| Enny님의 프로필World of Music사진블로그리스트 |  도구  도움말 |
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3월 7일 Some ideas about "Memoirs of A Geisha" From the angle of music, the soundtrack of Memoirs of a Geisha is impressive. Memoirs of a Geisha displays the captivating and restrained beauty that Williams has always been capable of but rarely sustains. The two themes of this film music, theme of Sayuris played by Yo-Yo Ma on solo cello, and “Chairman’s Waltz” played by Itzhak Perlman on violin, which separately express the longing but indistinct and hesitating love between the two people, just like the Eastern tradition which the emotion of people is not open minded and direct as Western culture. “Becoming a Geisha” is the extended melody cued by the theme of Sayuri, and also consistent in the gorgeous “Confluence”, where theme is reprised by the entire orchestra, in the final and powerful statement; “Brush on Silk” is a tense percussion-based cue that has a burst of dissonance, and it is perhaps the most embracing style which is much more Eastern than Western, although “The Fire Scene and the Coming of War” does contain an essence of the tragedy-laden Japanese vocal lament “Ogi No Mato (The Folding Fan as a Target) ; “Dr Crab’s Prize” features the traditional instrument Shakuhachi, expressing without accompaniment, creating a sense of loneliness and an air of mystique; The "Sayur"s Theme and End Credits” which lasts five minutes encapsulates the energy, emotion, and drama within the film, like a retrospection of the whole story of hers. Comparing with other film music by John Williams in 2005, although it was not as purely as Revenge of Sith was, and not as angry or confrontational as War of the Worlds, the atmosphere of delicacy, elegance and intimacy, coupled with the appropriate ethnicity of the orchestrations, and the beauty of the melody, make this music a winner all the way.
However, I am a person who has the Eastern background; Thus, I pay more attention to the issue that whether the color of music from Memoirs of a Geisha expresses correctly in Eastern characteristic. But I notice there is seldom exact style of Japanese music and sometimes I even can hear many Chinese musical elements in it. Maybe in the eyes of Western people, Eastern culture is very similar in each Eastern Asian country, and they can grasp the whole style of Eastern music, but hard to understand and distinguish the deep and detail differences among them. That’s why we can hardly tell whether the music from Memoirs of a Geisha approaches Japan or China, or none of these.
The film music of Memoirs of a Geisha reminds me of another similar work: Film music from The Last Emperor in 1988, which the film tells the story of the dramatic life of the Chinese last emperor Pu Yi. Its music was composed by three composers: David Byrne from the U.S, Ryuichi Sakamoto from Japan and Cong Su from China.
Maybe the film music of The Last Emperor was so successful that the later film music which has the characteristics of cross-culture is deep affected by it, considering it as a reference or standard. Music from Memoirs of Geisha is another typical production of mixture of Western and Eastern music. Even if the music using some traditional Japanese instruments, such as samisen, Kotsuzumi, and Shakuhachi, and also showing the famous Japanese traditional music and dance style just like Kyomai, Kabuki and Hogaku, the melody and color reminds us of the style of The Last Emperor, especially the music of “Going to School”, the same rhythm, the same orchestration, and a very similar melody. It is very obvious that John Williams imitates the style of The Last Emperor. Sometimes I am really disappointed with him to do so. Because I think as a very talented and individual film scorer, John Williams should have his ultimate tastes even doing the same topic with other composers. Maybe the musical style of the film music from The Last Emperor just fits to the common imagination of how Western people consider Eastern music and its culture which leads that every piece of cross-cultural film music should be like this way. Of course, we cannot require John Williams to compose the pure and genuine Eastern music because of his different cultural background. Conversely, John Williams, together with Itzhak Perlman and Yo-Yo Ma work out an intercultural cooperation, making the music just fits the style of the whole film: locating the Eastern culture in the Western style. 댓글 (7개)
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