# Film Score Reductions & Analysis! Post Requests, thoughts, etc. here!



## bradfrey (Mar 29, 2016)

Hey everyone!
I've been spending a lot of time lately reducing and analyzing film score cues, and I wanted to share the final products with all of you via my YouTube channel, "FilmScoreAnalysis," which you can find here: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCk_jzTmW2Fmfnm70c2kZHpQ

So far, there's only a few John William cues, including Jurassic Park, Jaws, Harry Potter, and Catch Me If You Can. I'm currently working on some Star Wars and Schindler's List cues from him as well.

Other composers I'm working on analyzing currently include Danny Elfman (Nightmare Before Christmas, Batman), Hans Zimmer (The Dark Knight trilogy), and Bernard Herrmann (Psycho). 

I created this thread to get some requests from all of you, and to hopefully start some cool discussions about these cues. What are some of your favorite cues that you'd like to see here?

Thanks everyone! 
-Brad


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## artmuz (Mar 29, 2016)

I think this is excellent and very well done!


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## rainierjmartin (Mar 29, 2016)

I loved your John Williams analyses! If you could do a Star Wars video on cues like Throne Room or Binary Sunset that would be very cool.


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## Mundano (Mar 29, 2016)

First of all, thank you for this work. Would it be tedious or sumptuous to analyse Philip Glass's Koyaanisqatsi OST?


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## tonaliszt (Mar 29, 2016)

Loving the Catch me if you can analysis. Great work.


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## bradfrey (Mar 30, 2016)

rainierjmartin said:


> I loved your John Williams analyses! If you could do a Star Wars video on cues like Throne Room or Binary Sunset that would be very cool.


Thanks! I'm working on both the main Star Wars theme as well as the Throne Room right now, Binary Sunset would be a great one to do as well!


Mundano said:


> First of all, thank you for this work. Would it be tedious or sumptuous to analyse Philip Glass's Koyaanisqatsi OST?


Not any more tedious than any of the other scores (more or less) Is there a particular cue you'd be interested in seeing?


n.h said:


> Loving the Catch me if you can analysis. Great work.


Thanks! I'm working on reducing the "Recollections/Father's Theme" from Catch Me If You Can as well.


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## Groctave (Mar 30, 2016)

Such a great job ! Studying masterpieces is fundamental to improve one's musical vocabulary.

Love the 'Jaws' analysis and its Stravinsky reference (I KNEW it sounded like something I had already heard). I also hear some Dvoràk in the very beginning of this cue : the first bars of the New World Symphony, 4th movement. What do you think ?


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## Mundano (Mar 30, 2016)

Thanks for answering. How about around 14min, Brasses modulations, 28min, Woodwinds+organ?+Choir triple-time, and 30:30min, Strings Section? love minimalism...


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## newcreation08 (Mar 31, 2016)

You are doing a really great job, bradfrey!!! 
Many thanks for sharing this!


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## bradfrey (Mar 31, 2016)

Groctave said:


> Love the 'Jaws' analysis and its Stravinsky reference (I KNEW it sounded like something I had already heard). I also hear some Dvoràk in the very beginning of this cue : the first bars of the New World Symphony, 4th movement. What do you think ?



I knew I was forgetting something! I can definitely here the New World Symphony in there at the beginning. I think I remember reading somewhere that Dvoràk was one of his main inspirations for the score, along with Ravel's "La Valse" and Stravinsky's "Rite of Spring." (There's no doubt he takes inspiration from Dvoràk in many, many other cases as well, of course!)



Mundano said:


> Thanks for answering. How about around 14min, Brasses modulations, 28min, Woodwinds+organ?+Choir triple-time, and 30:30min, Strings Section? love minimalism...




Sure thing! I'm finishing up a few other cues right now, but I'll stick that one in my "queue" and get to it as soon as I can


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## bradfrey (May 12, 2016)

Just to update everyone (if you're not already subscribed!), I've uploaded a TON of new Star Wars score reductions and analysis. Check it out!

Main Theme/Imperial Attack
The Desert
Binary Sunset
Cantina Band
March of the Resistance

Playlist:


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## novaburst (May 12, 2016)

Keep it up and dont stop, very good stuff you have there.


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## marclawsonmusic (May 12, 2016)

This is terrific stuff. Are the score reductions themselves available for download / sale? 

This is literally hours and hours of work you've done to both reduce and analyze what is going on harmonically. I would pay money for that 

Excellent work,
Marc


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## bradfrey (May 12, 2016)

marclawsonmusic said:


> This is terrific stuff. Are the score reductions themselves available for download / sale?
> 
> This is literally hours and hours of work you've done to both reduce and analyze what is going on harmonically. I would pay money for that
> 
> ...



Thanks Marc! Glad you're enjoying the videos. I've been considering selling the reductions/analysis as a book or something, but I'm really not sure what the legality of it would be. I feel like I would need publishing rights of some sort, and I'm not sure how to do that.


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## Paul T McGraw (May 15, 2016)

Thank you bradfrey! Awesome work.


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## BenG (May 20, 2016)

This is fantastic and really well done!


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## Rodney Money (May 20, 2016)

Thank you for having more time on your hands than I do (try to take that as a compliment, lol.) Excellent work and fun to watch and listen to. I subscribed.


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## Flux (Jun 12, 2016)

Thank you for these Bradfrey! Very helpful

If I could suggest cues, the theme from Studio Ghibli's Princess Mononoke and Leaving Hogwarts from Harry Potter would be my suggestions. Keep up the good work!


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## Black Light Recordings (Mar 27, 2017)

Bradfery
Your work on these reductions and analysis is pure gold. Thank you for taking the time and sharing the knowledge. I keep your Williams reductions on regular repeat to soak it all in. If you can, talk us through your work flow on putting one of these together. I've been transcribing some Bernard Herrmann work lately and there are two things I know for sure: 1) There are not enough hours in the day to transcribe the way I do (import audio file to my DAW, play along to work out the parts, write into MuseScore). 2) I absorb and internalize twice as much information if I work out the transcription yourself. I'd love to get faster at this. How do you do it?

G


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## Rohann (Mar 31, 2017)

A rarely mentioned HZ score I'd love to see analyzed is the score for the Last Samurai.


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## MatFluor (Mar 31, 2017)

This is pure gold, really love it.

Is it possible to share these reductions (meaning a PDF or the like)?

I would love to see a nice Goldsmith cue


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## Saxer (Apr 6, 2017)

This reductions are fantastic! The are not only very helpful but the also look awesome!

Would love to see a version of Alan Silvestris Back to the Future main theme


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## Lassi Tani (Oct 13, 2017)

@bradfrey I would love to see Scherzo for X-Wings from the Force Awakens 

And thank you very much for these analyses!


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## ptram (Oct 13, 2017)

An incredible work, Brad! If I can ask something, I would love to see the analysis of some Jerry Goldsmith score, for example Alien.

Paolo


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## Rohann (Oct 25, 2017)

Howard Shore's LOtR next?


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## churchwill (Jun 30, 2022)

bradfrey said:


> Just to update everyone (if you're not already subscribed!), I've uploaded a TON of new Star Wars score reductions and analysis. Check it out!
> 
> Main Theme/Imperial Attack
> The Desert
> ...



Hi bradfrey, I'm writing an essay on the score on Star Wars, and Binary Sunset is one of the songs I'm using. your score reductions and analyses have been super helpful, even just to be able to read a score without having to scroll up and down a page with a million staves. Is there a particular reason your Binary Sunset video is now unavailable? Thanks, will


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