Ennio Morricone’s music for Quentin Tarantino’s The Hateful Eight

Written by:
Mohammad Hadi Majidi

After watching Quentin Tarantino’s latest movie, The Hateful Eight, everyone was excited by its novel music besides the beautiful scenes of blood and guts.

The Hateful Eight is the first collaboration between the world-famous film music composer, Ennio Morricone, and Quentin Tarantino as a famous director.

The presence of Tarantino who is known by films like The Pulp Fiction and Kill Bill which are characterized by his “nonlinear storylines, satirical subject matter, and his personal aestheticization of violence“. Morricone, as a multi-style composer whose styles have made him one of the most versatile, experimental and influential composers of all time, made this collaboration so attractive.

Tarantino starts working on civil war events of America from his movie “Django Unchained” and The Hateful Eight is his second film on the wild west era and maybe Tarantino chose Morricone as the film composer, because of his wide experience on Spaghetti-western movies.

A composer like Morricone, could rest on his “laurels, and compose scores with those everyday sounds he was first known for“. However, he decided to write a different music in a different style and with different voices. “I’m continuously thinking about music, continuously researching and attentive. I cannot just remain still,” he says. “I don’t want to remain conservative; I want to go ahead and look at the future.”
So that the orchestration of the overture part of the film is so innovative. Morricone combines the real voices of an orchestra with some new electronic techniques as he says, “Quentin Tarantino and his film really deserve a music of their own.”
To create that original score for Tarantino, Morricone largely turns to tools unavailable in 1964, like synthesizers, which drive the tense, gloomy eight-minute overture. (Morricone’s compositions for The Thing, used in The Hateful Eight, were some of his first work with synths in the early 1980s).
The experimenting composer isn’t above technological advances, but he’s quick to warn young composers of the dangers of seductive technology. “Electronic instruments have to be used to justify something that doesn’t exist, not to replace for instance an orchestra,” he says. “If you use the synth just to recreate the sound of an existing musical instrument, it is wrong. But if you use the synth to create a sound that doesn’t exist, that’s a very wise way to use it.”

In this movie, there are lots of scenes in which Morricone has created the feeling of humor among the horrible violent scenes of the movie. One of the best examples or maybe the most memorable part of the movie is the Lincoln’s letter scene in which we observe lots of murders and a flood of blood everywhere, also we know the characters depth of crime, and while the character reading the Lincoln’s letter that is about beauty and glory of patriotism and duty, Morricone wisely match this scene whit a glorious fanfare music in the background that just make us feel funny about the meaning of patriotism and glory.
The director, Tarantino had reused Morricone’s music in several of his other films: Django Unchained, IngloriousBastards, and Kill Bill. But for The Hateful Eight, he knew he wanted an original soundtrack for the first time.
“This material deserved an original score,” explained Tarantino in an interview with Christopher Nolan. “I’ve never thought that way before. I didn’t ever want to trust a composer with the soul of my movie.” But he decided he could trust the man whom he describes as his favorite composer in history.
Morricone urges his listeners to hear The Hateful Eight score apart from his previous work—especially from the enduring legacy of his spaghetti Westerns. “Forget the work that I’ve done in the past for the Italian Western or for the Sergio Leone movies,” he says.

The other attractive point of the film’s music is the songs that Morricone and Tarantino had chosen for the movie. Especially the song “Jim Jones at Botany” Bay that Jennifer Jason Leigh sings with a guitar, is the traditional Australian folk ballad , which dates from the early 19th-century.

The soundtrack of the movie won a Golden Globe and Academy Award for Best Original Score on 28 February 2016.
The opening track, “L’ultima diligenza di Red Rock” (Versione Integrale), was released as a single online on December 15, 2015. In December 2016, it gained a nomination for a Grammy Award for Best Instrumental Composition for Mr. Morricone.

 

 

Post a Comment

Required fields are marked *
*
*
Your email is never shared.

Transition to Enlightenment: Six Lectures on Mozart’s String Quartets (4)

Mozart’s compositions bear the imprint of Enlightenment ideals in various ways. His music exhibits a balance between reason and emotion, mirroring the Enlightenment’s call for a harmonious integration of these elements in human life. The clarity of Mozart’s formal structures in his symphonies and operas reflects Enlightenment principles of order and rational organization.

Fereydoun Shahbazian, An Iranian Musical Icon Passed Away

Fereydoun Shahbazian, the renowned Iranian composer, passed away at the age of 82 due to respiratory illness in Tehran. His last significant activity was leading the National Orchestra before the appointment of Homayoun Rahimian

From Past Days…

Kayvan Mirhadi and O.R.P Qaurtet

Establishing O.R.P. Quartet is Kayvan Mirhadi’s latest activity as a guitarist, composer and conductor of Kamerata Orchestra. Besides working with this Quartet, Mirhadi is busy these days recording and mixing some of his own works as well as some pieces by 20th century composers. O.R.P Quartet performed a concert in Rasht, Gilan Province in late May 2016 and offered a master class.

The Structure of Kurdistan Daf (III)

“Our ancestors believe powerful blows upon the Daf scatters evil spirits of disease and distress to create a clean and holy space filled with health and prosperity. Adding tools to Daf increases this instrument’s purification, spreading, and summoning powers of evil forces and goddesses. Daf was mostly depicted by red, color of blood, in ancient times or sometimes it was depicted with green, the color of plants and nature. There were probably some mysterious designs painted upon the wooden body and frames of these instruments just like today” (Pahlavan, 2013: 44).

“Guitar Memories” Released

The album “Guitar Memories” consists of the performance of baroque to recent era masterpieces, by Mehrdad Mahdavi, and is published by Tanin-e Honar Publication.

In this album there are pieces composed and arranged by artists such as: Sylvius Leopold Weiss, Johann Anton Logy, Fernando Sor, Yuquijiro Yocoh, Leo Brouwer.

Whose dream?! Whose reality?!

(A review of the “So Faraway” album; Tar and Tonbak duet; Siavash Imani, Pedram Khavarzmini)

Interview with the Makers of the New Qeychak (II)

Regarding the classification of a new instrument in an instrument family, one can point to a number of fundamental issues, one of the most obvious of which is the instrument’s visual features. If we look at how the new instrument has changed compared to its historical versions, the set of visual elements that link the instrument to the Qeychak family becomes apparent. But other characteristics such as the geometric dimensions of the instrument, characteristics of the instrument’s various parts and how they relate to each other, its systematic performance, its sound range (compared to modern versions), the material and color of the sound, the way it is played and the like, can be considered in order to classify the instrument in the Qeychak family.

Farhad Poupel’s piece, Road to Bach, performed at Suntory Hall

On June 19, 2021 , young Iranian composer and pianist, Farhad Poupel’s piece, Road to Bach, was performed at the prestigious Suntory Hall by the great Japanese pianist, Kotaro Fukuma. The piece was commissioned by Kotaro Fukuma to have its world premiere in Suntory Hall during a concert by the same name.

Fereydoun Shahbazian, An Iranian Musical Icon Passed Away

Fereydoun Shahbazian, the renowned Iranian composer, passed away at the age of 82 due to respiratory illness in Tehran. His last significant activity was leading the National Orchestra before the appointment of Homayoun Rahimian

Farshad Sanjari, Forgotten Iranian Conductor Met His Tragic End

Farshad Sanjari, one of the most renowned Iranian conductors in the 1970s in Iran died after fire broke in his apartment in Vienna on November 22, 2019. Farshad Sanjari was not involved in politics; however, he was one of the victims of the Iranian Islamic Revolution in 1979. After the victory of the Islamic Revolution, his name was never seen as the conductor of any programmes.

Polyphony in Iranian Music (IV)

Two choirs alternatively perform Veŝ Tavaré Na avaz (Transcription 5). The second group starts the avaz before the first group finishes it; consequently, two different voices coincide (Transcription 5, staves 2 and 5).

Principles of Playing Violin (VI)

B. applying force: the force needed for putting finger on finger board is applied through finger tips and using the rest of hand set especially wrist is not allowed. To practice this, it is possible to hold violin without the bow and throw the fingers on the finger board from 1-2cm distance; apply force only through finger tips.