are you defining "the first three seasons?" Production-wise, there were two seasons of B:TAS and either one or two of TNBA. Broadcast-wise, B:TAS was split over four seasons (although with only 10 episodes premiering in the second, 10 in the third, and 5 in the fourth). If you're referring only to the Fox/B:TAS seasons, why exclude TNBA? There was some terrific music there too.
I define the first three season the way IMDB does. Anything afterward and IMDB calls it by another name (I think "The Adventures of Batman & Robin"). Basically, when the artistic style changed.
No, The Adventures of Batman and Robin was a title used for most of the second production season of B:TAS (aired as the third and fourth broadcast seasons on Fox, in 1994-5). It featured a new title montage of clips showing both Batman and Robin in action, with a really gorgeous arrangement of Shirley Walker's Batman leitmotif as the main title theme. The change in art style came when the series was revived as The New Batman Adventures a few years later. Those "New Look" episodes never had their own main-title theme, airing as part of The New Batman/Superman Adventures with a combined title sequence and a new Shirley Walker theme. The DVD set uses the original BTAS main titles for those, which is disappointing, because I like either of Walker's themes far better than the Elfman theme. Okay, looking at IMDb, I see it combines the two Adventures of B&R seasons under the "Season 3" heading. So again, why not cover the New Batman Adventures episodes as well?
Matter of personal taste in the show's style afterward. The 150m.com servers are back up, so hope everyone checks the site out. And they are the first three seasons, as you can see by the airing date; even if they were aired out of production order, you can see each season has a September to May cycle. And the DVD's handle it that way too.
But if the focus is on the music, there's no significant change in the style there. They still used orchestral scores, most of which were still by Shirley Walker with some by Lolita Ritmanis, Harvey Cohen, and other TAS veterans. And there's some good stuff there. Nightwing got a cool theme (featured in "You Scratch My Back," "Over the Edge," and "Old Wounds"), as did the villain Roxy Rocket in "The Ultimate Thrill" (whose motif sounds more like a classic adventure hero's theme than a villain's theme, but that fits the thrillseeking character). Walker's eerily soulful, Celtic-influenced score for the Ventriloquist/Scarface episode "Double Talk" was quite memorable -- a very different direction than her jazzy score for the original Ventriloquist/Scarface episode "Read My Lips," but appropriately so since the emphasis was more on Wesker than on Scarface. In "Chemistry," Walker briefly reprises the "destiny" motif from Mask of the Phantasm when Bruce decides to give up being Batman. In "Girls' Night Out," Ritmanis does some nice, subtle work with all the character leitmotifs she's juggling in the score -- Batgirl, Supergirl, Harley, Ivy, Livewire. "Beware the Creeper" features a lively, jazzy Creeper theme (I think it's by Michael McCuistion, but I could be wrong). And of course in the Dick Sprang segment of "Legends of the Dark Knight," Walker does a fun pastiche of stock drop-in cues from old TV cartoons and serials, complete with really abrupt cuts from one piece of "library music" to the next (though all the cues were original to Walker). Not exactly. The first 60 episodes were aired between September 1992 and May '93. Fox then aired the last 5 episodes of the first production season in the week of Sept. 13-17, 1993 and 5 episodes of the second production season over the month of May 1994 (2 in the first week, then one per week thereafter, interspersed with reruns); those technically fall into a single broadcast year, though they're over 7 months apart. Then we got 10 more episodes under the Batman & Robin title once a week from September to November 1994. And the 5 remaining episodes of the second production season were delayed until the week of September 11-15, 1995, making them technically part of a fourth broadcast year. No, they don't. They take the 85 TAS episodes and divide them into three essentially equal volumes of 28, 28, and 29 episodes. The FOX "seasons," going by the IMDb definitions, were 60, 10, and 15 episodes respectively (although in fact they were 60, 5+5, 10, and 5). The fourth DVD volume contains all 24 TNBA episodes, which were aired over two seasons of 13 and 11 episodes, respectively (Sep '97-Jul '98 and Sep '98-Jan '99). Also, the DVDs contain the episodes in production order, which in the case of TAS is radically different from the broadcast order. And your server still isn't working. I had the link open in another window while writing this response, and I just realized it was still loading after nearly 15 minutes, with nothing but a white screen.
Three seasons is more than enough to handle. I still haven't done all the reviews for the episode I got here. Besides, anyone who loves hte music from the ones I cover, will like the music for the later episodes and Superman: TAS. And instead of taking me to task on it, you can see on my site I mention the other episodes and their music being good too. So enjoy all the eoffrt I put in, damnit.
I can't see anything on your site, as I explained. And I'm not taking you to task, merely offering clarification. Given that you've created a site which, presumably, is intended to inform people, I had assumed you would welcome accurate information rather than resisting it.
The information I have there is accruate, even more so than commonely known, as the composer credits for example.
Why so defensive? You seem to think I'm criticizing you, but all I'm doing is trying to help by offering more information. Granting that the information you have there is accurate, what's the problem with accepting a gift of additional information? We're both fans of BTAS music. We're on the same side here. Finally able to get into the main page of the site, although the server is extremely slow and I still can't access any other pages. Sad to learn that Harvey Cohen has passed away. He did terrific work, especially in "A Bullet for Bullock."
The better question is not "Why so defense", as "why are we still going in the same circle?" Just enjoy my site. :-) The information is accurate, it comes from the composers. I reach all of the 23 living composers, the widow of Harvey R. Cohen (material for him will come at a later date), both of Walker's sons (still handling the Walker Estate, I am told), and yes -- Cohen had a bright future ahead of him. The servers wre down four about four hours yesterday. And at the rate I'm getting hit and bandwidth being consumed, it's looking like all my bandwidth for the month will be used up before the month is over, meaning the site won't be back online until the 1st of the next month. I guess that's a good thing.
Look, I'm just trying to help. I'm not disputing the accuracy of the information on your site, and I don't understand what I've said that makes you think I am. I'm simply offering more information and suggestions. I don't understand why you're being so resistant to a well-intentioned effort to support and assist you in your efforts. It looks like a good site, but why rest on your laurels when you could make it even richer?
Because I got enough new information to take care of, technical school starting in a couple days, and some other stuff. I don't have the time really. And on top of that, I'd just like some free time away from a computer screen.
Okay. I never suggested you had to make updates instantly. Just something to keep in mind for the future.