Customer Reviews

Hollywood Rhapsody: The Story of Movie Music, 1900-1975

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It is facinating to read about the behind scenes history of our most famous movies, and the men and women who made them. Also, very enlightening stories and facts about Hollywood and Los Angeles.

If you were writing a report on music in the movies, Hollywood Rhapsody should be in your bibliography!!! It's a very compelling and funny factual book about music and the stories about the composers.

"Hollywood Rhapsody" provides a richly detailed and completely engrossing panoramic history of what is probably (along with film editing) the most neglected aspect of moviemaking -- its music. It's like taking a behind-the-scenes tour of how your own internal dream soundtrack got built, collaged from dozens and dozens of scores and songs, ranging from the unforgettable to the maudlin and kitsch. The research is superb and fully annotated, yet the narrative flows effortlessly, like a great conversation, mixing the history of the film business, technical innovations, and the impact of European emigre composers on Hollywood with often ribald anecdotes. My favorite is the story about how David O. Selznick butted heads with Dmitri Tiomkin over "the orgasm music" for Jennifer Jones in his camp masterpiece, "Duel in the Sun." Though it closes around 1975, just as John Williams is staging the triumphant comeback of orchestral scores, the book has the feel of an elegy for a now vanished era of lyrical wit and melodic invention which the success of Disney's recent musicals has done little to overcome. For anyone who loves movies, the American songbook, or cultural histories of popular art forms, this book will amply award your attention. A terrific read!