Tema: Kenneth Branagh

De las memorias de Lawrence Ashmore, orquestador de Patrick Doyle desde su debut Enrique V (1989) , hasta Cómo Gusteis (2006). Su primer trabajo en la industria del cine fue orquestando La Caída del Imperio Romano, de Dimitri Tiomkin, en 1964.

Falleció en 2013.



Sobre Doyle y Henry V:

A wet night in Charing Cross road I presented myself at the stage door of the Phoenix theatre and asked the doorman for Pat Doyle’s dressing room. I had already seen the show, “As You Like It”, and so had had my first encounter with Kenneth Branagh and The Renaissance Theatre Company. Pat Doyle, who hails from Glasgow had a small part but also sang some songs during the play accompanying himself on an autoharp. His role in the company was mainly to supply original music, so this play was a good opportunity for him to display his talent.

(...)



This introduction had been made by our mutual friend, Brian Gascoigne, a pianist, arranger and computer wizard who had a small studio within the larger CTS Studio in Wembley. Brian had been making some demonstration tapes for Pat who was preparing them to present to the production company that was about to make “Henry V”, Kenneth Branagh’s first movie as director. Not surprisingly, given his position with the company, Pat had asked his boss if he could be considered as composer for the picture, but had not yet been offered the job. Brian Gascoigne had declined the job of orchestrating for Pat and had recommended me (thanks, Brian!)

(...)


For the next week or two we started together on some ideas for the score, some of which Ken liked and some he didn’t. During this time we were together every day at Brian’s studio and I had a chance to get to know him a bit. From a Scottish catholic, working class family, he was the seventh son of a seventh son, which is supposed to mark you out for distinction in the world of affairs. He had studied at the Royal Scottish Academy, after which he had worked in Scotland as an actor/musician until joining The Renaissance Theatre Company.

Eventually Pat was chosen as composer and began to realise the size of the job he had taken on. It would be a score for full orchestra lasting about 75 minutes, which Ken had decided even though filming had not yet started. This is a great help to any composer, who usually doesn’t get called in until shooting has finished, because Pat now had some three months to spend writing the score which, bearing in mind the fact that this was his first movie he was going to need.

Another advantage for him was the fact that he himself was in the picture, playing a small part, but crucially, experiencing the movie as it grew during filming, something no composer normally gets. And another lucky fact was that most of the Production Staff were also doing something for the first time and thus had no preconceived ideas about what was possible.

This was an absolute boon for the creative people as, traditionally, the producers (that is the budget-watchers, money-men and accountants), can seriously limit creative freedom by forcing budgetary controls over everything. All this was mostly absent. Steven Evans, the producer, who was securing the financing of the picture, had all the usual headaches associated with finding the money, but he didn’t let that disturb the people who were making the picture. And David Parfitt, another producer, was also a Renaissance man, and thus an ally.

Filming took place at Shepperton Studios, its woods and its grounds, while the Battle of Agincourt was shot in a field opposite, beside the giant reservoir next door whose high bank had to be carefully screened from any camera shot.

I went down several times to watch filming and one night watched the sacking of Harfleur by fire and the “once more unto the breach, dear friends” speech, with fire engines and fire fighters everywhere as we put the town to the torch. Terribly exciting for me as I love fireworks. By the time filming had finished Pat had already mapped out some of the main themes. The main theme progresses through the score from the dark minor form of the original version in the main title, to its triumphal major key apotheosis of the hymn “Non Nobis Domine” which closes the Battle Scene. Rather satisfying that.

At that time Pat was using the old method for writing. He would sketch out the music in “short score”, that is, in a three line piano part with instrumental indications and timings. But even that early on in the process, he had decided we should use click tracks to ensure exact synchronisation between the music and the film.

This means printing an audible “click” that one listens to while playing the music to ensure the exact tempo is maintained. If it is properly used it is not so rigid as it might sound, and Pat used irregular bar lengths to break up any sense of monotony. Nowadays, most composers use this method and employ a music editor who takes care of the technical side and prints the outline scores with timings and “hit points”, moments where music must coincide in some emphatic way with the picture. Of course it all takes a bit of getting used to and progress was slow at first, but we soon picked up speed.

Another feature of work with Pat was his freedom from convention. This meant that many of my opinions about the suitability of what he suggested would be called into question and I would find myself going down a completely different musical path. Although we had some clashes over this at the beginning, I found this rather refreshing. On the other hand, he would let me have my way with unusual combinations of instruments so that eventually we wound up with “an interesting and unusual score”. (Here I’m quoting the conductor – see below.)

One of Pat’s characteristics is his love of singing and choirs, so when it came to the climax and King Henry calls for hymns of praise to be sung, it was an opportunity for him to come up with something so simple yet so effective as “Non Nobis Domine”, which forms the high spot of the score. It was recorded at CTS studios, at that time one of the best studios anywhere for recording movies. A few weeks before, one of Ken Branagh’s staff was discussing the picture with a friend who revealed that she knew Simon Rattle and that he loved movies. “Would he be interested in recording ‘Henry’?” she was asked. Simon was asked and said he would be delighted to record Pat’s score and he would bring the City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra down to London to do it. Wow! Could any composer ask for more?

On the first day of recording Pat and I and the rest of the music staff arrived early. The studio staff were already there as was the director and all the production staff. The atmosphere was “First Night”, excited but suppressed . We spoke for some minutes until, standing in the door, there was Simon Rattle who shook hands and started to chat to both Ken and Pat who introduced me.


(...)

So to the recording sessions. We started recording the music in the order in which it appears in the movie after the title music. A black screen is suddenly illuminated by a lighter’s flame. It falls on the face of the chorus, played by Derek Jacobi as he speaks these famous lines, “Oh for a muse of fire that would ascend the brightest Heaven of invention.” As he moves, “a Kingdom for a stage…”, lighting begins to reveal a film studio. At this point the strings begin a quiet progression of chords in D minor.

This was the first time Pat had heard a note of his score and it overwhelmed him. “Oh! It sounds wonderful”, he shouted out in the silent control room, “I’ve got to tell them!”. To everybody’s surprise he jumped up, leapt down the stairs and burst into the studio where the orchestra were still playing the cue with all eyes on the conductor and their backs to the door through which this excited composer had just burst. Those eyes spun round to see a loony standing in the doorway shouting, “It sounds GREAT!” . Most of the orchestra had not met Pat and didn’t know him from Adam, so it was up to Simon Rattle to calm the situation quickly and introduce him, “Ladies and gentlemen…Mr Patrick Doyle, the composer”. This eased the situation and there was some applause. However inexcusable it might seem, there is only one time in your life you hear your own music for the first time and it is the most wonderful moment too, unique and unforgettable.


(...)

It’s so funny to think that all that industry, so common only a few years ago, has now utterly changed because the advent of computers and modern software have made the old style music copyist completely redundant. This important skill has been totally bypassed by “Sibelius’’, an ingenious music writing computer software that will produce music as perfect as a printer and perform all vital functions connected with the production of printed scores and orchestral parts.

And all in a few years. Composers who write for films and television have also had their lives and working methods changed by computers. It would be very difficult to compose for these media nowadays without using a computer, indeed there is now a new official profession of “electronic composer” that has come into being. Pat is one such composer who has changed his work method, as I described earlier, and “gone electronic”. But here I have to speak for myself when I say these changes have not always been for the better.

Previously the director would have been satisfied with a conference with his composer in which he would be played themes on a piano, which he could approve, while the fine detail of each music cue could be left to the composer to write in his own way. That state of affairs has been changed by computers. Now the director can ask for, and get, an electronic “mock up” of the final score to approve or disapprove. This is called a “demo”, which the director can take away with him as a music file and play to himself or even add to his picture to see how I suits him.


For the director, this may seem to be fine. But for the composer, his creative freedom is now compromised. He is effectively chained to that version of his music. If he decides on a better version, he has to persuade the director that the new version is better, and probably has to produce a new “demo” to support his argument.

This has given the director even more control over his composer than he already had. I don’t have to tell you that this state of affairs is not always popular with composers!