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Dances With Wolves: (John Barry) According to the
studios during the production of
Dances With Wolves, actor Kevin
Costner did everything wrong for a first-time director. He sought to
make a historical drama with expansive vistas, utilized various
challenging animals in an era prior to special effects, insisted upon
faithful interpretations of a dying language, and, most importantly, ran
over budget. Costner's faith in the story, however, caused him to invest
his own money in the production, and against all odds, the movie not
only proved to be an overwhelming critical and popular success (winning
seven Academy Awards and earning over $400 million on a budget of
roughly $20 million), but revived Westerns in Hollywood and allowed
other reinventions of the genre to gain similar notoriety soon after.
With Costner in the lead role,
Dances With Wolves tells of a
disillusioned Union Lieutenant during the American Civil War who is sent
to man an abandoned fort in Colorado, only to become enamored with the
local Sioux tribe, learning its language and marrying one of its
members. When the American Army catches up with him, he is defended by
his newly adopted community and seeks permanent seclusion in the West,
completing an unlikely journey that includes much sorrow along its path.
Costner knew from the start of production that he wanted a massive
symphonic score for
Dances With Wolves, the film's tribute to the
disappearing Western plains requiring music of significant scope to
accompany its striking scenery. The logical choice at the time was
British veteran John Barry, who was in the latter stages of the prime of
his career. In the late 1980's, the composer was already beginning to
experience a lengthy series of illnesses that would largely sideline him
as the 1990's progressed. After winning an Academy Award for
Out of
Africa, he suffered a ruptured esophagus and later dedicated his
score for
Dances With Wolves to the doctors who saved his life.
Artistically, Barry's shameless self-repetition in style was beginning
to take a toll on his career, ultimately leading to several rejected
scores in the 1990's. With everything from
Somewhere in Time to
Out of Africa all beginning to sound very alike in structure and
instrumentation,
Dances With Wolves really represented Barry's
last attempt, whether he knew it at the time or not, to parade his broad
string and simple melodic style at its best.
If ever there was a perfect cinematic match for Barry's
trademark symphonic romanticism of the 1980's,
Dances With Wolves
is that film. It's a blend of sound and sight that requires music
critics to turn off the intellectual sides of their brains, because
there is much in Barry's very simplistic approach to the movie that will
frustrate any student of composition. His insistence upon repeating each
phrase of a theme twice, utilizing static, slow tempos and instruments
in the same roles in almost every circumstance, and rarely manipulating
or layering his melodic ideas with any technical acuity all cause a
score like
Dances With Wolves to make cynics roll their eyes.
Make no mistake about it, this is not a spectacularly complex score,
despite the fact that Barry wrote more themes for this assignment than
he usually did for other productions. Each theme is applied like a
mini-movement in a symphony, never interacting satisfactorily with other
ideas or evolving in such a way, singularly or as a whole, to form a
convincing narrative arc. The predictable progressions in those themes
will remind you of half a dozen prior scores from Barry (including some
of his later James Bond work, no less) and a few still set to come later
in the 1990's. But if you're stuck lamenting the arguably problematic
circumstances just described, then you're missing the point of
Dances
With Wolves. It remains a classic score by nearly all definitions
because of its perfectly tailored emotional appeal in the context of the
film and its harmonic resonance on album, precisely the characteristics
you hoped for when Barry was able to take this assignment. The
instrumentation of the score included 95 orchestral players and a
12-member chorus for slight dissonant shades during moments of anxious
nerves. Barry chose to score the film from the lead's (John Dunbar's)
point of view, dismissing any idea of recording authentic Sioux music
and instead sticking to his comfortably symphonic approach on a massive
scale. The composer's only earlier attempt at Native American music,
White Buffalo, was by no means a success (in fact, many would
consider it a monumental failure in his career) and the truth remains
that Barry probably would have been incapable of attempting any other
style of score than the one he wrote. Despite the notoriety afforded to
the full blooded orchestral majesty of the score's fullest themes,
Dances With Wolves, like many Barry scores of the era, is best
tempered when toning back the ensemble to simple woodwind melodies over
strings and harp, the most intoxicating moments actually reflecting
lovely solo flute performances of subthemes in this score.
The many themes of the
Dances With Wolves score are
its greatest strength, regardless of their inability to mingle
appropriately or evolve significantly. The primary identity, the John
Dunbar theme, can reliably be heard in elevators or department store
atriums, and anyone who watches American football on television will
have immediately recognized it during the prolific United Way
commercials in which it was featured for over ten years. It was even a
favorite of Pope John Paul II. The score opens with an eerie trumpet
performance of this theme, immediately associating with the character's
disaffected relationship to the war. It later recurs with Costner's
journal reflections and as the highlight of the end credits. A lonely
arrangement for harmonica rather than violins is a nod to the Western
genre's usual tones, and the album version of "The Buffalo Hunt" gives
the prior trumpet performance a bold and victorious tone over lightly
tapped snare rhythms. Perhaps the most interesting aspect of the John
Dunbar theme is the fact that it defies Barry's usual method of
operation by not repeating each of its main phrases twice. Instead, it
follows a longer lyrical flow but features, curiously, no secondary
interlude or bridge sequence. After a decade of endless performances and
re-uses of this primary theme from
Dances With Wolves, many
listeners are likely to seek out the more obscure themes of the score
for their enjoyment. The love theme, for instance, similarly extends
from previous Barry scores as well, but manages to capture the same
grand melodic grace of the rest of the score in more intimate and
accessible tones. Heard in "Falling in Love," "The Love Theme," "The
Return to Winter Camp," and the end title suite, this material only
amounts to under ten minutes in length, but it is a satisfying diversion
from the score's more muscular inclinations. Also serving as a tender
interlude is Barry's idea for Dunbar's adopted wolf, Two Socks. In "Two
Socks/The Wolf Theme" and "Two Socks at Play," he conveys woodwind
lyricism that combines, ironically, the alluring solo flute performances
and underlying chord progressions of his love themes for
A View to a
Kill and
Moonraker, respectively. A theme for the Sioux takes
quite some time to develop, though it is initially easily identifiable
by the slapping percussion underneath its stark brass melody. The mix of
the drums in this cue was reprised, not surprisingly, by Barry almost
verbatim in
The Scarlett Letter. The actual theme here takes hold
in the late cues, highlighting "Rescue of Dances With Wolves" and
without the percussion in "The Loss of the Journal" and "Farewell." This
identity adopts the characteristics of Barry's early 1980's adventure
themes and will likely please his collectors.
One of the most enduringly frustrating aspects of
Dances With Wolves is that one of its seldom referenced subthemes
is actually its finest idea. The journeying theme itself became prolific
in its re-use in the public arena along with the John Dunbar theme, in
part because of its remarkable horn counterpoint. Its performances
throughout "Journey to Fort Sedgewick" also occupied obvious placements
in the movie, increasing its profile as well. It's a more generic Barry
theme in terms of its repeating phrases and derivative instrumental
applications, but some enthusiasts of the composer consider it to be
superior to the John Dunbar theme and the singular highlight of the
score. Several smaller motifs are meant to represent lesser concepts in
the film, perhaps the buffalo motif in "Journey to the Buffalo Killing
Ground" and "The Buffalo Hunt" the most engaging in its bold expressions
(they resemble the ballsy brass unison of
Zulu). The film version
of that cue contains an oddly unique middle passage with a theme that is
the score's only throwback to the Elmer Bernstein style of old Westerns.
Likewise, a spinoff of the Dunbar theme in "Ride to Fort Hays" is a
pleasant diversion that utilizes the same instrumentation as the famous
theme, but toys with different melodies over a common set of bass
progressions. On the other hand, Barry's choral and string dissonance
for scenes of suspense is rather weak and unmemorable. The overall
tapestry of melodic ideas in
Dances With Wolves may not be well
woven, but it hits the right emotional notes in each case. As previously
published by Jerry McCulley with great accuracy, "Utilizing Wagnerian
structure, Barry's main themes recur in magisterial symphonic form.
[They have] become an almost subconscious part of modern life, utilized
as Muzak and underscore for public events great and small. Barry's
skills as an arranger color his themes in subtly shifting orchestral
hues, giving even the most repeated melodic passages new emotional
weight." Barry summarizes the John Dunbar theme, love theme, and
identity for the Sioux in the "End Credits" suite, and true enthusiasts
of the score will recall that pop variations of the John Dunbar and
journey themes were commonplace on the radio airwaves at the time as
well. In the decades since, the Dunbar and buffalo hunt themes in
particular have been re-recorded by various performing groups for other
labels. Of particular note is a recording by the City of Prague
Philharmonic available on the Silva Screen label, the film version of
the "Buffalo Hunt" sequence resurrected in stunning surround sound
before the original performance was available commercially.
Unfortunately, the powerful journeying theme has remained strangely
neglected in the majority of the re-recordings through the years.
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2004 Album: | | |
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Only $9.99
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The original recording of
Dances With Wolves,
conducted by Barry, has endured its own long story on album. The
original release that accompanied the film's explosive popularity in
1990 contains all the necessary music and has always remained readily
available many years later. It achieved astounding sales statistics on
par with later Digital Age favorites like
Braveheart and
Gladiator. The "Gold" release of
Dances With Wolves in
1995 (otherwise known as the "Definitive Collector's Edition,") was one
of a string of gold-colored releases made available for highly popular,
best-selling scores of the era, a series that eventually included
Schindler's List and
Apollo 13. This supposedly limited
gold release featured three additional tracks of previously unreleased
music, none of which appears directly in the film. The last two tracks
are the pop versions of the themes as mentioned before, re-orchestrated
by Barry in 1991. The first one, encompassing the John Dunbar and
journeying themes, is pleasant to the ears, but the second one is a
rather awkward combination of James Bond style and dramatic Dunbar
substance. These two tracks are the same ones contained on a promotional
CD circulated to radio stations in prior years for mass appeal. The
third track previously unreleased on a
Dances With Wolves album
is the "Fire Dance" selection from the Narada album, "Last Frontier,"
and it is very misplaced in the middle of Barry's score (its more
contemporary rhythmic style is far too disparate to function here). In
2004, as part of a celebration of Barry's 70th birthday, Sony released
Dances With Wolves once again, thankfully removing the pop tracks
and featuring about twenty minutes of previously unreleased material and
alternate versions of famous cues that had also been unavailable in
original form. The extended material is sprinkled through the album with
a few negligible extra minutes in existing cues. The full film versions
of the "Buffalo Hunt" and "John Dunbar Theme," as well as an extension
of the love theme in "Falling in Love," are very welcomed additions,
however. Unless you are a serious John Barry collector, though, this
expanded album may not offer you much more satisfaction than the
previous offerings. Despite the press stating that the 2004 Sony album
features the entire score, Barry reportedly recorded 100 minutes of
music for
Dances With Wolves, and thus this product is likely not
complete. No matter which version you find and enjoy,
Dances With
Wolves remains the crowning achievement in Barry's career and stands
as an epic, yet tender score of historical and popular influence for an
entire generation.
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| Bias Check: | For John Barry reviews at Filmtracks, the average editorial rating
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The original pressing's insert contains minimal information about
the film and score. The gold CD packaging features a slip cover and different
artwork on the insert; the CD itself is 24-Karat Gold and the sound is a
"20-Bit Digital Transfer using Sony's new 'Super Bit Mapping' (SBM)
Process." The 2004 album contains expanded notes about the score, but a
return to traditional packaging.
