I have to say that 1987 was
not a banner year for me. I was surviving the wilds of Junior High, doing my
best to keep a low profile, but still managing to get book dumped at least once
a week. My best friend moved to Mississippi later that year and I pretty much
felt lost.
Somewhere
along the way the joy of Transformers evaporated. I was into NES games,
especially The Legend of Zelda, but
I didn’t actually own an NES, and had to enjoy and play the game at a friend’s
house (a friend who was a few years younger than me, and so I couldn’t hang out
with at school and discuss the game).
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| This book contained tons of information that went beyond the movies. |
I was looking for something
to fall back on, and that may be where I experienced my first bout of
nostalgia. I rediscovered the Star Wars trilogy.
Part of this came with a trip to Disneyland, and riding Star Tours for the
first time. While I was there, my parents bought me the Star Wars Role Playing
Game book by West End Games. It was filled with all kinds of story and
character information I had never seen before.
I became (re)obsessed with
the movies, watching all three again for the first time in years. I pulled out
my old toys and started creating new adventures. And then I got an idea. What
if I could take Star Wars with me wherever I went? I had a walkman cassette and
headphones I had got for Christmas. There was a way… oh yes there was a way.
We had a radio with a built
in microphone and you could record directly to cassette tape. I used that
sucker to record the audio from Star Wars onto two tapes. It was a bit tricky
getting the right timing so I wouldn’t cut off the movie in mid sentence to
turn the tape over, but I got it done.
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| Ben Burtt obtaining new sound effects. |
It was this experience that
actually changed the way I appreciated film. First was the amazing sound effect
design by Ben Burtt. At the time I didn’t really know anything about sound
effects, but I still felt that Star Wars had its own unique world of sound.
These sounds set it apart not just from our real world, but from other science
fiction films I was familiar with like Star
Trek and The Black Hole.
Everything from the lightsabers, the blasters, the TIE fighters had its own
sound. It wasn’t until hearing the movie divorced of the visuals that I understood
that these sounds had to be created just for the movie.
The other element that
really struck me was the music. Sure I grew up with the music to Star Wars cemented in my brain. But it
was only the main themes that I really ever found myself humming. Listening to
the film play out, I suddenly became aware of how little dialogue there is in
the first third of the film and how much the music carries the feelings and
power of the story. Hell, the music practically told the story. That was the
moment where I realized how powerful a part music plays in film making. From
that time forward most of my storytelling would be accompanied by some kind of
score (either played while I write, or running along in the background of my
imagination).
I listened to those tapes more
than I’d like to admit. My parents must of have noticed because for Christmas
they got me the actual score for Star
Wars on cassette. My dad actually asked me to put it on our stereo and
suddenly I could hear the music – without the dialogue and sound effects and it
was like hearing it for the first time.
What amazed me was the music
I never really noticed before. The music during the Tatooine scenes was very
unusual, not at all what you think of when you think Star Wars. The variety
included the percussive drumming for the Sand People, the loneliness of the
Dune Sea and the playfulness of the Jawa music. There was even material not
used in the film that was amazing to hear.
Once I knew that film music
could be a wonderful listening experience outside of the film, I started to
notice it more. Movies like Star Trek:The Motion Picture, Conan the
Barbarian and Back to the Future
all had memorable music, and I could now find it at record stores to listen to
whenever I wanted. Part of the joy of collecting these was having a piece of
the movie in your collection, a kind of souvenir. But there was also the
amazing storytelling going on in the music itself that appealed to me.
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| When Star Wars finally made it to CD it was in this awesome 4 CD set. |
But the first quest was to
complete the Star Wars trilogy. I
found the Empire Strikes Back on
cassette pretty easily, and wow was that a revelation. Having the concert version of the
Imperial March was a high point in my geek quest. But for some reason Return
of the Jedi was very difficult to obtain. It actually took me a couple
years to actually find it. It was a big day for this film music nerd to play
all three tapes back to back and indulge in the power of John Williams’ music.
I can blame Star Wars for my current hobby of
collecting film scores. But it also opened up the idea of film being more than
just visuals and story. The audio was a key element to movies, especially genre
films. Star Wars changed a lot of
things about movie making, but one of the things it brought back was the
concept of a large-scale Golden Age style film score to support and accent the
action. While that approach won’t work for all movies, and will wax and wane in
popularity, it was what got me into enjoying film music in the first place.
Williams would continue to
score the Star Wars films, and his
sound helped define the world of the series. It is amazing how the music has
become as much part of that cinematic universe as the visuals.
