Saying It With Songs: Popular Music And The Coming Of Sound To Hollywood Cinema (Oxford Music/Media) (Oxford Music/Media Series) - Softcover

Spring, Katherine

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0199842221 ISBN 13: 9780199842223

Publisher: Oxford University Press, Usa, 2013

Synopsis

Hollywood's conversion from silent to synchronized sound film production not only instigated the convergence of the film and music industries but also gave rise to an extraordinary period of songs in American cinema. Saying It With Songs considers how the increasing interdependence of Hollywood studios and Tin Pan Alley music publishing firms influenced the commercial and narrative functions of popular songs. While most scholarship on film music of the period focuses on adaptations of Broadway musicals, this book examines the functions of songs in a variety of non-musical genres, including melodramas, romantic comedies, Westerns, prison dramas, and action-adventure films, and shows how filmmakers tested and refined their approach to songs in order to reconcile the spectacle of song performance, the classical norms of storytelling, and the conventions of background orchestral scoring from the period of silent cinema. Written for film and music scholars alike as well as for general readers, Saying It With Songs illuminates the origins of the popular song score aesthetic of American cinema.

About this title

About the Author

Katherine Spring is Associate Professor in the Department of English and Film Studies at Wilfrid Laurier University in Ontario. Her articles on film music have appeared in Cinema Journal, Film History, and Music and the Moving Image. The recipient of a development grant from the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada, she is presently undertaking a study of film music in contemporary Hong Kong and Hollywood cinemas.

Edition details

• Publisher: Oxford University Press, Usa
• Publication date: 2013
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 0199842221
• ISBN 13: 9780199842223
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 244