SUPERMAN: The Music... 8 CD Limited Edition Box Set

Jonathan Perregaux · 02-26-2008, 01:23 PM

This caught me completely off-guard this morning:

http://www.screenarchives.com/title_detail.cfm?ID=8874

Complete scores to Superman I-IV plus the animated series from the late 80's, all newly remastered from original elements. Superman: The Movie replaces the previous out-of-print 2-disc set with the entire score remastered from the original six-track masters, giving us music sourced from the first-generation master. Superman II is now complete and buffed, apparently less thin-sounding than the earlier record album and Japanese CD. Superman III is all here officially for the first time. The lost score for Superman IV by Alexander Courage is now presented uncut and whole. There is music here that did not survive the slashing of that film down to 90 minutes and has never been heard before.

Amazing stuff.

**HTF Ads**

oscar_merkx · 03-03-2008, 04:38 AM

for more informatio

The Complete Superman Soundtrack BOXSET

Quote:

Q. Why weren't scores for Superman Returns, Superboy and Superman: The Animated Series (Shirley Walker) included?
A. Mike Matessino: We started the project BEFORE Superman Returns came out and the licensing deal was already locked. As a brand new release there was no way we could have even discussed the possibility of doing anything with it, and as has been pointed out the union fees for something brand new would have been prohibitively expensive. The other thing that Superman fans may not realize is that our release is FSM's second box set. The first was "The Elmer Bernstein Film Collection," which had the same physical design but is 12 discs instead of 8. In trying to create a product line FSM wanted to follow the same design format, so when we started and realized we needed seven discs to present the four films, Lukas Kendall asked me if I had any ideas for an eighth disc in order to fill up the second clamshell case. A lot of ideas were thrown around Superboy, Supergirl, Smallville, the Shirley Walker scores, etc. but they were either too expensive and/or problematic to make happen

oscar_merkx · 03-03-2008, 04:46 AM

A Long-But-Fascinating Interview With The Folks Behind The New 8 CD Boxset Of SUPERMAN Scores!! -- Ain't It Cool News: The best in movie, TV, DVD, and comic book news.

A Long-But-Fascinating Interview With The Folks Behind The New 8 CD Boxset Of SUPERMAN Scores!!

Dharmesh over at SUPERMAN Cinema (Superman Cinema)conducted an interview between Mike Matessino and Lukas Kendall; the two producers involved in creating the SUPERMAN: THE MUSIC (1978-1988) 8CD box set.

Quote:

DHARMESH: You extracted quotes from previous interviews, some unreleased. Who did you interview for this release? Who couldn’t you get?
MM: Because of all the activity going on with Warner's DVD release, especially "The Donner Cut" of Superman II, the cast and crew were very much available and in particular Tom Mankiewicz, Ilya Salkind and Ken Thorne all became involved and contributed many recollections over several conversations. John Williams gave us a brief quote about Sandy Courage for Superman IV.
I also interviewed Eric Tomlinson, John Richards, Margot Kidder, Leslie Bricusse, Richard Donner, Pierre Spengler, Stuart Baird and a few others, but for some we didn't end up using direct quotes in the book.
As it evolved, Lukas sought to increase the amount of composer quotes and he got the okay to use the uncut Williams interviews done for all of the DVD documentaries. There was really no one I went for that I didn't get, although naturally I would like to have gotten something from Richard Lester or Sidney Furie.
Sandy Courage, unfortunately, is not in the best of health but he is very happy about the release and with the help of his daughter we located some important documentation about his work on Superman IV.

Quote:

DHARMESH: John Williams wrote two themes for Superman IV that we knew of, “Lacy’s Theme”, which harkens back to his jazz days, and the villainous “Nuclear Man Theme”. What’s surprising is that he wrote a third theme, one which was a precursor to the sound of Hook
- a revelation for you?

MM: Absolutely! I first heard "Jeremy's Theme" when we found the master for the aborted Superman IV album release, which was before I'd seen any documentation or heard the complete elements that I later worked with.
I love that no one really knew about it. It's a gem and I wanted it to be a surprise just like it was for me. If it's a precursor to Hook, that could partially be attributed to the fact that some of the themes for that film were written in the mid-1980s, when Williams and Leslie Bricusse (lyricist of "Can You Read My Mind") were developing a musical Peter Pan for Steven Spielberg that the director aborted sometime during the making of Empire of the Sun.
It's also been recently pointed out to me that "Jeremy's Theme" bears some resemblance to "Jim's New Life" from that project, which Williams worked on right after Superman IV.

there is so much more

oscar_merkx · 03-03-2008, 04:50 AM

some additional news

Quote:

Mike Matessino, producer of Film Score Monthly's /Superman: The Music (1978-1988)/ is the guest on the radio show "Celluloid Dreams" on Monday, March 3rd.

This edition will be entirely devoted to the music of Superman and will feature the premiere broadcast of music from /Superman IV: The Quest for Peace/. "Celluloid Dreams," hosted by Tim Sika and now in its 12th year, is dedicated to the art of film and the moviegoing experience, and is heard each Monday at 5:00 p.m. Pacific time on KSJS, 90.5 FM in San Jose, California.
The station does not stream live but for those not in the listening area the entire program is posted after the broadcast at http://www.celluloiddreams.net and is both listenable and downloadable for one week.

Jonathan Perregaux · 03-04-2008, 07:40 PM

I have started listening to the score for Superman II as this was in most need of an upgrade... and the results are astonishing. Sonically, it completely eliminates the "high school marching band" sound of the original LP without changing any of the music. It sounds brighter, more distinct, and downright gutsy. At times, I could have almost mistaken it for the original John Williams recordings. Whoever was turning the knobs on the original mastering should be ashamed of himself. All these years and I thought it was Ken Thorne's fault for the score sounding so bad. Now it sounds like it belongs in a Superman film. Bravo.

oscar_merkx · 03-10-2008, 03:46 PM

I am watching Superman The Movie along with the Isolated music track.

I had forgotten how powerful the music of John Williams is

Dan Szwarc · 03-12-2008, 11:21 AM

Can we buy this set anywhere else? $120 plus $10 shipping is steep, especially when I already own S1 on double-CD. I'd love to get SII, and the others just to complete the collection.

ThomasC · 03-12-2008, 11:30 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Dan Szwarc

Can we buy this set anywhere else? $120 plus $10 shipping is steep, especially when I already own S1 on double-CD. I'd love to get SII, and the others just to complete the collection.

You can buy it elsewhere, but it's the same price or more. You'll save a few bucks on shipping with Amazon, but it's the same retailer that's selling it. They're only making 3000 copies, so the price doesn't seem incredibly steep. Looks nice:

http://www.supermanhomepage.com/imag...heMusic-01.jpg

Jonathan Perregaux · 03-14-2008, 03:25 PM

I've listened to the scores to all four feature films in this box set. I'll spin the score to the '88 cartoon series next.

All the scores sound amazing. I loved hearing the little gems, such as "The Dome Opens" from Superman: The Movie, an alternate cue for the Phantom Zone sequence. Ken Thorne used this piece in II for the beginning of Superman's battle with the 3 villains. "General? Would you care to step outside?"

The score for IV was a revelation. Listening to it almost made me believe the movie didn't completely suck.

ThomasC · 03-14-2008, 05:48 PM

Oh dear, "Lacy (disco version)."

I can't believe it was even composed.

lukejosephchung · 03-15-2008, 10:28 PM

Just got my box set in the mail today...looking forward to checking out all the music in this amazing collection over the next 7 to 10 nights after work. Thanx to Mike Mattesino for such a superhuman achievement in film music archiving!

Dharmesh C · 03-18-2008, 02:01 PM

I'm glad you guys are enjoying it.

There will be another pressing of 3000. Only 6000 in the world.