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704 Pages | 58 h/t; 93 b&w film stills
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The Oxford Handbook of Film Music Studies
David Neumeyer
Gathers new essays from leading scholars in film studies, musicology, music theory, and cognitive science
Offers a combination of historical studies, topic surveys, theoretical models, and case studies
Provides one hundred illustrations, including musical examples and screen stills
Music has been an integral part of film exhibition from its beginnings in the late nineteenth century. With the arrival of sound film in the late 1920s, music became part of a complex multimedia text. Although industry, fan-oriented, and scholarly literatures on film music have existed from early on, and music was frequently among the topics discussed and disputed, only in the past thirty years has sustained scholarly attention gone to music in visual media, beginning with the feature film. The Oxford Handbook of Film Music Studies charts that interdisciplinary activity in its primary areas of inquiry: history, genre and medium, analysis and criticism, and interpretation.
The handbook provides an overview to the field on a large scale. Chapters in Part I range from the relations of music and the soundtrack to opera and film, textual representation of film sound, and film music as studied by cognitive scientists. Part II addresses genre and medium with chapters focusing on cartoons and animated films, the film musical, music in arcade and early video games, and the interplay of film, music, and recording over the past half century. The chapters in Part III offer case studies in interpretation along with extended critical surveys of theoretical models of gender, sexuality, and subjectivity as they impinge on music and sound. The three chapters on analysis in Part IV are diverse: one systematically models harmonies used in recent films, a second looks at issues of music and film temporality, and a third focuses on television. Chapters on history (Part V) cover topics including musical antecedents in nineteenth-century theater, the complex issues in sychronization of music in performance of early (silent) films, international practices in early film exhibition, and the symphony orchestra in film.
PART 1: Film Music : Central Questions
2. Music and the Ontology of the Sound Film: The Classical Hollywood System
James Buhler and David Neumeyer
3. Opera and Film
Marcia Citron
4. Visual Representation of Film Sound as Analytical Tool
Rick Altman
5. Film Music from the Perspective of Cognitive Science
Annabel Cohen
6. Composing for Film: Hanns Eisler's Lifelong Film-Music Project
Peter Schweinhardt and Johannes C. Gall, translated by Oliver Dahin
7. Ontological, Formal, and Critical Theories of Film Music and Sound
James Buhler
PART 2: Genre and Platform
8. Drawing a New Narrative for Cartoon Music
Daniel Goldmark
9. Genre Theory and the Film Musical
Cari McDonnell
10. "The Tunes They are a-Changing": Moments of Historical Rupture and Reconfiguration in the Production and Commerce of Music in Film
11. The Compilation Soundtrack from the 1960s to the Present
Julie Hubbert
12. The Origins of Musical Style in Video Games, 1977-1983
Neil Lerner
PART 3: Interpretative Theory & Practice
13. Classical Music, Virtual Bodies, Narrative Film
Lawrence Kramer
14. Gender, Sexuality, and the Soundtrack
15. Psychoanalysis, Apparatus Theory, and Subjectivity
16. Case Studies: Introduction
Robynn Stilwell
17. (Case Study 1) The Order of Sanctity: Sound, Sight, and Suasion in
DeMille's The Ten Commandments
Mitchell Morris
18. (Case Study 2) Strange Recognitions and Endless Loops: Music, Media, and Memory in Terry Gilliam's 12 Monkeys
Julie McQuinn
PART 4: Contemporary Approaches to Analysis
19. Transformational Theory and the Analysis of Film Music
20. Listening in Film: Music/Film Temporality, Materiality and Memory
Marianne Kielian-Gilbert
21. Auteurship and Agency in Television Music
Ronald Rodman
PART 5: Historical Issues
22. When the Music Surges: Melodrama and the Nineteenth-Century
Theatrical Precedents for Film Music Style and Placement
Michael Pisani
23. Audio-Visual Palimpsests: Resynchronizing Silent Films with "Special" Music
24. Performance Practices and Music in Early Cinema outside Hollywood
Kathryn Kalinak
25. Performing Prestige: American Cinema Orchestras, 1910-1958
Nathan Platte
David Neumeyer is Marlene and Morton Meyerson Professor in Music and Professor of Music Theory in the School of Music, The University of Texas at Austin. He is the author of several books including, most recently, a textbook with James Buhler and Rob Deemer entitled Hearing the Movies (2010).
Rick Altman, Professor of Cinema and Comparative Literature in the College of Liberal Arts and Sciences, The University of Iowa
Julie Brown, Reader in Music, Department of Music, Royal Holloway, University of London
James Buhler, Associate Professor of Music Theory, Sarah and Ernest Butler School of Music, The University of Texas at Austin
Marcia J. Citron, Martha and Henry Malcolm Lovett Distinguished Service Professor of Musicology, Shepherd School of Music, Rice University
Annabel Cohen, Professor of Psychology, University of Prince Edward Island
Johannes C. Gall, Free University, Berlin; member of the editorial staff of the Hanns Eisler Complete Edition (HEGA), published by Breitkopf & Härtel; board member of the International Hanns Eisler Society
Daniel Goldmark, Associate Professor of Musicology, Case Western Reserve University
Julie Hubbert, Associate Professor of Music History in the School of Music, University of South Carolina
Kathryn Kalinak, Margaret Tucker Thorp Professor of English and Film Studies, Rhode Island College
Lawrence Kramer, Distinguished Professor of English and Music, Fordham University
Marianne Kielian-Gilbert, Professor of Music Theory, Jacobs School of Music, Indiana University, Bloomington
Neil Lerner, Professor of Music, Davidson College
Cari McDonnell, Ph.D. candidate in music theory in the Sarah and Ernest Butler School of Music, The University of Texas at Austin
Julie McQuinn, Associate Professor of Music, Conservatory of Music, Lawrence University
Mitchell Morris, Associate Professor of Music, Department of Musicology, The UCLA Herb Alpert School of Music
Scott Murphy, Associate Professor of Music Theory, School of Music, University of Kansas
David Neumeyer, Marlene and Morton Meyerson Professor of Music and Professor of Music Theory, Sarah and Ernest Butler School of Music, The University of Texas at Austin
Michael Pisani, Professor of Music, Vassar College
Nathan Platte, Assistant Professor of Musicology, School of Music, The University of Iowa
Ronald Rodman, Dye Family Professor of Music, Carleton College
Peter Schweinhardt, Instructor of music, politics, history, and ethics in the Babelsberger-Filmgymnasium, Potsdam, Germany; board member of the International Hanns Eisler Society
Jeff Smith, Professor of Film in the Department of Communication Arts, University of Wisconsin, Madison
Robynn Stilwell, Associate Professor of Music, Georgetown University
"[O]ffers stimulating questions and music analyses." --CHOICE
"Taken as a whole, the book lives up to the expectations of the Oxford Handbook Series-it takes a very broad and interdisciplinary approach to evaluating the current state of the field...This volume is a must read for any scholar pursuing the serious study of music in film and other audiovisual media, and it will be of particular value to graduate students interested in film music studies."--Journal of the Society for American Music
"It is written to be easily understood by film and music students alike, as well as those who are not using this book in a classroom setting but are simply interested in the subject...The book does well in covering all sides of the arguments it presents, thoroughly explaining causes and effects of problems and important historical happenings, and organizes the author's ideas in a way that helps the reader feel more connected to the material...For those studying film, music, or film music, The Oxford Handbook of Film Music Studies is essential and, if you are an aspiring film composer, this is a book you absolutely cannot miss"--Film Matters
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