Dracula (album)
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''Dracula'' is a soundtrack performed by the Kronos Quartet, with music composed by
Philip Glass Philip Glass (born January 31, 1937) is an American composer and pianist. He is widely regarded as one of the most influential composers of the late 20th century. Glass's work has been associated with minimal music, minimalism, being built up fr ...
, for the 1931 film ''
Dracula ''Dracula'' is a novel by Bram Stoker, published in 1897. As an epistolary novel, the narrative is related through letters, diary entries, and newspaper articles. It has no single protagonist, but opens with solicitor Jonathan Harker taking ...
''.


Genesis and performance

The movie (directed by Tod Browning and starring Bela Lugosi) could be shown to audiences both as a
silent movie ''Silent Movie'' is a 1976 American satirical comedy film co-written, directed by and starring Mel Brooks, released by 20th Century Fox in the summer of 1976. The ensemble cast includes Dom DeLuise, Marty Feldman, Bernadette Peters, and Sid Cae ...
and as a talkie, though conversation was limited to basic narrative elements. Unusually, it did not have a specific score and only two pieces of music on its soundtrack: Tchaikovsky's ''
Swan Lake ''Swan Lake'' ( rus, Лебеди́ное о́зеро, r=Lebedínoye ózero, p=lʲɪbʲɪˈdʲinəjə ˈozʲɪrə, link=no ), Op. 20, is a ballet composed by Russian composer Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky in 1875–76. Despite its initial failur ...
'' during the opening credits, and the overture of Wagner's ''
Die Meistersinger von Nürnberg (; "The Master-Singers of Nuremberg"), WWV 96, is a music drama, or opera, in three acts, by Richard Wagner. It is the longest opera commonly performed, taking nearly four and a half hours, not counting two breaks between acts, and is traditio ...
'' during a scene at an opera. Glass was commissioned to write the score by Universal Studios Home Entertainment, which released the movie with the Glass-soundtrack on VHS and DVD in 1999. According to Glass, the choice of
chamber music Chamber music is a form of classical music that is composed for a small group of instruments—traditionally a group that could fit in a palace chamber or a large room. Most broadly, it includes any art music that is performed by a small numb ...
played by a
string quartet The term string quartet can refer to either a type of musical composition or a group of four people who play them. Many composers from the mid-18th century onwards wrote string quartets. The associated musical ensemble consists of two violinists ...
rather than an orchestral score followed from the movie's setting, "libraries and drawing rooms and gardens." Kronos and Glass (on piano) performed the score during viewings of the movie across the United States in 1999 and 2000 to promote the album. Other promotion efforts by Universal, which was trying to "reinvigorate and re-market" their Classical Monsters catalog, included discounts for buyers of multiple CDs, and a trailer for the movie on copies of the video release of ''
The Mummy A mummy is an unusually well preserved corpse. Mummy or The Mummy may also refer to: Places *Mummy Range, a mountain range in the Rocky Mountains of northern Colorado in the United States *Mummy Cave, a rock shelter and archeological site in Par ...
''.


Philip Glass and the Kronos Quartet

Glass and the Quartet have collaborated on a number of albums. Kronos first recorded a Glass composition on the 1985 soundtrack '' Mishima: A Life in Four Chapters''. In 1986, they contributed two tracks to his ''
Songs from Liquid Days ''Songs from Liquid Days'' is a collection of songs composed by composer Philip Glass with lyrics by Paul Simon, Suzanne Vega, David Byrne and Laurie Anderson. Glass began the project scoring lyrics by Byrne and then thought to collaborate with ad ...
''. In that same year they recorded a composition of his for their 1986 album '' Kronos Quartet'', their first album on Nonesuch Records, which also releases Glass's music. In 1993, they recorded '' Kronos Quartet Performs Philip Glass'', containing his String Quartets nos. 2, 4, and 5; the latter is the first piece Glass wrote specifically for Kronos. A number of compositions played by Kronos are found on the Philip Glass 10-CD collection ''Glass Box: A Nonesuch Retrospective'', released in 2008.


Critical reception

The soundtrack and the performances thereof have received mixed reviews. '' Entertainment Weekly'' was very positive, praising the "hypnotic new score," while ''The Essential Monster Movie Guide'' calls the score "unnecessary," and a Lugosi-biography calls it "ill-considered." Negative reviews abounded: Allan Kozinn of '' The New York Times'' remarked that "the project seems not to have inspired Mr. Glass....Heard alone on CD it is harmless enough, but coupled with the film it does more harm than good." The '' San Francisco Chronicle'' said, in anticipation of a performance with the composer on piano, "after previewing CD and video, it is painfully evident that this composer and this film are mismatched." It continued, "Glass' constant score simply sounds busy, its gloomy arpeggios merely getting in the way. The few chords that accompany moments of shock verge on the cheesy....the Glass music seems to suck away the film's life blood. Who's the vampire now?" Likewise negative, but this time after a live performance of the movie and music at Royce Hall, on the UCLA campus, was Kenneth Turan of the '' Los Angeles Times'': "As a public event, however, the Royce concert, performed by Glass and the Kronos Quartet and conducted by Michael Riesman, was a distinct disappointment." Others were more positive.
Roger Ebert Roger Joseph Ebert (; June 18, 1942 – April 4, 2013) was an American film critic, film historian, journalist, screenwriter, and author. He was a film critic for the ''Chicago Sun-Times'' from 1967 until his death in 2013. In 1975, Ebert beca ...
praised the score, writing: "The Glass score is effective in the way it suggests not just moody creepiness, but the urgency and need behind Dracula's vampirism. It evokes a blood-thirst that is 500 years old." Self-proclaimed "film purists" Bill Hunt and Todd Doogan called the soundtrack "quite cool" and commented that it "fits the film perfectly." After commenting on what he called the low artistic quality of the film, Philip Kennicott of '' The Washington Post'' said: "The delightful thing about Glass's music for film is that there's no need for it. It is a pure artistic addition to something that was not wanting in the first place; and in that act, Glass confirms a kind of reverence for the original. It is, artistically if not financially, an act of selfless collaboration with a partner — the film — that might be considered the culturally undead." Bradley Bambarger, in ''
Billboard A billboard (also called a hoarding in the UK and many other parts of the world) is a large outdoor advertising structure (a billing board), typically found in high-traffic areas such as alongside busy roads. Billboards present large advertise ...
'', praised the soundtrack as "one of Glass' most lyrical, moving works, regardless of genre." Mark Allender's review on '' Allmusic'' likewise ranks the soundtrack very high in Glass's oeuvre:


Track listing


Releases and format

The album was released by Nonesuch with two different covers. One was black with the name "DRACULA" in a panel with an ornamented border; the version currently available has a colored drawing of Count Dracula resembling the movie poster. Unlike most other Kronos releases on Nonesuch, this album does not come as an MP3 download. The soundtrack was included in a 5-CD compilation of Philip Glass soundtracks, released in 2001 (Nonesuch 79660).


Credits


Musicians

*David Harrington – violin *John Sherba – violin *Hank Dutt – viola *
Joan Jeanrenaud Joan Jeanrenaud ( Dutcher; born January 25, 1956) is an American cellist. A native of Memphis, Tennessee, she played with the LLP Kronos Quartet from 1978 until 1999, when, after a sabbatical, she left to pursue a solo career and collaborations ...
cello


Production

*Recorded at
Skywalker Sound Skywalker Sound is the sound effects, sound editing, sound design, sound mixing and music recording division of Lucasfilm. Founded in 1975, the company's main facilities are located at George Lucas's Skywalker Ranch in Lucas Valley, near Nicasio, ...
, Nicasio, California **Bob Levy – engineer


See also

* List of 1999 albums


References

{{Authority control Kronos Quartet albums Philip Glass soundtracks 1999 soundtrack albums Horror film soundtracks Nonesuch Records soundtracks Alternative versions of soundtracks