Listening to Movies: The Film Lover's Guide to Film Music
During the course of a lifetime, the average moviegoer will hear thousands of film scores, of which only a handful will register strongly. Karlin, concentrating here on instrumental scores rather than songs, targets the lay reader with no prior musical training. First, he explains the technical means by which a film's music is composed, recorded, and mixed. Next, he discusses what to listen for and how to evaluate a film score, using the music of eight popular films as examples. Karlin also includes an overview of the composer's role, from the era of silent films to the present, as well as personal profiles of the composers. Appendixes covering a list of soundtrack shops and vendors, a filmography, and a list of Academy Award winners and nominees add to his guide's usefulness as a resource. Informative but far from dry, this book should be in any serious film collection.- Marianne Cawley, Kingwood Branch Lib., Tex.Copyright 1994 Reed Business Information, Inc.