FSF-079 You're Fired! (06/02/07)

Have you ever worried about losing your job? I think everybody during some point in their lives has felt a small shade of stress when it comes to job security. Let's face it, not many people have jobs which are so secure they seem to defy the laws of basic economics.

Film composers are no different. Rejected scores are unfortunately far more common than one might think. So why do composers get fired? Is it because they're lazy, show up late to scoring sessions, yell obscenities at the director, or purposely sabotage their own work? Not hardly. The main reason composers' scores are rejected is that director's simply are not happy with them and there is no time, desire, or patience, to work with the composer to fix it. The solution in many of these cases is replacement. To a film director it's almost easier to start from scratch with a new composer than work out what it is they don't like about the score from the previous composer. It takes a lot of money to heal this particular wound but in the film industry healing wounds are paramount to frugality.

This week on Film Score Focus we're going to listen to music from rare rejected scores. They're rare because scores don't often see the light of day once they are tossed out. A tiny crop of rejected scores have been commericially released and several more are floating around as private composer promos. Just about every major composer that I have played on Film Score Focus has had a score rejected at some point during their career. They still get paid but most composers admit that money is a poor anesthetic when the painful dagger of rejection impales their creative heart. Tune in and tell me if the music you hear sounds deserving of the trash heap because that's where all of this week's music ended up.

Here is the program lineup for FSF-079 You're Fired!



One of the most famous rejected scores in the history of cinema was Alex North's 2001: A SPACE ODYSSEY (1968) which was rerecorded by Jerry Goldsmith and released on Varese Sarabande in 1993. In January 2007, the near miraculous release of the original 1968 recordings from 2001 were released by Intrada Special Collection and limited to 3000 copies. CDs are still available on Intrada's web site.

Jerry Goldsmith's last rejected score before his passing was TIMELINE (2003) which was released on Varese Sarabande. WOLFEN (1981) by Craig Safan was released by Miles End many years ago and has since been long out of print. Copies can be found floating around on ebay at times. Even the great Elmer Bernstein has had scores rejected. One of his more recent throw-aways was LAST MAN STANDING (1996) released by Varese Sarabande who also released a new recording of Bernard Herrmann's TORN CURTAIN (1966) which was conducted by Joel McNeely. TORN CURTAIN is the film which caused the rift between Herrmann and Alfred Hitchcock. The experience was so tumultuous that they never spoke to each other ever again.