https://filmscoremonthly.com/board/posts.cfm?threadID=156256&forumID=1&archive=0Over the course of the past two years Leigh Phillips has successfully self-produced new recordings of 79 minutes* of previously unreleased Jerry Goldsmith music written for eight episodes of the long-running TV anthology series The General Electric Theater (*including the gorgeous 9 minute bonus score called "Autumn Love", written for the CBS Music Library in the late 1950s). Last year Leigh already announced his intention to produce a new recording of Lionheart in 2024, but this is a mammoth project which requires a great deal of planning and materials. There is a chance he might be able to start a smaller project beforehand, and so with his blessing we are going to conduct a poll online to see what film music fans might be most excited for him to tackle next. At Leigh's suggestion I'll still include an option for Lionheart for folks who truly see that as their highest priority (the prospect that they are most eager for) out of these, and allow TWO votes for each person, from this list.
This vote absolutely WILL impact what Leigh prioritizes next, so please don't hold back in sharing your thoughts and preferences here! (But please don't suggest other titles not on this list of options, such as In Harm's Way or The Satan Bug -- these are bigger projects and Leigh doesn't want to consider any of those until Lionheart is done.)
1. Thriller Volume 3: Fairly self-explanatory... as a follow up to the two beloved Tadlow Music volumes co-produced by Leigh years ago, this would include suites from the four remaining Goldsmith scores for the series which have not yet received modern recordings, plus suites from three Morton Stevens scores. To find out the scores Leigh has in mind, plus hear samples from them (taken from the DVD M&E tracks), check out this short podcast conversation with Leigh:
https://goldsmithodyssey.buzzsprout.com/159614/8425660-odyssey-interviews-leigh-phillips
2. Jerry Goldsmith at Climax Mystery Theater: Uniquely in his entire career, Goldsmith was the primary composer for this live (and originally in color, for those with the right equipment!) anthology TV series during its entire four-season run. With a few exceptions, whenever an episode required original music, he was the one who provided it. But unfortunately, many of the easily-accessible extant episodes of this series are ones which didn't require original music, so we have exactly three hourlong episodes in our possession for which Leigh could reconstruct the scores by ear, and use to produce a new recording: "Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde" (written for only three instruments in 1955, Leigh is a particular admirer of this one and would like to let it shine in modern sound), "Trail of Terror" (which has a lovely romantic theme that stands out in a few cues), and "A Matter of Life and Death" (my personal favorite -- just watch at least the beginning of this episode and marvel at the thrilling opening cue which sounds like fully mature Goldsmith, around 2 minutes in): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zaFu6KnlSXg
3. Jerry Goldsmith at The CBS Radio Workshop: Aside from "The Thunder of Imperial Names", re-arranged for wind band, none of Jerry Goldsmith's radio compositions have ever been released on album. That was one of four segments of the CBS Radio Workshop episode "1489 Words" which I and my cohosts at The Goldsmith Odyssey regard as Jerry Goldsmith's very first masterpiece, written earlier in 1957 before he even tackled his first film score Black Patch. Basically a series of four concert works setting famous poetry to music, conceived for narrator and orchestra, each one of them is a gem but especially the first lengthy segment "The Highwayman" which is positively spine-tingling at times. If you don't know this work already, check it out here in its original radio version narrated by Jerry's friend, actor William Conrad:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QFleK1sVxQs
For this new recording project, a version of all four pieces both with and without narration would form the centerpiece of the final album. But Goldsmith creatively scored at least a half dozen episodes of this series total, over a one year period. Here is our podcast coverage of his first score for the series, very much in his modernist style:
https://goldsmithodyssey.buzzsprout.com/159614/14067728-episode-41-storm-cbs-radio-workshop-1956
He also first crossed paths with Ray Bradbury on this series, brilliantly scoring a pair of short story adaptations:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aWiDEj-6Xbk
All in all, his music for this show constituted the most creative and experimental of his '50s output.
4. Three Western Premieres by Jerry Goldsmith: The western genre was one in which Goldsmith particularly excelled, and we have access to three projects he worked on which have never before been released on album: the dark score for the lost 1959 feature-length Playhouse 90 "Out of Dust" (IMDb's synopsis: "On a cattle drive across the prairie, the sons of a wealthy cattle baron plot his death"), a contrastingly light and energetic score for the unsold 1961 half-hour pilot "Mister Doc" which eventually was folded into the final season of The General Electric Theater (IMDb's synopsis: "Western comedy about a pharmacist and his son at the turn of the 20th century"), and last but not least Goldsmith's final work for CBS Radio, the 1958 western adventure series Frontier Gentleman, for which he composed the main theme and three full episode scores. Listeners of The Goldsmith Odyssey will remember that from our pilot episode, where we played some excerpts from all three Goldsmith scores for the show:
https://goldsmithodyssey.buzzsprout.com/159614/653347-episode-0-live-television-and-radio
5. Jerry Goldsmith's All-Synth Scores, for Orchestra: Alien Nation and Runaway seem generally well-liked, but with the latter in particular I think most Goldsmith fans tend to agree that the composition itself is much better than the very dated synths. Since Jerry basically "orchestrated" that score for synthesizers, I have long thought it would translate particularly well to a real orchestral ensemble, with synth being just an added element for some sci-fi flavor. Goldsmith's other all-synth score Criminal Law may be one of the most generally-hated scores of his entire career, but wait until you listen to this Leigh Phillips mockup which gives an idea of what it could sound like if performed by an orchestra. In my opinion, it's like hearing a whole new score!
https://mega.nz/file/eyQVAZaA#UqwCtT_L9TCdzlLU7Ox0KxMwE6BwGADwgiCjKYun_Xo
Leigh has been intrigued by the prospect of arranging these for orchestra for well over a decade now, and has floated the idea of tackling a 20 minute suite of highlights from each score to create an hourlong album. If there's enough interest, maybe the shortest score Criminal Law could even be recorded complete (the Varese album leaves off a few cues) because with 20 minutes from each of the other two scores, the whole thing would still fit on a single CD.
6. I am most eager for a new recording of Lionheart.
HAPPY VOTING! (Remember, you can choose TWO.)
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