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INFO: I have composed a soundtrack for "Felix the Cat in Two-Lip Time", a black and white animated cartoon from 1926.

Originally a silent movie, it now features music performed by a jazz combo and an orchestra. This is a somewhat unique approach in that the music has been not been written in the traditional piano accompaniment style so typical for the era of silent movies back in the 1920's and 30's. So rather rather than re-create what was actually played at the time of the original screening, I chose to compose a jazzy score, in parts perhaps similar in style to Vince Guaraldi's legendary music for The Peanuts animated television series from the 60's and 70's.

I have deliberately not used any sound effects for the score but have instead tried to emulate a real orchestra using traditional instruments. This applies also to the final scene where the orchestra gets crazy using a whole arsenal of percussion instruments like the marimba, the celesta, timpani, cymbals, chimes, bells, wood blocks, and a wind machine.

"Two-Lip Time", which is believed to be in the public domain, is the story of Felix' adventures in the Netherlands. While abundant with cheesy clichées, it's a great deal of fun to watch. There is a unique both anarchistic and whimsical charm in the crude hand-drawn images from Pat Sullivan Productions that is hard to find these days, I feel. Created by Otto Messmer in the early 1920's, Felix the Cat was a popular cartoon character at the time. For more information go to http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0141924/

INFO: This piece was originally planned as a bariton rendition of German romantic poet Christian Morgenstern's poem, "Hier im Wald mit dir zu liegen" ("Lying in the woods with you"). Lacking a singer, I have chosen to use a cello to carry the tune.

HIER IM WALD MIT DIR ZU LIEGEN

Hier im Wald mit dir zu liegen,
moosgebettet, windumatmet,
in das Flüstern, in das Rauschen
leise liebe Worte mischend,
öfter aber noch dem Schweigen
lange Küsse zugesellend,
unerschöpflich - unersättlich,
hingegebne, hingenommne,
ineinander aufgelöste,
zeitvergeßne, weltvergeßne.
Hier im Wald mit dir zu liegen,
moosgebettet, windumatmet...

~Christian Morgenstern (1871-1914)

INFO: This piece was developed as a birthday gift, commemorating my brother's 40th birthday. A mixed choir and string orchestra in the lead, the symphonic score celebrates the event with a strong melody (G-D-E-D-C-H-A) which carries through the suite.

After the main theme in the style of a movie soundtrack intro is repeated many times over, with instruments such as oboe and trumpets taking turns in the lead, the piece culminates in a John-Williams-style brass band percussion finale.

This four-minute orchestral suite was developed from scratch. The individual tracks were played and edited with sequencer and audio software. The virtual orchestra of roughly 30 musicians basically consists of a brass band, strings, choir, piano, organ, flute, oboe, trumpets, tubular bells, harp and percussion.

The piece was revised and newly recorded in 2007, utilizing, among others, a boy's choir.

INFO: This Bach-style upbeat intervention piece is played by a string quartet consisting of violin, viola, cello and counter bass. All instruments take turns in leading the five-beat principal melody which is varied several times.

The piece was revised, expanded and newly recorded in 2007. It now includes rhythmically aggressive Steve-Reich-style variations of the main theme.

INFO: A joyful Baroque-style rendering, this contrapuntal fugue introduces a number of brief but memorable themes which are then developed through successive polyphonic imitations.

INFO: This piece is a rendition of American poet Silvia Plath's well-known poem, "I am Vertical". Following the poem's energetic verve, the score seeks to emulate this by using a piano and a bassoon to counteract the tune. The overall mood is, shall we say, defiant.

INFO: This jazzy piece involves two Jazz Steinway pianos, catching each other's tunes, and intermingling counter melodies into a compound piece.

The music has actually been written to accompany Henry Wadsworth Longfellow's poem, Loss and Gain. Other than what this suggests, the piece itself is quite upbeat and modernistic.
 

LOSS AND GAIN

When I compare
What I have lost with what I have gained,
What I have missed with what attained,
Little room do I find for pride.

I am aware
How many days have been idly spent;
How like an arrow the good intent
Has fallen short or been turned aside.

But who shall dare
To measure loss and gain in this wise?
Defeat may be victory in disguise;
The lowest ebb is the turn of the tide.

~Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

INFO: This joyful one-minute work celebrates the advent of summer. After some rhythmic teasing from the string orchestra, the flute takes on the lead melody in a lively, clear-textured, and radiantly colored orchestral execution.

INFO: The piano, of all instruments, offers perhaps the best voice for emotional release. Other than the title might suggest, the overall mood of this three-minute all-piano piece is bright and calmly joyful. The memorable melody is warm, crystal clear and simple, with a passionate lyricism.

INFO: This soundtrack score was composed with a film sequence in mind of a fishing boat setting out to a rough sea very early in the morning, with flashes of nightly lightning still covering the sky beyond. The initial mood of the score is dark and reflects the uncertainty of the venture – will the boat return safely or be claimed by the sea instead?

As the ship progresses towards the horizon, the music takes on the leitmotif, a catchy orchestral rendering in the tradition of British sea songs from Henry Purcell. The theme is later accompanied by a mixed choir, and instrumental solos from a flute and a guitar. The score eventually culminates in a grand finale reminiscent of film composer James Newton Howard's symphonic scores.

INFO: This one-and-a-half minute piece is an as-is reflection of past and present, of good times and bad times. The main theme (H-A-G-D8) shares both joyful and melancholy ingredients. Repeated vigorously several times over in various octaves, it ends on a happy note, but with a touch of sadness over the fact that, no matter if good or bad, time is, after all, fading away.

INFO: My rendering of this British all-time favorite traditional song features a small symphonic orchestra with piano and strings in the lead. It contains four stanzas, the last of which I have written myself. 

The two-minute piece has been recorded with an amateur men's choir and a children's choir. The occasional wrong notes make for the distinctive charm so prevalently contained in the folk song itself, a joyful celebration of the English country garden bursting of exhuberance and passion.
 

In an English Country Garden

1
How many kinds of sweet flowers grow
In an English country garden?
We’ll tell you now of some that we know,
Those we miss you’ll surely pardon.
Daffodils, heart’s ease and flox,
Meadowsweet and lady smocks,
Gentian, lupine, and tall hollyhocks,
Roses, foxgloves, snowdrops, 
blue forget-me-nots
In an English country garden.

2
How many insects come here and go
In an English country garden?
We’ll tell you now of some that we know,
Those we miss you’ll surely pardon.
Fireflies, moths, gnats and bees,
Spiders climbing in the trees,
Butterflies drift in the gentle breeze.
There are snakes, ants that sting,
And other creeping things
In an English country garden.

3
How many songbirds fly to and fro
In an English country garden?
We’ll tell you now of some that we know,
Those we miss you’ll surely pardon.
Bobolink, cuckoo and quail,
Tanager and cardinal,
Bluebird, lark, thrush and nightingale.
There is joy in the spring
When the birds begin to sing
In an English country garden.

4
How many mothers do we love so
In an English country garden?
We’ll tell you now of one that we know,
Those we miss you’ll surely pardon.
Laughing mostly all the time,
Pity that she isn’t mine,
Lovely, precious, jolly and devine.
When you’re heading her way
She will make your day
In an English country garden.