The Film Music Society
Encyclopedia
The Film Music Society, Inc. (formerly the Society for the Preservation of Film Music, Inc.) is a non-profit educational organization based in Los Angeles. It was founded in 1983 by film historian-musicologist, William H. Rosar, the year that the American Film Institute
commenced its " Decade of Preservation."
, and the Institute of the American Musical (Miles Kreuger, Founder and President) in Hollywood, The Film Music Society has sought broad public support for a mission of national scope: to preserve for posterity the mostly unpublished materials created in the composition, orchestration
, and recording of American motion picture music or film music — Sheet Music
(composers' manuscripts, orchestration
s, orchestra parts), recordings (disc, tape, soundtrack
s), and documents (cue sheets, contracts, correspondence).
materials was under the sole purview of the movie studios who owned them and the composers who were employed to write the music. Mostly these materials were stored and continue to be stored in studio music department libraries and in film vaults only accessible to studio personnel. In the heyday of the Hollywood studio system
(c. 1920s-1950s), film composers often retained their manuscripts and recordings of their music given to them by the studios as a courtesy. When scoring independent film
s composers often retained all the score materials themselves, but not the actual music track or soundtrack
, which was kept by the production company.
In 1937, producer and film industry visionary David O. Selznick
proposed that copies of selected scores should be deposited at the Museum of Modern Art
in New York City, though the plan did not materialize. Ten years later, British musicologist Frederick W. Sternfeld organized the College Committee on Film Music, composed of musicologists, teachers, and librarians, whose goal was to make films, scripts, and copies of film music materials available for study to scholars and students. Some of the material Sternfeld collected for this purpose is preserved in the Rauner Special Collections Library of Dartmouth College
and in the Bodleian Library
of Oxford University.
Unfortunately the College Committee had been disbanded by the late 1950s, at a time when the studio music departments began to discard portions of their older holdings, believing them to be of no further practical use or commercial value. Probably the greatest single loss occurred in the late 1960s when Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer
Studios in Culver City, CA, discarded all of its orchestra parts and full scores (orchestration
s), material that was both priceless and irreplaceable. At the same time music tracks recorded on nitrate film or magnetic film had begun to deteriorate.
Responding to what was dubbed the "M-G-M Holocaust" by film historians, the veteran film and TV composer Fred Steiner
formed a small watchdog group in the 1970s that included himself, his film composer colleague David Raksin
, and music librarian Jon Newsom of the Library of Congress
Music Division. They would periodically visit the studio music departments and encourage departmental personnel not to discard any material before a new home could be found for it, such as colleges or universities, institutions where collections of other film-related material had already been established. In time Steiner believed that there should be a national organization to promote greater public awareness of this precious and unique cultural legacy and to preserve its heritage.
The tragic historical lesson of the ancient Library of Alexandria
in Egypt being burned was that as long as only one copy of a book exist, it is not safe from destruction. Were it not for the copies laboriously made by the scribes in the Alexandria Library that were then placed in other libraries of antiquity, all would have been lost forever. Knowing of that historical precedent, as a corollary to the continuing vigilance of Steiner's watchdog group, the formation of the Society as a national non-profit membership organization was initiated by Rosar in 1983, and underwritten by soundtrack collector, Henry P. Adams. Its mandate was to seek out film music collections, whether at the studios or in the hands of composers, donate them to academic libraries, and make preservation copies of them to be placed in other repositories. Since its founding the Society has published a quarterly newsletter, The Cue Sheet, which reports its activities, and includes articles and interviews on film music topics.
Rather like an invisible college, the Founding Board of Directors included a diverse group of individuals, who all shared knowledge and a common love for film music: A composer (Fred Steiner
), a film journalist (Tony Thomas), a librarian (Linda Mehr of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences
Library), a motion picture music editor (George Korngold, also a record producer and son of film composer Erich Wolfgang Korngold
), film historians (Rudy Behlmer
, Clifford McCarty, and William H. Rosar), a performing arts programmer (Jay Alan Quantrill), and an attorney (Leslie Zador, son of film composer Eugene Zador). William H. Rosar served as its first President (1984-89) and subsequently as its first Executive Director (1989-90). Incorporated as a California non-profit public corporation in 1984, the organization changed its name to The Film Music Society in 1997. The current president is composer David Newman
, son of the celebrated film composer, Alfred Newman
.
In 1990, William H. Rosar went on to found the International Film Music Society, a learned society
of scholars studying film from the standpoint of musicology, and which in 2011 established the Institute for Film Music Studies for that purpose. He is editor of the first learned journal in the field, The Journal of Film Music, which is the official organ of the Institute.
American Film Institute
The American Film Institute is an independent non-profit organization created by the National Endowment for the Arts, which was established in 1967 when President Lyndon B. Johnson signed the National Foundation on the Arts and the Humanities Act...
commenced its " Decade of Preservation."
Mission
Patterned after the National Geographic SocietyNational Geographic Society
The National Geographic Society , headquartered in Washington, D.C. in the United States, is one of the largest non-profit scientific and educational institutions in the world. Its interests include geography, archaeology and natural science, the promotion of environmental and historical...
, and the Institute of the American Musical (Miles Kreuger, Founder and President) in Hollywood, The Film Music Society has sought broad public support for a mission of national scope: to preserve for posterity the mostly unpublished materials created in the composition, orchestration
Orchestration
Orchestration is the study or practice of writing music for an orchestra or of adapting for orchestra music composed for another medium...
, and recording of American motion picture music or film music — Sheet Music
Sheet music
Sheet music is a hand-written or printed form of music notation that uses modern musical symbols; like its analogs—books, pamphlets, etc.—the medium of sheet music typically is paper , although the access to musical notation in recent years includes also presentation on computer screens...
(composers' manuscripts, orchestration
Orchestration
Orchestration is the study or practice of writing music for an orchestra or of adapting for orchestra music composed for another medium...
s, orchestra parts), recordings (disc, tape, soundtrack
Soundtrack
A soundtrack can be recorded music accompanying and synchronized to the images of a motion picture, book, television program or video game; a commercially released soundtrack album of music as featured in the soundtrack of a film or TV show; or the physical area of a film that contains the...
s), and documents (cue sheets, contracts, correspondence).
History
With the advent of sound films circa 1928 the safekeeping of specially composed film scoreFilm score
A film score is original music written specifically to accompany a film, forming part of the film's soundtrack, which also usually includes dialogue and sound effects...
materials was under the sole purview of the movie studios who owned them and the composers who were employed to write the music. Mostly these materials were stored and continue to be stored in studio music department libraries and in film vaults only accessible to studio personnel. In the heyday of the Hollywood studio system
Studio system
The studio system was a means of film production and distribution dominant in Hollywood from the early 1920s through the early 1960s. The term studio system refers to the practice of large motion picture studios producing movies primarily on their own filmmaking lots with creative personnel under...
(c. 1920s-1950s), film composers often retained their manuscripts and recordings of their music given to them by the studios as a courtesy. When scoring independent film
Independent film
An independent film, or indie film, is a professional film production resulting in a feature film that is produced mostly or completely outside of the major film studio system. In addition to being produced and distributed by independent entertainment companies, independent films are also produced...
s composers often retained all the score materials themselves, but not the actual music track or soundtrack
Soundtrack
A soundtrack can be recorded music accompanying and synchronized to the images of a motion picture, book, television program or video game; a commercially released soundtrack album of music as featured in the soundtrack of a film or TV show; or the physical area of a film that contains the...
, which was kept by the production company.
In 1937, producer and film industry visionary David O. Selznick
David O. Selznick
David O. Selznick was an American film producer. He is best known for having produced Gone with the Wind and Rebecca , both of which earned him an Oscar for Best Picture.-Early years:...
proposed that copies of selected scores should be deposited at the Museum of Modern Art
Museum of Modern Art
The Museum of Modern Art is an art museum in Midtown Manhattan in New York City, on 53rd Street, between Fifth and Sixth Avenues. It has been important in developing and collecting modernist art, and is often identified as the most influential museum of modern art in the world...
in New York City, though the plan did not materialize. Ten years later, British musicologist Frederick W. Sternfeld organized the College Committee on Film Music, composed of musicologists, teachers, and librarians, whose goal was to make films, scripts, and copies of film music materials available for study to scholars and students. Some of the material Sternfeld collected for this purpose is preserved in the Rauner Special Collections Library of Dartmouth College
Dartmouth College
Dartmouth College is a private, Ivy League university in Hanover, New Hampshire, United States. The institution comprises a liberal arts college, Dartmouth Medical School, Thayer School of Engineering, and the Tuck School of Business, as well as 19 graduate programs in the arts and sciences...
and in the Bodleian Library
Bodleian Library
The Bodleian Library , the main research library of the University of Oxford, is one of the oldest libraries in Europe, and in Britain is second in size only to the British Library...
of Oxford University.
Unfortunately the College Committee had been disbanded by the late 1950s, at a time when the studio music departments began to discard portions of their older holdings, believing them to be of no further practical use or commercial value. Probably the greatest single loss occurred in the late 1960s when Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer
Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer
Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer Inc. is an American media company, involved primarily in the production and distribution of films and television programs. MGM was founded in 1924 when the entertainment entrepreneur Marcus Loew gained control of Metro Pictures, Goldwyn Pictures Corporation and Louis B. Mayer...
Studios in Culver City, CA, discarded all of its orchestra parts and full scores (orchestration
Orchestration
Orchestration is the study or practice of writing music for an orchestra or of adapting for orchestra music composed for another medium...
s), material that was both priceless and irreplaceable. At the same time music tracks recorded on nitrate film or magnetic film had begun to deteriorate.
Responding to what was dubbed the "M-G-M Holocaust" by film historians, the veteran film and TV composer Fred Steiner
Fred Steiner
Fred Steiner was an American composer, conductor, orchestrator, film historian and arranger for television, radio and film. Steiner wrote the theme music for The Rocky and Bullwinkle Show, Perry Mason and The Bullwinkle Show...
formed a small watchdog group in the 1970s that included himself, his film composer colleague David Raksin
David Raksin
David Raksin was an American composer born in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. With over 100 film scores and 300 television scores to his credit, he became known as the "Grandfather of Film Music." One of his earliest film assignments was as assistant to Charlie Chaplin in the composition of the score...
, and music librarian Jon Newsom of the Library of Congress
Library of Congress
The Library of Congress is the research library of the United States Congress, de facto national library of the United States, and the oldest federal cultural institution in the United States. Located in three buildings in Washington, D.C., it is the largest library in the world by shelf space and...
Music Division. They would periodically visit the studio music departments and encourage departmental personnel not to discard any material before a new home could be found for it, such as colleges or universities, institutions where collections of other film-related material had already been established. In time Steiner believed that there should be a national organization to promote greater public awareness of this precious and unique cultural legacy and to preserve its heritage.
The tragic historical lesson of the ancient Library of Alexandria
Library of Alexandria
The Royal Library of Alexandria, or Ancient Library of Alexandria, in Alexandria, Egypt, was the largest and most significant great library of the ancient world. It flourished under the patronage of the Ptolemaic dynasty and functioned as a major center of scholarship from its construction in the...
in Egypt being burned was that as long as only one copy of a book exist, it is not safe from destruction. Were it not for the copies laboriously made by the scribes in the Alexandria Library that were then placed in other libraries of antiquity, all would have been lost forever. Knowing of that historical precedent, as a corollary to the continuing vigilance of Steiner's watchdog group, the formation of the Society as a national non-profit membership organization was initiated by Rosar in 1983, and underwritten by soundtrack collector, Henry P. Adams. Its mandate was to seek out film music collections, whether at the studios or in the hands of composers, donate them to academic libraries, and make preservation copies of them to be placed in other repositories. Since its founding the Society has published a quarterly newsletter, The Cue Sheet, which reports its activities, and includes articles and interviews on film music topics.
Rather like an invisible college, the Founding Board of Directors included a diverse group of individuals, who all shared knowledge and a common love for film music: A composer (Fred Steiner
Fred Steiner
Fred Steiner was an American composer, conductor, orchestrator, film historian and arranger for television, radio and film. Steiner wrote the theme music for The Rocky and Bullwinkle Show, Perry Mason and The Bullwinkle Show...
), a film journalist (Tony Thomas), a librarian (Linda Mehr of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences
Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences
The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences is a professional honorary organization dedicated to the advancement of the arts and sciences of motion pictures...
Library), a motion picture music editor (George Korngold, also a record producer and son of film composer Erich Wolfgang Korngold
Erich Wolfgang Korngold
Erich Wolfgang Korngold was an Austro-Hungarian film and romantic music composer. While his compositional style was considered well out of vogue at the time he died, his music has more recently undergone a reevaluation and a gradual reawakening of interest...
), film historians (Rudy Behlmer
Rudy Behlmer
Rudy Behlmer is an American film historian and writer. Born and raised in San Francisco, California, he is an expert in the history and evolution of the motion picture industry....
, Clifford McCarty, and William H. Rosar), a performing arts programmer (Jay Alan Quantrill), and an attorney (Leslie Zador, son of film composer Eugene Zador). William H. Rosar served as its first President (1984-89) and subsequently as its first Executive Director (1989-90). Incorporated as a California non-profit public corporation in 1984, the organization changed its name to The Film Music Society in 1997. The current president is composer David Newman
David Newman (composer)
David Louis Newman is an American composer and conductor known particularly for his film scores. In a career spanning nearly forty years, he has composed music for nearly 100 feature films.-Life and career:...
, son of the celebrated film composer, Alfred Newman
Alfred Newman
Alfred Newman was an American composer, arranger, and conductor of music for films.In a career which spanned over forty years, Newman composed music for over two hundred films. He was one of the most respected film score composers of his time, and is today regarded as one of the greatest...
.
In 1990, William H. Rosar went on to found the International Film Music Society, a learned society
Learned society
A learned society is an organization that exists to promote an academic discipline/profession, as well a group of disciplines. Membership may be open to all, may require possession of some qualification, or may be an honor conferred by election, as is the case with the oldest learned societies,...
of scholars studying film from the standpoint of musicology, and which in 2011 established the Institute for Film Music Studies for that purpose. He is editor of the first learned journal in the field, The Journal of Film Music, which is the official organ of the Institute.