Favorite Movie Score

[RoperTrace]

While I can't say it's something I'd listen to repeatedly, 2001: A Space Odyssey is iconic. The dominant timpani in the opening scene really sets the tone.

 

[SimonDoom]

John Carpenter has not only directed some of the top horror movies of all time but does the score for many of them as well.
The Thing, They Live, the famous intro to Halloween and a lot more.

The Halloween piano theme is one of the spookiest ever. It's perfect for that movie.

 

[onehitwanda]

* How to Train your Dragon - John Powell
* Snow falling on Cedars - James Newton Howard

 

[joclfc]

I know it's not a movie score but Jeff Wayne's War of the World's is fantastic

 

[lovecraft68]

The Halloween piano theme is one of the spookiest ever. It's perfect for that movie.

That and Tubular Bells from Exorcist are my favs. I used to play them both on guitar...and that was about the only thing I could play. Well, I could do the Munster's theme song too.

 

[SimonDoom]

That and Tubular Bells from Exorcist are my favs. I used to play them both on guitar...and that was about the only thing I could play. Well, I could do the Munster's theme song too.

If I pulled my guitar out of the closet I might still remember the chords from Freebird, but that's about it.

 

[karina_jayde]

I love Clint Mansell's work, especially for The Fountain and Moon

 

[Djmac1031]

The melody appears earlier (if I remember correctly) when Sam carries Frodo up Mount Doom.

It does, but I believe it's first appearance is when Gandalf describes the White Shores to Pippen during a pause in the battle at Gondor.

And yeah it pulls tears from my eyes every damn time.

 

[Djmac1031]

Okay John Williams has already been mentioned for both Jaws and Star Wars.

But let's not forget that fucking iconic Superman theme. Or The Planet Krypton theme, which is an ode to Also Sprach Zarathustra.

But for full soundtracks, I'll add the original Raiders Of The Lost Ark to the list. You can put the soundtrack on and literally relive every movie moment in your head while listening.

 

[Djmac1031]

And now for one off the slightly beaten path:

The Flash Gordon soundtrack by Queen.

Cheesy movie? Absolutely. But brilliant soundtrack, and features Brian May playing the Wedding March as only he can.

 

[RoperTrace]

It's Star Wars.

I could write another 10k words on other great soundtracks and pretend to evaluate them rationally and according to objective and fair criteria.

It'd still be Star Wars.

One opening chord straight to my childhood.

While I've never heard Williams claim it, the Star Wars music is heavily "borrowed" from Anton Dvorak's, A New World Symphony. ANWS precedes it by a few decades. I had to learn A New World Symphony(parts of) when I played mostly classical piano in my youth. I recognized it immediately when taking my young son to see Star Wars.

 

[Djmac1031]

Indiana Jones is a classic, and not just the main theme, as is the 1970s Superman theme, both of which are John Williams again. No one does bombastic scores quite as well, I feel.

lol. Sorry, should have known someone else would beat me to both of those.

 

[Candy_Kane54]

I loved Vangelis doing the soundtrack for Blade Runner.
Anything by Hans Zimmer (especially DaVinci Code and Gladiator) and John Williams (especially Fanfare for Krypton)

 

[TheRedChamber]

While I've never heard Williams claim it, the Star Wars music is heavily "borrowed" from Anton Dvorak's, A New World Symphony. ANWS precedes it by a few decades. I had to learn A New World Symphony(parts of) when I played mostly classical piano in my youth. I recognized it immediately when taking my young son to see Star Wars.

For those interested in a side by side compairson

There's also that bit in the Mahlers Second which everyone (including I presume the orchestra) refers to as 'The Death Star Blows Up' Here's a clip, although, rather hilariously I'm not entirely sure if it SW then Mahler or the other way around.

And also comparisons to Holst.

Thing with it is, Williams is clearly writing this score in the mode of the great heroic symphony and while he's clearly inspired by a whole bunch of pieces, I don't think he's that cheaky - the Mahler maybe, but it's essentially just a bunch of orchestar hits building tension to an explosion. The Dvorak is similar in tone but I wouldn't count it as ripped off.

As Brahms is supposed to have said when people said his 1st Symphony sounded a lot like Beethoven "Well obviously. Any fool can see that." And indeed it's still a great symphony.

 

[TheRedChamber]

There's also that bit in the Mahlers Second which everyone (including I presume the orchestra) refers to as 'The Death Star Blows Up' Here's a clip, although, rather hilariously I'm not entirely sure if it SW then Mahler or the other way around.

Closer inspections suggest Williams himself is conducting that second one, so...

 

[MajorRewrite]

Rocky: the music made that movie.

Bond, James Bond: the consistent use of the music throughout the series is perfectly done.

 

[SimonDoom]

And now for one off the slightly beaten path:

The Flash Gordon soundtrack by Queen.

Cheesy movie? Absolutely. But brilliant soundtrack, and features Brian May playing the Wedding March as only he can.

It's the only good thing about that movie!

 

[OffNSFW]

Williams was working off of temp tracks that George Lucas had used as a placeholder, hence the similarities between Star Wars and King's Row, the Planets, etc. He had more creative latitude starting with Empire, which might account for how much further out there it is.

Late '70s/early '80s Williams doesn't get enough credit for how fucking weird he got--not in the heroic a-rump-ta-tump march stuff that people typecast him for doing, but more modernist cues like the Hoth battle or baby Superman's journey to Earth. It's adventurous stuff that the average listener would probably find unpalatable if it weren't set to a movie. But music is drama just as much as a movie is. For that reason, I think making music for film can be a point of entry for that kind of rhythmic and harmonic dissonance.

Anyway, Williams is the GOAT. We're not going to get another one like him when he's gone.

 

[HordHolm]

He's been mentioned already but I'd go so far as to state that Leone wouldn't have had half the career he had without Ennio Morricone's scores. If we take it from the perspective of how much the score means to the movie (and even the genre, with Morricone), then Morricone wins by several lengths, with Vangelis for Blade Runner coming in second and perhaps Basil Poledouris with Conan the Barbarian.

 

[Dearelliot]

Music from "Once upon a time in the old West"

 

[joclfc]

Any of the Spaghetti Westerns, The Good, the Bad and the Ugly was great and the Dollar films

 

[CX726577]

Any of the Spaghetti Westerns, The Good, the Bad and the Ugly was great and the Dollar films

Most all of the scores to Quentin Tarantino films.

 

[Bramblethorn]

Fury Road.

 

[MrPixel]

Any of the Spaghetti Westerns, The Good, the Bad and the Ugly was great and the Dollar films

What's fascinating about the early Morricone scores is he was tasked with making epic music on the thinnest budget possible. He had no sweeping large orchestras to build the dramatic moments, yet the music adapts to large ensembles very well. Here's my current favorite interpretation of the Good/Bad/Ugly theme. Of course the English horn at 2:48 may have a little to do with it:

 

[AwkwardlySet]

John Williams - The Superman March. I loved the score since I was a kid for its uplifting and memorable tones. As I grew older and started to understand music better, I started to appreciate even more the rich harmonies and counterpoint of his scores. The man is a rare genius of movie music, probably the greatest ever.

Ennio Morricone - Ecstasy of Gold. The powerful scene from The Good, The Bad, and The Ugly with Tuco running through the graveyard while in the clutches of greed is followed by a truly epic score. Ennio is one of the greatest movie composers of all time in my opinion, who focuses on emotional music and exotic instruments, although his music isn't as harmonically rich and complex as Williams'