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Hello Everyone,
I watched the MJ interview last night on 20/20 and there was a scene where MJ climbs this tree at his Neverland Ranch. Anyway, I noticed that during that particular scene there was this enchanting background music being played in the key of C. It sounded like a slight variation of Mr. Elfman’s underlying melody heard at the very beginning (the first 13 seconds) of Edward Scissorhand’s Track 2 (Storytime) as well as the first 10 seconds of Ice Dance (Track 7). Did anyone else catch this ?
This also reminds me of that Toys R Us commercial which aired about 2-3 years ago during the Xmas holiday. It had some of the choir melodies from Ice Dance but sounded like a different variation. Does anyone remember this one ?
Just seems like the music from Edward is popping up all over the place. Which IMHO is a great thing! We need more music like this! I just wish these variations were available on CD.
BTW, while I’m on the subject of Edward Scissorhands I just want to say that Mr. Elfman outdid himself with that score. It is truly a masterpiece of melodic genius to say the least. His “Sergeant Pepper’s” opus if you will. Not even the great John Williams (with all due respect) has ever been able to touch the very foundation of my soul as has Mr. Elfman. The way he (Mr. Elfman) spins these delicate layers of sonic mastery into an ethereal heaven is far beyond the talents of many. And to be able (within a matter of a few musical seconds) to gently coax the tender resistant tears out of even the most rigid of people is an incredible feat that only very few elite composers can do. It is my hope that Mr. Elfman would one day return to this melancholy style of melodic expression and continue to bless with world with his creative genius.
Sincerely,
C.Lee
um…lets just hope he wins an Oscar before he hits 60
ps- the nissan commercials were amazing, y doesnt sum1 post them sumwhere, anywhere, i dont care how, i dont care where, i think the elfman fan base would appreciate hearing these lost pieces of beauty all over again or for the first time, perhaps the most recent music of his in the classic edward styleMichael Jackson on a Danny Elfman board?! Blasphamy!!!
A lot of commercials rip-off Elfman’s music. Especially around Christmas time. Right now there’s this one for the cellular phone service Cricket featuring an arm of crickets picking up phones and hurling them off a cliff. The music sounds incredibly like Elfman’s.
WOW! I thought that perhaps Mr. Elfman had made some kind of license agreement with these big companies to use his possible Edward “leftovers” (the extended cuts that perhaps sadly never made it on the CD). If this is not the case then could this be grounds for infringement ?
As far as I’m concerned, Mr. Elfman’s music is highly distinctive in style. Not to say that his style could not be immolated but the stuff that I heard was REMARKABLY similar in melody (give or take a note or two). This is especially true of the background music from the MJ tree climbing scene that I mentioned above. And as for the Toys R Us commercial, it was 100% IDENTICAL to ICE DANCE.
I remember when Brian May sued Vanilla Ice & Company for that Ice Ice Baby bass line while Vanilla’s reps forever claimed that the bass line was NOT EXACTLY the same (an extra note was added) as the original composition authored by Queen. It was to no surprise that May won the case hands down.
Just my Xtra 2 Cents.
C.Lee
Well, here is the bad thing: It is not copying if it is not EXACTLY the same. Say if you change ONE chord, or just a few notes on the theme, then you get past it. It is total bull**** but what are you gonna do? Look at it this way, everyone wants to copy Elfman because he is the best (hehehe). I don’t think Elfman cares too much otherwise he would be sueing everyone.
Knight (They should change the copyright laws)
I may be wrong, but I believe Danny really hates hearing his music in commercials. However, as he explained in a past interview, he doesn’t own the rights for his own compositions : the studios themselves acquire it as they acquire his music.
Therefore, the companies who wish to employ Danny’s music do have to buy the rights… but they do it directly from the studios (say, Fox in case of EDWARD).
Elfman said that if he had disagreed to do the Nissan commercials, they would have directly used the Edward music anyway, even without Danny’s consent, because Fox gave them the right to. So Danny accepted to do it, but, as he said, without a lot of enthusiasm.Chanel n°5… Eurodisney resort park in Paris… all these commercials use Edward’s music to such an extent that it becomes disgusting.
– Squeezir.
The reason I said that is that usually, they have some composer do a variation. Now why spend the money on a composer if you have the rights to the original piece? I’ll tell ya, because they don’t, so they have to hire a composer and tell him “Do a variation on this piece of music by Elfman” and he says “Yeah! Ok! This is my big break! What do I care if I am directly ripping off someone elses music!”. This same kinda crap happens in film too, alot more since some smartass came up with the idea of ‘Temp scores’, and some people (will not name names) go ahead and directly rip off the music in a temp score, and the studio and director don’t give a **** because that was what they wanted anyways (hence the Temp score). Grrrrr.
Knight (I am getting upset now)
Theres a commercial ripping off Edward Scissorhands. The commericial is this perfume one, where Estella Warren (Planet of the Apes, coincidentally, another movie with an Elfman score) is in a Little Red Riding Hood outfit and is being chased by wolves around a room overlooking the Eiffel Tower. They play the whole main theme in all its glory from the “Introduction/Titles” cue. Hope this might do something to calm everyone down. It isn’t always necessarily his exact music, sometimes its variations.
The commercial you speak of, Slasher, is the one I told you about for Chanel n°5. I heard that it’s directed by Luc Besson, but I’m not really sure about it.
– Squeezir.
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