COLLECTION True Grit: Music from the Classic Films of John Wayne
Paul Bateman conducting the
City of Prague Philharmonic
Silva SSD 1037
[64:27] [Note this is an established release, issued in
1994]
Amazon
US
I usually am wary of compilation-score albums that are drawn from the films
of a single actor’s work, but this one caught my attention with its
wide-ranging content spanning an array of film music styles. For all his
many stolid and repetitious screen roles, Wayne also contributed no small
number of significant performances during his long career — many of
which must have, in one way or another, helped inspire some darned fine music.
And, like a good John Wayne Western, let’s cut right to the chase: This
CD is worth purchasing simply to have the suite of themes from Jerry
Goldsmith’s In Harm’s Way. Composed in 1965, when Goldsmith was
on the verge of what, arguably, was his most creative period, this score
features a riveting, horn-driven theme for Wayne’s character, ‘The
Rock.’ Militaristic yet strongly melodic, the theme is a minor gem from
the composer’s early career and is superior, I think, to his far-better
known Patton theme from a few years later. The segment also includes the
film’s main title sequence (‘First Victory’), which director
Otto Preminger placed at the end of the film over dramatic special-effects
footage of a storm at sea. For it, Goldsmith drops his already well-established
thematic material to present, instead, starkly austere music depicting the
bleakness of war. Paul Bateman’s take on this final cue with the City
of Prague Philharmonic is slower and more deliberate than Goldsmith’s
original version, but that’s a small caveat. (Goldsmith fans also should
appreciate this trivia note: The composer appears in one of the film’s
scenes -- conducting a small Navy band.)
"True Grit ... John Wayne" opens with music from four classic Wayne films
directed by John Ford, who loved to use traditional folk melodies in his
films. To see how effectively this can be done, pick up the video of Stagecoach
and watch the opening 2 minutes -- a masterpiece of economical storytelling
in which Ford cuts quickly between various set-up scenes punctuated by Richard
Hageman’s equally fast-cutting themes that include standards ‘Bury
Me Not on the Lone Prairie’ and ‘I Dream of Jeannie with the Light
Brown Hair.’ Both Ford’s and Hageman’s styles are passé
today, but they were fresh and dynamic in 1939 and much of that freshness
is captured by Bateman in a 10-part ‘Narrative for Orchestra’ that
takes the listener along on the perilous stagecoach journey into Apache
territory. Ten years later, Wayne gave a performance that ranks among my
own sentimental favorites, in Ford’s She Wore a Yellow Ribbon.
‘Leaving the Fort’ offers a rousing version of that film’s
title song, also incorporating the popular cavalry march ‘Gary Owen.’
Matched with Ford’s visuals, this is muscular music that becomes part
of the film, and Bateman’s handling here brings it nicely alive.
Also well handled is a 7-minute suite from Max Steiner’s The Searchers
-- even though Ford reportedly disliked the score, suggesting it sounded
more appropriate for Cossacks than Indians. (He offered virtually identical
criticism of Alex North’s music to Cheyenne Autumn.) In truth,
Steiner’s music is gently insightful in its delineation of Wayne’s
complex Ethan Edwards character, and even his drum motifs for the Indians
are more stirring than stereotyped. The Quiet Man, with Victor Young’s
impressive takes on various Irish themes, rounds out the Ford films, although
he also directed the brilliant Civil War segment in How the West Was Won,
which featured Wayne as the crusty Gen. William Sherman and is represented
on this recording by Alfred Newman’s rousing main title music.
While I wish this CD offered more music from its title score, what we do
have from True Grit is enjoyable. Apart from Wayne’s and Kim Darby’s
excellent performances, this 1969 film features what I consider perhaps the
best of Elmer Bernstein’s many outstanding Western scores — as
much for the delicacy with which he underlines the character of the young
girl, Mattie Ross, as for the humor and strength with which he invests
Wayne’s Oscar-winning role of Rooster Cogburn. By the time he was ready
to release the film’s original soundtrack on LP, Bernstein had decided
to take a different tack, re-recording its themes and cues in arrangements
by swing/jazz orchestrator Artie Butler. No doubt this afforded a welcome
break from his usual soundtrack-recording routine, but it also denied us
the full-blooded glory of the real score. Bernstein partially rectified that
in the mid-1980s when he recorded 21 minutes covering 9 cues for an LP that
also offered music from The Commancheros. That recording with the Utah Symphony,
available on CD from Varese Sarabande, may be more authoritative than this
version, but Bateman and veteran arrangers Leo Shuken and Jack Hayes (both
of whom have often worked with Bernstein) have produced a worthy complement
to the composer’s version.
Two Dimitri Tiomkin scores are included in this collection. The Oscar-winning
The High and the Mighty is a theme indelibly connected with Wayne, who whistled
it throughout the film as he helped fly a stricken airliner. Bateman does
a commendable job, also, with the overture from The Alamo which, like How
the West Was Won, features a dead-on arrangement by Christopher Palmer. The
Longest Day and The Cowboys round out this CD’s offerings. The former
is a simplistic albeit catchy march tune which Bateman handles adroitly,
largely eschewing bombast for a surprising subtlety. The Cowboys is represented
by the 9-minute overture popularized by its composer, John Williams, when
he was with the Boston Pops. To the City of Prague Philharmonic’s credit,
it handles Williams’ energetic French horn writing with a vigor that
rivals the Pops’.
And this final note: The liner notes -- compiled with the aid of The John
Wayne Film Society in Sutton-in-Ashfield -- features a handful of nice stills
and mini-posters from the actor’s films. I especially enjoyed the contrast
between the gaunt, obsessed Ethan Edwards of The Searchers and the
almost-wistfully smiling David Crockett of The Alamo.
Reviewer
John Huether
