Kubrick's Music: Selections From The Films Of Stanley Kubrick [Audio CD]

Stanley Kubrick's audacious use of music was one of the aspects that distinguished his films. He handled music with sensitivity, invention and respect and it resulted in the creation of some of the most indelible scenes in cinema history..Three that spring to mind. The use of Vera Lynn's 'We'll Meet Again' over a ninety-second montage of nuclear explosions that closes Dr. Strangelove; the deployment of Strauss waltzes to create an elegant cosmic ballet during the docking sequence in 2001, and the highly controversial use of Gene Kelly's 'Singin' in the Rain' during the attack on F. Alexander and his wife by Alex and his Droogs in A Clockwork Orange. Our presentation comprises musical selections from Kubrick's central masterpieces, complimented by pieces which the director used as 'temp tracks' during the production and by all accounts with every intention of using these in the film, only to decide to replace them late on. In 2001, the scherzo from Felix Mendelssohn's 'Midsummer Night's Dream' (used for scenes of weightlessness) and Vaughan Williams 'Antarctica Suite' (for the Stargate effects and scenes on the moon) were both used in preview showings of the film before being discarded. While on Eyes Wide Shut, Wagner's 'Lieder Im Triebhaus' ('In the Greenhouse') from Wesendonck Lieder was a significant theme in the production for more than a year before being replaced. We have also assembled the complete vintage ballroom music from The Shining. The final movement from Berlioz's 'Symphonie Fantastique', with its epic use of the chant from the Roman Catholic Requiem mass, the 'Dies Irae', and a Sibelius piece, 'Valse Triste'. Both were important to the evolution of the film..Finally, as a young man, Stanley Kubrick fell in love with Sergi Prokofiev's score for the Sergei Eisenstein's first sound film, Alexander Nevsky. He played it to death, and it would inspire him later in his own use of dramatic music. From the scintillating recording by Fritz Reiner with the Chicago SO, we include the movement.