British Film Lecture One

The three central questions of the course:

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How the music of composers is shaped by film

How film is a platform for experimentation
What do they tell us about the role of music in British life

Does it create tension between higher and lower art?

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Films as representation of music consumption

Techniques/modes: how do they use music and sound to tell the story of
image?

LOOK AT THE BFI page on KEATS: the readings on movies are useful along with
the module playlist bob national
*Films are the focus each week
Film scores beginning in 1930s and 40s: emigration from Austria/Germany to U.S
and Britain

Now Voyages (1942)

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Signals emotion
Inaudibility
Continuity
Unity: theme at the beginning and the end
Principals of Gorbman

NONDIEGETIC MUSIC: background (not soundtrack), accomps dialogue, can

character hear?
DIEGETIC MUSIC: within the narrative
Interchange between inaudible and audible music (Under dialogue and not
meant to be heard)
Signifier of emotion: anger/frustration of woman in bass
Narrative cueing: point of view- who are we listening to and what is the focus of
the scene?
formal demarcation in change of setting to living room
Continuity: between flashback and present time
Between individual shots
Unity: motivic direction, leitmotifs
Repetition of beginning theme at end of the scene

Challenging these ideas..

1930s documentary
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Coal Face (1935)

Spare Time (1939)

How do they focus on the modern ideas of life?

Exploration and presentation of working life.
Associated with GPO film unit which was government sponsored: industries,
promotion, adverts
Collaboration of artists: Eg Brittens first composing job

Film unit was how Britten earned a living, he moves to the U.S to pursue this and
stopped composing for film upon his return to Britain in 1942

Coal Face: One of the first documentaries after GPO acquired sound editing
equipment
John Grierson quote: The creative use of sound (1934) 29

Cavalcanti- director and sound editor, experimental European traditions, as

important as Brittens work here
Music binds loose images into a structured form: the relationship to sound and
image
Use of location sound: cannot actually hear but are prerecorded sounds

Foley Techniques: realistic sound effects produced in a studio

Montage: assembly, editing, juxtaposition/accumulation of image, quick cuts
between images

Mechanical, repetitive, percussive music: idea of industrial process underlined,

objective?, dehumanising in final section

Opening chorus returns in scene of maps: presentational, factual

Music celebrating the end of the working day: disjunction with the images of
industry

Shift to more lyrical music when not in the mines: images of the village, above
ground, life governed by the mine

Spare Time (1939) DIAGETIC

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focus on leisure
three industries: steel, cotton, coal

Steel: morning/afternoon free time

In the pub Handel choir, Handels Largo
Drone bell calling the men to work
More optimistic way of life
Music harmonises the subjects