Meet The Robinsons Soundtrack
© N/A
Danny Elfman Meets The Robinsons
By: Randall LarsonDate: Thursday, March 15, 2007
THIS WEEK’S RECOMMENDATIONS
Disney’s latest computer-animated feature, Meet The Robinsons, opens on March 30th and comes complete with a stirring score by Danny Elfman. The soundtrack album comes out on March 27th from Walt Disney Records. Based on the characters and events in the illustrated book, A Day with Wilbur Robinson, by William Joyce, the film is set in the year 2037 and is about the time-traveling adventures of inventor “Will” Robinson and his family. The film is scheduled to be shown in selected theaters using the same 3D process used in Chicken Little.
Despite being set in the future, Elfman has brought to bear a notably nostalgic vein in his scoring approach. While firmly set in his best vintage, Elfman has scored Meet The Robinsons kind of like a toned-down Beetlejuice – mischievously zany but not quite as frenetically wild – Elfman scoring Tim Burton through the lens of nostalgic Americana.
After passing through half a dozen pop songs – performed with a similar dichotomy of modernity and nostalgia by Matchbox Twenty’s Rob Thomas, Rufus Wainwright, Jamie Cullum, and The All-American Rejects we are presented with ten tracks of Elfman’s score, starting off with short cues but growing progressively longer through the very engaging 6-minute finale. The score takes a compelling journey from opening to closure, often mixing elements of Elfman’s own influences – a little bit of Bernard Herrmann in “Goob’s Story,” which is effectively awe-invoking with its hints of ascending choruses and soaring, significant chords, lending dramatic weight to the character’s tale; a healthy dose of Carl Stalling or Carl Bradley in the scores frequent excursions into manic cartoonmusicland; all circulating in and around the score’s heart, which is Elfman’s gentle and nicely finessed family theme.
“To The Future” takes us thirty years hence via a bubbling chorale chanted by insistently persuasive female chorus bridged by frantic jazz combo riffing, with a pseudo-angelic chorus highly intoning “The Future Has Arrived – Today!” Elfman’s approach is almost as if he remixed Beetlejuice as lounge music, resulting in a wondrous new sound texture and tone, plenty of dazzling, flying Elfman arpeggios, and a very gentle and affectionate heart, embodied by a somewhat Americana sounding main theme for the family. The theme is suggested in several earlier tracks (notably at the end of “A Family United” and the beginning of “The Evil Plan” but it isn’t until the closer, “Setting Things Right,” that Elfman fully develops it in very warm and sentimental terms. But even here there are hints of jazz and rumba and quirky humor’ Elfman always maintains a cool edge to the score, and you can often hear it grin.
Especially in a track called “Pop Quiz and the Time Machine Montage,” a cute and quirky and intoxicating lounge-ish motif for keyboards, chorus, and (yes!) bongos which sounds as amusing as that ensemble suggests. It’s perfect montage music and is just a lot of fun to listen to on the CD.
The film also includes a version of Robert B. & Richard M. Sherman’s classic “There’s a Great Big Beautiful Tomorrow” from the former Disneyland attraction, Carousel of Progress (you can still see it at Disney World, performed by none other than They Might Be Giants, complete with a thereminlike, flying soprano singer backing before morphing into a bit of big band jazz and then culminating with a 1960s-styled Broadway show closer). Jonas Brothers’ update of Kim Wilde’s “Kids of the Future” concludes the album.
Disney has done a nice job with this score, sequencing the songs first and allowing a reasonable 30 minutes for uninterrupted score, with two bonus song closing out the CD.
SCORING THE ROBINSONS:
The following is edited from material provided by Walt Disney Records:
The soundtrack album of Meet The Robinsons features 8 songs and almost as much joyful diversity as the Robinson family itself. It features the lead single "Little Wonders" from Rob Thomas as well as tracks from the new runaway hit rock/pop ensemble The All-American Rejects, the dynamic British singer-songwriter and pianist Jamie Cullum, plus bonus tracks from the teenaged, hyper-energized trio Jonas Brothers and the ever-innovative pop group They Might Be Giants.
"I am so excited by the music in the movie because it adds even more energy and emotion," says director Steve Anderson.
Rufus Wainwright, the Canadian-American who has been lauded as one of the most extraordinary songwriters of his generation, jumped at his chance to become part of the Walt Disney legacy by contributing key songs. "So many great many people have written for Disney movies, from Randy Newman to Elton John and Phil Collins," he notes, "it's become something very coveted and respected. I was honored to be thought about in that way."
Wainwright would ultimately write three songs for the film including Wilbur's theme "Another Believer" (written with Marius de Vries), the Big Band tune "Where Is Your Heart At?" which is sung by Grammy-nominated jazz and pop star Jamie Cullum and the romantic "Motion Waltz." Wainwright's inspiration came throughout from trying to put himself in the audience's position. "I wanted songs that would be immediately sustaining and really keep their attention," he says.
Also contributing the song "Little Wonders" to Meet The Robinsons is Rob Thomas, the primary composer and lead singer for the mega-hit rock band Matchbox Twenty. Thomas only needed to see a few clips of the early animation for the film to know he wanted to be a part of the project. "I never thought I would get the chance to do something like this," he says. “After seeing a few bits and pieces of the film I was really excited."
It was all he needed for inspiration. "The story itself inspired me, with this orphan trying to figure out who he is through this magical fantasy," Thomas explains. "There was a melody in my head and it all kind of started to flow together. The song is about how people sometimes can get stuck in a bad moment when something is bringing you down and lose sight of the idea that something else will come along to make them happy. Y'know life has its ups and downs but it's all about making the most of those great little moments."
For Steve Anderson, the songs added even more hues and shadings to Lewis' story. "We have the really fun stuff with the Frog Band but I also wanted a couple of songs to really take you into Lewis' inner world and struggles," says the director. "Rufus Wainwright writes about the search for family and then Rob Thomas writes about finding Lewis finding a family in a completely different way than he ever could have dreamed. The songs become a great part of the journey."
Meanwhile Danny Elfman was crafting a score that matches the Robinson's mix of high-speed hilarity and heart. Elfman, who has created dozens upon dozens of truly distinctive feature film scores - ranging from Batman and Spider-Man to Good Will Hunting and Chicago and, on the animation side, from Nightmare Before Christmas to Charlotte's Web – found that Meet The Robinsons still managed to offer something completely different. He saw the chance to flash back to the kind of kaleidoscopic score one heard back in the days of Looney Tunes and Merry Melodies, filled with surprising and entertaining shifts in tempo, tone and style, matching the jazzy energy of the Robinsons, while at the same time providing a lush, romantic background to Lewis' transformational journey.
Elfman comments: "I've always somewhat avoided animation because the music can get kind of silly and spoofy but Meet The Robinsons not only struck me as very creative and crazy in the best sense, but also as very emotional. It meant that I could, on the one hand, do some stuff like Carl Stalling, who composed for the classic Warner Bros. cartoons, while on the other also write big themes that relate to story and character."
Elfman eventually developed distinct themes for each of the film's major characters - a sweeter, yearning theme for the starry-eyed orphan Lewis, a chaotic Latin-inspired theme for the magnificently manic Robinsons and a more mischievous theme for Doris, the evil bowler hat. He was especially inspired by the spirit of the Robinsons. "This family's so over the top and what really sparked me is that their movements are so quick and sudden. They zip around in that classic Golden Age of animation style, so I'd pick a character's movement and just follow them with the music, go right with what they were doing," he explains. "There's also a funny retro attitude to a lot of the music because this vision of the future has a fantastic retro feel to it."
Elfman's score was eventually performed and recorded by a 90-piece orchestra, including not only strings but a sizable horn section and even a full choir. "The choral music adds more color, another element. They can do things no other instrument can do," notes Elfman.
In addition to scoring the film, Elfman collaborated with alt-rockers Nick Wheeler and Tyson Ritter of The All-American Rejects to craft the buoyant track "The Future Has Arrived." Performed by The All-American Rejects, the song blends the "funny retro attitude" of Elfman's score with AAR's own rock/pop sound.
Creating the score and "The Future Has Arrived" turned out to be a total pleasure. "I've done nearly 60 films, but I can only think of maybe 6 that went this smoothly," Elfman confesses. "Working with Steve Anderson and the whole creative team on Meet The Robinsons was just easy and wonderful. It was really the exception to the rule and it was nice to be reminded that movie-making can be this way."
Anderson was equally excited by Elfman's contributions. He comments: '" remember the first time Danny played me a demo. It was for the Future City fly-through scene and I was just glued to every note and my eyes misted up because I thought 'this is so perfect. This is everything I've dreamed about.' Danny just has that ability to know exactly the right thing to do musically to make any moment richer. The comedy is funnier, the tears fall faster, the scary moments are scarier and everything is deeper because of Danny's music."
FILM MUSIC NEWS
Grindhouse Soundtrack © 
In other Varese Sarabande news, Howard Shore’s score for Zodiac and Harry Gregson-Williams music from Snakes On A Plane both came out this week. John Frizzell’s score for The Reaping, which Varese will release on March 27th, is a grand work for choir and orchestra, capturing the age-old, Biblically-epic, battle of good and evil.
Last week, brother composers Mychael and Jeff Danna were at the Todd AO Scoring Stage, where they recorded music to their latest collaboration: Fracture. The film, directed by Gregory Hoblit (Primal Fear), the film is a thriller about a game of cat-and-mouse between an assistant DA (Ryan Gosling) and a man who was accused of murdering his wife, but released on technicalities (Anthony Hopkins). See the photo report on the scoring sessions at: http://www.soundtrack.net/news
Film Score Monthly has released their March titles. In the Silver Age Classics series comes The Wrath Of God (1972), an action-adventure film that has been viewed as everything from a violent drama to a parody of movie conventions. Lalo Schifrin provided a terrific score in the traditions of his western and action efforts of the time (such as Clint Eastwood's Joe Kidd), with a distinctive Latin flavor as well as orchestral elements ranging from the avant garde to contemporary rock (perhaps evoking spaghetti westerns and their anachronisms).
In the Golden Age Classics series we have Some Came Running (1958), a prestigious adaptation of James Jones's second novel about a serviceman (Frank Sinatra) who returns to his rural Indiana hometown following World War II. While struggling to find his purpose in life, he is torn romantically between a luckless floozie (Shirley MacLaine) and an intellectual schoolteacher (Martha Hyer) who appreciates his ambitions as a writer but spurns him romantically. The movie required from Elmer Bernstein not only a jazz score, but moments of musical Americana. www.filmscoremonthly.com
New Line Records will release Howard Shore’s persuasive orchestral score to The Last Mimzy on March 20th.
On March 28th, La-La Land records will release the first ever official, studio-endorsed CD release of composer Jerome Moross’s classic, original score to the beloved 1958 MGM/UA epic western, The Big Country, starring Gregory Peck, Carroll Baker, Charlton Heston, Burl Ives and Chuck Connors and directed by William Wyler. Remastered and complimented with exclusive liner notes and official art, this special release of Moross’s original score recording is limited to 3000 units. The score was released in 1991 on a limited (and subsequently sold out) box set, containing a CD and an exhaustively thorough 64-page booklet all about the film and its score, by Screen Archives Entertainment (their first specialty release, as I recall), but while that set was approved by the composer’s estate it was not approved by the Studio. La-La Land’s CD is in mono, as no stereo masters of the original recording are in existence, but it has been meticulously cleaned and remastered. I had the pleasure of writing and editing the liner notes for this release, so I’m not entirely objective, but I can attest to the quality of the sound – and the score, of course, remains a masterpiece; one of the finest American Western scores ever. – www.lalalandrecords.com
Japan’s new label specialty Avanz offers their third exclusive world premiere Ennio Morricone CD release with La Fidanzata Del Bersagliere aka Soldier's Girl. Like the label’s previous Matchless and Buone Notizie, the CD presents the content from the original Italian Cometa LP, issued in a limited quantity of only 1000 copies for Morricone collectors back in the late 1970s. The film was a 1966 romance movie directed by Alessandro Blasetti.
If you’ll be in the Los Angeles area on March 24th, you might want to stop by Dark Delicacies in Burbank (www.darkdel.com) – Perseverance Records is hosting their first ever composer signing at 2 PM. Composers David Williams (The Prophecy), Jim Manzie (Leatherface, Texas Chainsaw Massacre III), Charles Bernstein (Deadly Friend), Dennis Dreith (The Punisher), Phillip Lambro (Crypt of the Living Dead), Craig Safan (Remo Williams) are scheduled to be on hand to autograph their Perseverance CD’s (you must buy one to get it signed). Jeff Burr and R.A. Mihailoff (director and star of Leatherface), and Scott McKinlay (director of Gag) have all signed on to be there. They will be joined by Scott Glasgow (Robotech) and Christopher Young (Ghost Rider, Spider-Man 3) from Varese Sarabande. www.perseverancerecords.com
GAME MUSIC NEWS
The videogame soundtrack that first opened a door to the Grammy Awards, defined new production standards for game music, set sales records and eventually led to an Academy Award, is being commercially released worldwide by Universal Music Group Recordings, Inc.
Quest for Glory V Soundtrack © 
It was the music from Quest for Glory V that first turned the heads of Recording Academy leaders in 1997 and began the process of bringing game music into the Grammy Awards. The soundtrack's film-score sensibilities and high production standards demonstrated a maturing approach to game music that placed it on par with film and television soundtracks. "I still remember sitting in NARAS' offices for the first time, watching Academy VP Diane Theriot place the Quest for Glory V soundtrack in her CD player and push the play button," says Thomas. "I was so nervous. Quest was my opening move to get game music into the Grammy Awards. So when she started smiling and nodding her head at me, I knew the orchestra had done the trick. She said, 'I'm very impressed,' and got the ball rolling that very day." Grammy eligibility was extended to game music for the first time, and ultimately three new categories were added for its inclusion.
Today the modern film orchestra is ubiquitous in dramatic game scoring. But 10 years ago, the live symphonic tracks in Quest for Glory V were ground-breaking. They were among the very first orchestral recordings for any American-made game, and the first ever for game-maker Sierra. Said Craig Alexander, Sierra's general manager at the time, "Quest for Glory V: Dragon Fire features a full orchestra, classical guitar, gothic harp, layered vocals, even a handful of exotic instruments, all played by the finest studio musicians. It cost us a bundle, but every reviewer out there is raving about the music. I wish I could get that much bang for the buck out of all aspects of production." (Grammy Magazine, Getting In The Game, Spring Issue 1999)
The Quest for Glory V soundtrack literally led to an Oscar. The soundtrack CD caught the attention of Ken Ralston, then president of Sony Pictures Imageworks, during pre-production for his animated short film, The ChubbChubbs. Said Ralston, "That led me to pursue Chance Thomas for our first animated short... His scores are ingenious, evocative and have a sophisticated filmic sound." Chance delivered a comic, foreboding original score for The ChubbChubbs that won Best of Show at the International Aurora Awards in music scoring. The film went on to dominate short film festivals and awards, eventually taking home an Oscar at the 75th Annual Academy Awards. This was the first time a game music composer had scored an Oscar winning film of any kind.
Music from Quest for Glory V was performed live at the world's first game music concert held outside Japan. The historic symphonic concert at the 2003 European GC conference featured the "Overture" from Quest for Glory V's soundtrack, a five-minute exposition of the game's main themes. Maestro Andy Brick conducted the Czech National Symphony Orchestra in its performance at the renowned Gewandhaus Concert Hall in Leipzig, Germany.
With a CD release by Sonic Images in 1998 selling more than 50,000 units, Quest for Glory V: Dragon Fire was the most commercially successful game soundtrack of its day. It remains among the best selling American game soundtracks of all time.
Recommended Soundtrack sources:
www.arksquare.com/index_main
www.intermezzomedia.com/ (Italy)
www.moviemusic.com
