570183bk Son of Kong 2/6/06 9:10 PM Page 12 important film music re-recordings with conductor William Stromberg and reconstructionist John Morgan for Marco Polo. Fanfare critic Royal S. Brown, reviewing the complete recording of Hans J. Salter and Paul Dessau’s landmark House of Frankenstein score, saluted the CD as a “valuable document on the kind of craftsmanship and daring in film scoring that passed by all but unnoticed because of the nature of the films.” Film Score Monthly praised the orchestra’s recording of Korngold’s Another Dawn score, adding that “Stromberg, Morgan and company could show some classical concert conductors a thing or two on how Korngold should be played and recorded.” The same magazine described a recording of suites from Max Steiner’s music for Virginia City and The Beast With Five Fingers as “full-blooded and emphatic.” And Rad Bennett of The Absolute Sound found so much to praise in the orchestra’s film music series he voiced a fervent desire that Marco Polo stay put in Moscow and “record film music for ever”. Many of these recordings are now being reissued in the Naxos Film Music Classics series. William Stromberg Film composer, conductor and arranger, William Stromberg is widely viewed as a rising talent on Hollywood’s busy film music scene, especially for his work in the challenging realm of film music restoration. Along with colleague John Morgan, Stromberg has rescued many classic film scores from oblivion. This digital recording of Max Steiner’s scores for The Son of Kong and The Most Dangerous Game was originally released on Marco Polo and is now being reissued on Naxos. Busy as a conductor of studio orchestras in Los Angeles, Stromberg maintains an interest not only in film music but American music. He has recorded several much-praised albums for Naxos, including several suites by American colourist Ferde Grofé. In addition, he has conducted works by Korngold and Steiner in Europe. He most recently re-recorded the complete score to Max Steiner’s The Adventures of Mark Twain for Naxos. Stromberg has composed numerous film scores, including Trinity and Beyond (and its sequels, Atomic Journeys and Nukes in Space) as well as Killing Streets, Oddball Hall and Edge of Honor. He continues to conduct the Moscow Symphony Orchestra in his own film scores as well as those by Hollywood’s golden-age composers. Hearty acknowledgments and thanks to those mighty souls who provided Kong-sized assistance in the production of this album ... James V. D’Arc and Brigham Young University’s Film Music Archives, Ray Faiola, Rudy Behlmer, George Turner, Howard Green, Anna Bonn, Valle Music Services, Albert K. Bender (founder, The Max Steiner Music Society), Danny Gould (Warner Bros. Music), Julie Graham and Gordon Theil (UCLA Arts Library, RKO Archives), Bill Littman, Tony Thomas, Richard Bush, Michael Haas, Robert Fiedel, William H. Rosar, Scott MacQueen, Bob Burns, Ann Whitaker, David Schecter & Kathleen Mayne, Ray Harryhausen and our all-time favourite harpist, Louise Steiner Elian. 8.570183 12 570183bk Son of Kong 2/6/06 9:10 PM Page 2 Max Steiner (1888–1971) these weren’t enough headaches, Bernhard Kaun I find it particularly gratifying to reconstruct music couldn’t do all the orchestrations in the allotted time – and for full symphony orchestra – from this early 1933 and some were farmed out to Emil Gerstenberger, who period of sound film. For one thing, the original music The Son of Kong occasionally orchestrated for Steiner. The composer tracks for The Son of Kong and The Most Dangerous The Most Dangerous Game 1932 found Gerstenberger’s orchestrations too florid, however, Game no longer exist; beyond that, owing to limited and made numerous changes before the copyists got to orchestra size and archaic sound recording of the Score reconstructions by John Morgan them. Because of this hectic schedule, Steiner wasn’t period, this music has never, until now, been heard with as specific in his sketches as he normally would have all the thrilling detail and rich dynamics Max Steiner Ray Harryhausen, Maker of Monsters, been, and since I was freshly orchestrating this music, originally envisioned. on Max Steiner, Maker of Music ... the two comments I dreaded most in Steiner’s written instructions to his orchestrators were: “Phone me and John Morgan, December 2000 What an exciting surprise it was when I first heard these I’ll explain” and that cryptic abbreviation “Etc.” new re-recordings of Max Steiner’s The Most Dangerous Game and The Son of Kong. For many years, I have wished for these scores in modern sound John Morgan minus all the villainous snarling and prehistoric roaring Without peer in the painstakingly meticulous art of film music reconstruction, John Morgan is fast gaining and sundry sound effects. How marvelous it is to at last attention for his own film scores, ranging from his music for the atomic bomb documentary Trinity and Beyond have it with a full symphonic orchestra under the very and, more recently, Starship Troopers 2: Hero of the Federation, both composed with longtime colleague talented conductor and film composer Bill Stromberg. William Stromberg. Morgan also recently scored a documentary about his friend, special-effects pioneer Ray I really never thought I’d hear these scores on their own. John Morgan, Ray Harryhausen and William Stromberg Harryhausen. In the late 1970s, Morgan worked as an orchestrator for such film composers as Fred Steiner, Bruce Some years had passed since its initial release when Broughton and Alex North. It was during this period he began work in the realm of film music restoration. A I first came across that wonderful, compact film The am delighted to be re-introduced to this revelatory Steiner friend of Max Steiner during the latter’s final years in Hollywood, Morgan has made reconstructing and re- Most Dangerous Game. At the time, I had no idea what score. The tune Runaway Blues is especially delightful recording Steiner’s greatest film scores part of his mission for the Naxos and Marco Polo film music series. In the title even meant. I must have entered the theater as it weaves its way through the rest of this exciting, recent years, Morgan has overseen the reconstruction of numerous lost scores by such eminent Hollywood after the credits, and yet I instinctively knew, upon atmospheric score about life back on Skull Island. composers as Alfred Newman, Franz Waxman, Hugo Friedhofer, Erich Wolfgang Korngold, Hans J. Salter, hearing the music, I was in the presence of Max Steiner. I am most grateful that veteran film composer John Frank Skinner and Bernard Herrmann. Among other scores by Max Steiner, Morgan and Stromberg have re- One would never believe such a film score was written Morgan has resurrected these scores, so important in recorded King Kong and The Adventures of Mark Twain. way back in 1932. That haunting waltz and what it both music history and film history, for new generations becomes embeds itself long in one’s memory. to hear, admire and appreciate. True, the subject matter I was especially surprised at how wonderful The may not be everyone’s cup of tea – giant apes and Moscow Symphony Orchestra Son of Kong sounded. Although I’ve always felt The rampaging dinosaurs and remote jungle islands and Established in 1989, the Moscow Symphony Orchestra includes prize-winners and laureates of Russian and Son of Kong, as a film, lacked some of the inspiration merciless hunters are probably an acquired taste – but international music competitions and graduates of conservatories in Moscow, Leningrad and Kiev who have that characterizes King Kong and The Most Dangerous it is hard to imagine these, even today, without the played under such conductors as Svetlanov, Rozhdestvensky, Mravinsky and Ozawa, in Russia and throughout Game, there is nothing at all lacking about the music. I power of Max Steiner’s music to back them up. the world. In addition to its extensive concert programmes, the orchestra has been recognized for its outstanding recordings for Marco Polo, including the first-ever survey of Malipiero’s symphonies, symphonic music of Ray Harryhausen has created visual effects for such enduring classics as Mighty Joe Young, The Beast From Guatemala, the complete symphonies of Charles Tournemire and Russian music by Scriabin, Glazunov, 20,000 Fathoms, The Seventh Voyage of Sinbad and Jason and the Argonauts, to name but a few. Harryhausen Rachmaninov, Tchaikovsky and Nikolay Tcherepnin. The orchestra also stays busy recording music for received a special Lifetime Achievement Academy Award in 1992 for his contribution to the world of cinema. contemporary films. Critical accolades for the orchestra’s wide-ranging recordings are frequent, including its 8.570183 2 11 8.570183 570183bk Son of Kong 2/6/06 9:10 PM Page 10 Arranger’s Notes Lost Worlds and Forgotten Music: Max Steiner’s Legendary RKO Scores With the success of our complete recording of Max section. Like King Kong, there was a great amount of Steiner’s King Kong and numerous requests for more doubling in the woodwinds, with some players asked to As much as Babe Ruth, Frank Buck or Will Rogers, than-usual studio orchestra to work with, later singled Steiner music from this rich period at RKO, we decided play several different instruments, including composer Max Steiner – or rather his music – fired the out King Kong as a picture that would challenge any to record both the sequel to Kong – namely, The Son of saxophones. In the early days of sound recording, imagination of an entire generation of Americans, and composer to furnish his very best. “It was made for Kong – and King Kong’s predecessor, The Most saxophones provided a fuller, rounder sound than some during some of the country’s most trying times.