Over the years, I have come to realize that the Oscars are an enormous folly, especially regarding choices for the soundtrack categories. Three years ago, the Academy thankfully re-established the dual "original score" categories, one for dramatic scores and the other for musicals/comedy. Ironically, this move allowed "more serious" dramatic scores to compete in the absence of Disney efforts. In reality, the Academy has not changed much in its curious and sometimes absurd treatment of film scores over the years. In 1998, however, the Academy did a much better job in its nominations for scores, without stranding any of the best 1997 scores (as they have done in years past).

The 1997 Filmtracks Surfers' Awards:

(Based on visitors' votes from 12/1/97 to 1/31/98)

• Best Original Score (as heard in the film):
  1. Titanic (James Horner)
  2. Contact (Alan Silvestri)
  3. Starship Troopers (Basil Poledouris)
  4. Men in Black (Danny Elfman)
  5. Seven Years in Tibet (John Williams)

• Composer of the Year:
  1. John Williams (Rosewood, The Lost World, Seven Years in Tibet, Amistad)
  2. Jerry Goldsmith (Fierce Creatures, Air Force One, L.A. Confidential, The Edge)
  3. James Horner (The Devil's Own, Titanic)
  4. Danny Elfman (Men in Black, Good Will Hunting, Flubber)
  5. Basil Poledouris (Starship Troopers)

• Best CD Release of the Year:
  1. Return of the Jedi: Special Edition (John Williams)
  2. Titanic (James Horner)
  3. Star Wars: Special Edition (John Williams)
  4. Space and Beyond (Silva Sci-Fi Compilation)
  5. Seven Years in Tibet (John Williams)

You can view the complete voting results at the December, 1997, Theme of the Month.

Aside from having a productive year, Jerry Goldsmith has recently had the honor of composing the first ever theme for the Academy Awards. Goldsmith's 30-second fanfare will be heard at every commercial break during telecasts for years to come. The theme is remarkably similar to the opening track of 1995's First Knight, capturing the momentous (or pompous, depending on your point of view) feeling of the Oscars.

Here is an .ra audio clip of Goldsmith's Academy Awards fanfare: oscar.ra

Goldsmith began 1998 with a disappointing effort in Deep Rising, but is scheduled to score several potentially great films later in the year, including U.S. Marshals and Star Trek IX. For more information about Goldsmith's career, visit the Filmtracks Jerry Goldsmith Tribute. In 1997, Goldsmith scored Fierce Creatures, Air Force One, L.A. Confidential, and The Edge.

The Filmtracks 1997 Awards:

The wide variety of awards cover every aspect of film scoring and soundtrack CD production in the past year. Some of the categories were created this year for pure fun, so don't take them too seriously. You'll find everything from an analysis of this year's Oscars to the award for "Worst Artwork on a Soundtrack CD's Packaging." Enjoy!

As Pertaining to the Academy's Picks:

The Academy did much better this year than it usually does, nominating many of the genuinely best or influential scores of the year. It was a surprising, but deserving breakthrough for Danny Elfman, who received nominations in both original score categories. Elfman was himself surprised by his nomination for Good Will Hunting. No matter the quality of Elfman's work (or that of Goldsmith, Williams, and Glass), no score will have a chance against the unsinkable Titanic. James Horner's score, which has topped the Billboard charts now for six weeks in sales, will take the Dramatic Score category with ease. Any score that can create such a world-wide sensation gets my vote as well. Of the nominations in this category, only Philip Glass' Kundun is a disappointing score (It becomes more irritating every time I attempt to listen to it... auction! auction!). In its place, Elmer Bernstein's thematically diverse score for Hoodlum should have been nominated. For perennial powerhouse John Williams, Amistad was nominated over Seven Years in Tibet because of Amistad's more recent release, even though Seven Years in Tibet is a much more noteworthy score. Graeme Revell's stylish The Saint and David Arnold's Tomorrow Never Dies (which is considerably better than its recent album suggests) round out an excellent year for adventure. Honorable mention this year goes out to Alan Silvestri's Contact, Jerry Goldsmith's L.A. Confidential, and Terence Blanchard's Eve's Bayou.


For Best Original Comedy/Romance Score, I spent the last three weeks split between two favorites. The two standouts are the ones that start with an "A"... Anastasia and As Good As It Gets. The other nominations in this category are just "space-fillers"... a justification to keep the animated film scores a safe distance from the more dramatically significant ones (or so it seems). Of these two scores, I finally choose David Newman's Anastasia as my favorite because it played a much more important role in the film. It also dislodged Alan Menken (and his absolutely unforgivable score for Hercules ) from his perch. With all due respect to Hans Zimmer, his score was not very significant in As Good As It Gets. He has a good reputation with the Academy, though, and the film has a good chance of winning some major awards. My Best Friend's Wedding suffers the same fate behind the comedic performances of the actors, and without more recognition for the film, it has a very slim chance. The other two nominees became popular because of the song albums that accompanied them. Men in Black is a lightweight, and I have a difficult time tolerating Anne Dudley's (Crying Game) music. In the nominations, I would replace Men in Black with Rachel Portman's always fantastic style in Addicted to Love and Full Monty with Debney's Liar Liar, a score that does very well keeping up with Jim Carrey.


As for the songs, this isn't even close. Celine Dion will provide James Horner with his second award of the night. I feel that the best song of the year was "Once Upon a December" from Anastasia. Although it was nominated for a Golden Globe, the Academy chose the title song from the album instead. And please, God, don't let the song from Hercules miraculously win an award. I'd gladly accept the wrath of El Nino instead.

Best Score for a 1997 Television Film:

No contest! The best score for a 1997 TV film is Mark Snow's 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea. It is a superb score, and exceeded all of my expectations for a television score. Snow, who is well known for his themes for The X-Files, composed a seaworthy masterpiece for 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea that includes swaying, wave-like strings, choral enchantment, and breathtakingly dark and dramatic cues. Other noteworthy TV scores of '97 include Lee Holdridge's Into Thin Air: Death on Everest and Bruce Broughton's Emmy nominated score for True Women. The most interesting TV release of the year was Stargate SG-1, which combined portions of David Arnold's original masters with new music by Joel Goldsmith.

Best Score for a 1997 Television Series:

Chicago Hope, Jeff Rona & Mark Isham. Very enjoyable score with well-performed and mixed solos.

Best 1997 Compilation:

Silva's Space and Beyond. Filmtracks voters voted this one of the best CD releases of 1997, and it finished ahead of all other compilations. Remarkably, Silva Screen's other film music compilations also finished near the top. At the moment, they are dominating the field with one good release after another by the City of Prague Philharmonic.

Best Re-Issue:

Return of the Jedi: Special Edition. Also voted by the viewers of Filmtracks, this CD wet the appetites of film music fanatics more than any other release of the year, especially with Williams' new Ewok Celebration cue. Fanatics couldn't ask for anything more!

Worst 1997 Score:

Alan Menken's Hercules . Inexcusably poor music. Even though I have received seven death threats because of my review of this score last summer, I stand firm in my beliefs about it. The gospel touch does not capture the Disney magic. The vocals are irritating, especially compared to Anastasia.

Best/Most Improved Film Music Website:

Film Score Monthly. Lukas Kendall and his staff of writers debuted their website in the spring of 1997, and the popularity of their daily articles has become enormous. Their inclusion of a reader response mailbag (which is publicized in subsequent articles), as well as their messageboard, creates a forum for very good film music discussion.

Most Disappointing Film Music Website:

Varese Sarabande. Perhaps the most confusing and impersonal site for film music resides here, which is a tragedy because Varese supplies us with so many of our beloved CDs! They have no text navigation links and their plug-in audio sounds have crashed both my computers at work and home. To welcome them onto the web earlier in the year, I sent them a few e-mails. Over a period of months, I never received a resonse --nor did any of my friends and fellow webmasters. I even offered them a month of free advertisement space at Filmtracks and that didn't generate a response. Get with it, guys! If only they put as much online enthusiasm into all of their releases as they did with Starship Troopers.

Best Love Theme:

Graeme Revell's The Saint. A generally overlooked score. It has elements of classic James Bond themes in it. The love theme occupies a healthy 12 minutes on the CD, too.

Most Overlooked Score:

Elmer Bernstein's Hoodlum. Just when you thought he was past his prime...

Biggest Tragedy in the Film Music Community:

Patrick Doyle's fight with leukemia. He's still composing, though!

The Most Nostalgic Score:

David Arnold's Tomorrow Never Dies. Pays a great tribute to brassy jazz of the great John Barry Bond scores and restores the series after Eric Serra's pitiful Goldeneye.

Best Cultural Score:

Terence Blanchard's Eve's Bayou. Blanchard add a touch of ominous mystery that accompanies the film very well.

Best "Let's Crank It Up and Irritate the Elderly Neighbors" Track:

"Aknot Wot!" from The Fifth Element. What more can I say? This track has it all, from overlapping film quotes to female orgasm sounds. I actually did use this track as described in the title of this award... ;-)

Label with the Best Art/Design on Packaging:

Sonic Images Records. As an Adobe Photoshop enthusiast and devoted graphic layout artist, I appreciate good design. These guys deserve credit for producing colorful package art that is more pleasing to the eye.

Worst Packaging on a Soundtrack CD Release:

The Lost World, MCA Records. Somewhere, in some cubicle in an overcrowded office, someone thought it would be a nifty idea to have a cardboard casing for Williams' score, complete with childish pop-up dinosaurs. Hopefully, this man was fired. Please, I'd like to think that the film music community is a bit older than pop-up age. The most irritating thing about it is the fact that you can't tell what the CD is from the side (on, for instance, a shelf).

Best Bootleg:

John Scott's King Kong Lives. It has great sound and extra tracks from half a dozen other Scott scores in demand... It's an absolute treat.

Most Gossip-Stirring, Controversial Industry Figure:

CD Producer and Soundtrack Cinema host Ford A. Thaxton. Makes life more interesting.

Best IMAX Score:

David Michael Frank's Cosmic Voyage. This rivals my previous IMAX favorite, Christopher Stone's Special Effects score from the previous year.

Best Children's Score:

David Newman's Anastasia. Very good songs, and an overall good film for the kids.

Best Score to Listen to While Driving:

Hans Zimmer's Peacemaker . Hans Zimmer has done most of the best driving tracks of all time. This year, nothing is more fun to listen to that the end of the fourth track from this CD. I place it right up there with the theme from Crimson Tide.

Best Vocal Performance:

Sissel, Titanic. She makes tears come to my eyes during the film.

Best Score for a TV Commercial:

"Adiemus," composed by Karl Jenkins --used as the African/new age music in international Delta Airlines commercials.

Best Single Track:

Tie between "Shooting the Captain" (track #19 on 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea) and "Victory Celebration" (track #10 on the second disc of Return of the Jedi: Special Edition) because of its novelty.

Most Erotic Soundtrack Packaging:

Jonas y la Ballena Rosada (Jonah and the Pink Whale), composed by Pepe Stephens --Bolivian/Mexican Production. Outer packaging contains six large pictures of naked female breasts in various levels of focus. Very hard to miss in a collection. It has some good guitar music, too.

Most Erotic/Perverted Track Titles:

Don Davis' promo score for Bound. Take a look and marvel at the various levels of subliminal messages in the titles.

Best Insert Notes:

Any of the Silva Screen compilation releases.

Worst Insert Notes:

The re-release of Octopussy. No offense to Lukas Kendall or others who contributed to the narrative substance --I'm just one of those people who has a difficult time folding maps back into their original position, so the unfolding poster insert of the release made the writing very difficult to follow.

The Saving Grace:

James Horner's Titanic has stayed at the top of the Billboard charts so long that it has had a profound effect on the popularity of film music. It's the most popular orchestral score of all time, and I tip my hat to Horner, Celine Dion, Sissel, and James Cameron for making it happen.

Be sure to visit the Filmtracks Awards pages, with Academy and Filmtracks picks from the last ten years.

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