{"id":9425,"date":"2018-05-29T14:08:58","date_gmt":"2018-05-29T14:08:58","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/thecliffedge.com\/?p=9425"},"modified":"2018-09-06T16:02:51","modified_gmt":"2018-09-06T16:02:51","slug":"kfmf18-michael-nyman-music-that-defines-a-world","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/thecliffedge.com\/?p=9425","title":{"rendered":"KFMF18: Michael Nyman: Music that defines a world"},"content":{"rendered":"

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By Ray Bennett<\/p>\n

KRAKOW \u2013 When Michael Nyman asked director Jane Campion why she chose him to write the music for her 1996 film \u201cThe Piano\u201d, she said something that pleased the iconic British composer very much. \u201cYou\u2019re the only composer,\u201d he recalled her saying, \u201cwho can create music that instantly and convincingly defines a world.\u201d American actress Holly Hunter, who won an Oscar for the picture, also made a remark that he treasured. \u201cShe said I had helped her, through my music, to create the character,\u201d Nyman told me. \u201cThat is the ultimate vindication of what the composer does. I had helped to create the mood or psychological grounding on which she was then able to build.\u201d<\/p>\n

Nyman, who is unable to attend,\u00a0will be honoured as the recipient of the 4th Wojciech Kilar Award during\u00a0tonight\u2019s opening concert of the 10th Krakow Film Music Festival at the NOSPR Concert Hall in Katowice, which will be repeated Wednesday night\u00a0at the ICE Krak\u00f3w Congress Centre.\u00a0The Polish National Radio Orchestra conducted by Belgian maestro Dirk Bross\u00e9 also will perform Nyman\u2019s \u201cString Quartet No. 3\u201d, from his score from “The Piano”, arranged by Nikiforos Chrysoloras.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>Previous honourees were American Oscar-winner Elliot Goldenthal, French Oscar-winner Alexandre Desplat and Canadian Oscar-winner Howard Shore. The Kilar Award is named for the late Polish conductor whose prolific film work included Francis Ford Coppola\u2019s \u201cBram Stoker\u2019s Dracula\u201d and Roman Polanski\u2019s \u201cThe Ninth Gate\u201d. Coincidentally, he also scored Polanski\u2019s Oscar-winning \u201cThe Pianist\u201d and Jane Campion\u2019s 1996 film \u201cThe Portrait of a Lady\u201d while Nyman\u2019s best-loved movie score is for Campion\u2019s \u201cThe Piano\u201d. Notoriously, it was not nominated for an Oscar for his score for \u201cThe Piano\u201d although the soundtrack has sold more than three-million copies.<\/p>\n

The music for the picture is dissimilar, however, to his celebrated scores for British filmmaker Peter Greenaway\u2019s films such as \u201cThe Draughtsman\u2019s Contract\u201d (1982), \u201cA Zed and Two Noughts\u201d (1985), \u201cThe Cook, the Thief, His Wife & Her Lover\u201d (1989) and \u201cProspero\u2019s Books\u201d or Andrew Niccol\u2019s \u201cGattaca\u201d (1997), Neil Jordan\u2019s \u201cThe End of the Affair\u201d (1999) or Michael Winterbottom\u2019s \u201cWonderland\u201d (1999). Not to mention his equally acclaimed operas (such as \u201cThe Man Who Mistook His Wife For a Hat\u201d), multi-media work, books and 40-year career with the Michael Nyman Band.<\/p>\n

He is proud of his work for Greenaway although when they first started working together, he hadn\u2019t thought of himself as a film composer. He told me, \u201cWe were two fellow artists working together and our ideas and ideals happened to coincide in certain areas and not coincide in other areas. When I was working with him, I didn\u2019t think, \u2018Oh, this is how one gets into the film business; this is how one gets into the soundtrack business.\u2019 I was literally just working with my colleague and fellow artist and I think that is so unusual. I didn’t realise how fortunate I was. I found the one film director who encouraged the film composer to be as independent minded as possible and to write music that wasn’t dictated to in the way that you are in the commercial world.\u201d<\/p>\n

The concerts, Pendericki2Cinema, are part of the City of Krakow\u2019s celebrations of Krzysztof Penderecki\u2019s s 85th birthday and they will feature several of the celebrated Polish composer\u2019s works. Elliot Goldenthal also will be on hand for the premiere of his \u201cConcerto for Trumpet and Strings\u201d, which is dedicated to 18th century Polish hero Tadeusz Ko\u015bciuszko.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

By Ray Bennett KRAKOW \u2013 When Michael Nyman asked director Jane Campion why she chose him to write the music for her 1996 film \u201cThe Piano\u201d, she said something that pleased the iconic British composer very much. \u201cYou\u2019re the only … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5,1694,8,9],"tags":[4795,513,1481,3953,681,4171,4115,4791,4793,4794,4792,4796,4114],"class_list":["post-9425","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-film","category-krakow-film-music-festival","category-music","category-news","tag-concerto-for-trumpet-and-strings","tag-dirk-brosse","tag-elliot-goldenthal","tag-holly-hunter","tag-jane-campion","tag-krakow-film-music-festival","tag-krzysztof-penderecki","tag-michael-nyman-kfmf18","tag-nikiforos-chrysoloras","tag-peter-greenaway","tag-polish-national-radio-orchestra","tag-tadeusz-kosciuszko","tag-wojciech-kilar-award"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/thecliffedge.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9425","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/thecliffedge.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/thecliffedge.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thecliffedge.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thecliffedge.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=9425"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/thecliffedge.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9425\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":9504,"href":"https:\/\/thecliffedge.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9425\/revisions\/9504"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/thecliffedge.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=9425"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thecliffedge.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=9425"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thecliffedge.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=9425"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}