Grendel Grendel Grendel Music Credits

Music composed and conducted by Bruce Smeaton

With the participation of the Melbourne String Quartet

Title song performed by Julie McKenna

Recorded and mixed at A & M Studios, Melbourne

Recording Supervisor: Alf Bean

Recording Engineer: Graham Owens

Additional Recording: Alberts, Sydney Pepper Studios, Adelaide

Composer Bruce Smeaton

(Below: details of the music in Cinema Papers, May-June 1979)

Bruce Smeaton:

Bruce Smeaton composed two of the segment scores (The Husband and The Priest) for the portmanteau feature film Libido, before doing the score for Peter Weir's The Cars That Ate Paris, and then moving on to do David Baker's The Great Macarthy.

Smeaton became a major award-winning Australian composer for film and television, who immediately after working on Picnic at Hanging Rock would go on to work on a series of classic Australian feature films, including Fred Schepisi's The Devil's Playground and The Chant of Jimmy Blacksmith.

Working with Schepisi on The Priest episode for Libido helped prepare Smeaton for the more expansive score he did for The Devil's Playground, and it's arguable - because his work on Picnic tended to be overshadowed by the pan flute gambit - that the film was the first real chance for Smeaton to do an expressive work that aided the atmosphere and emotion of a fully effective drama.

With The Chant of Jimmie Blacksmith, Smeaton continued in expansive mode, and because of the film's substantial budget, the score was one of the few in the early revival that could afford to be laid down at the old Anvil Studios near the village of Denham in Buckinghamshire, with a British orchestra, the National Philharmonic, formed exclusively for recording purposes.

Smeaton would continue to work with Schepisi, after the director went to Hollywood (Barbarosa, Iceman, Roxanne), and he also became involved in various television shows, such as The Boy in the Bush, A Town Like Alice, 1915, and Five Mile Creek.

Around the same time as Grendel Grendel Grendel, Smeaton also did the underscore for (…maybe next Time) and The Earthling (or at least the version designed for the Australian cut).

Smeaton's relatively short wiki - at time of writing - is here.

(Below: Bruce Smeaton in 1988)

(Below: Smeaton as he turns up in the DVD 'making of' for Picnic at Hanging Rock): (Below: in the 'making of' for Summerfield. Adding the hat changes everything)

The music for the film has been released on CD, no doubt reflecting the way that many consider it one of composer Bruce Smeaton's brightest and breeziest scores - at least once past the prologue spoken by Phillip Adams: CD 1M1CD1033 2004

01. Prologue (spoken by Phillip Adams) 4'32" 02. Tuesday morning. Scandinavia. 515 AD; A Song for Grendel sung by His Mother 6'45" 03. Thursday Afternoon; The Revenge of Wiglaf 2'24" 04. The Shaper's Song sung by The Shaper 3'17" 05. The Strangers 1'14" 06. The Occasion of Consolidating the Realm sung by The Shaper 3'15" 07. Appeasing the King of the Gods 2'52" 08. The Dragon's Song sung by The Dragon 2'40" 09. The Religious Sacrifice 1'35" 10. Montage, A Passing Decade; The Apple-Fight 2'25" 11. Grendel's Soliloquy, Poor Me sung by Grendel 3'26" 12. We Know a Lovely Monster sung by The Shaper 1'55" 13. The Dragon's Riddle 1'40" 14. The Final Evening 3'14" 15. Attacking the Castle 4'42" 16. End Titles 0'56"

The package includes an 8 page booklet featuring an overview of the animated film's story and imagery.

At time of writing, the disc was still available from www.1m1.com.au

Below are the lyrics for the title song, called Tuesday morning. Scandanavia. 515 AD; A Song for Grendel sung by His Mother, which - rare for an Australian film of the time - has a touch of Broadway musical style and sophistication about it, as Grendel's mum gently bemoans her son's horrendous attributes.

It runs over the head credits and over the early action, and the some of the key words - nail, fang, claw, and so on - pop on screen during the performance:

Grendel Grendel Grendel Your mother loves you Grendel Standing there, all twelve feet four Or more of you Mother loves Every hair Every scale Every tooth Nail Fang And claw of you Grendel Grendel Grendel Grendel

Grendel Grendel Grendel Your mother needs you Grendel Listening nightly at the door for you

Mother loves Every grunt Every groan Every howl Moan Wail And roar from you

Grendel Grendel Grendel Grendel But other people Grendel They might even like you Grendel But feel the size and scale of you The smell, the eyes And wail of you Are all too much And much too scary

Perhaps if you weren't so Green And hairy Someone other Than just your mother Could love you Grendel Grendel …

But other creatures Grendel May be less pleased with you Grendel The jaws, the fangs, and growl of you The claws, the smell, and scowl of you Are all too gross and most alarming If only a part of you were charming Perhaps some other Besides your mother Could bear you Grendel ... Grendel … Grendel … Grendel …