Its the night before the funsters come out in goulish and macabre garb to celebrate the best of superstitious cultural celebrations. Where best to enjoy the phenomena than being ensconced within the Gothic confines of St.Stephens Uniting Church, surrounded by the illumination of thousands of candles. Its a full house, waiting with spirited enthusiasm for our esteemed musicians, the Melbourne-based quartet–Elective Strings, an ensemble whose musicality and entertaining style is electric and charged with verve.
Here was the playlist for last night’s performance.
1. DANCE MACABRE
2. FUNERAL MARCH OF THE MARIONET 3. ERIKONIG
4. EVERY 27 YEARS
5. STRANGER THINGS theme- Survive
6. GHOSTBUSTERS
7. HALLOWEEN theme
8. SELECTED MOVEMENTS FROM PSYCHO
9. KNIVES OUT
10. ICE DANCE( EDWARD SCISSORHANDS)
11. THIS IS HALLOWEEN
12. WHAT’S THIS
13. SCOOBY-DOO
14. BEETLEJUICE
15. THE ADDAMS FAMILY
16. THRILLER
17. WEDNESDAY
18. GOO GOO MUCK
19 TIME WARP
20 IN THE HALL OF THE MOUNTAIN KING
Let me garnish the playlist with informative tit bits.
1. Dance Macabre personifies Death summoning representatives from all walks of life to dance along to the grave. Every year on Halloween, according to legend, Death called the skeletons from their graves to dance to his tunes while accompanying them with his fiddle until the rooster crows at dawn and they return to their graves. Written in 1874 by French composer Camille Saint-Saens. Its in a key of G. The work has been imitated by many over the years- Bella Bart, James Newton Howards, Hector Berlioz, Sergey Rachmaninoff, Steven Sondheim and Rober Lopez.
2. Charles Gounod was originally conceived by the composer as a tongue-in-cheek parody of a critic he had come to detest. The spirit of good-hearted fun became indelibly associating with his theme- Alfred Hitchcock Presents its a short piece written in 1872 for solo piano. One of the better known accompaniment was Hells Bells, a Walt Disney Silly Symphony cartoon.
3. ERIKONIG is a song by Schubert Based on a poem by Goethe about a father and son riding horseback on the edge of a forest on a stormy night. The son attempts to alert his father that an evil supernatural being is trying to snatch him away.
4. Every 27 Years, in the novel IT, signifies the extended interval between the waking periods of the extra-dimentional shapeshifter. The lyrics are by Benjamin Wallfische
(Chorus)
Oranges and lemons Say the bells of St.Clements
You owe me five farthings
Say the bells of St.Martins
Benjamin Wallfische is an English composer, conductor and pianist. His most popular album is Blade Runner 2049
5. Survive is a four-piece synthetic band, in Austin, Texas. Its two members, Michael Stein and Kyle Dixon composed the score for the Netflix series.
6. GHOSTBUSTERS is a song by American Musician, Ray ParkerJr. as the theme to the 1984 film. It peaked at no.1 on Billboards Hot100 for three weeks. The phrase “who you gon’ call?” Came from a cheese commercial.
Call GHOSTBUSTERS
7. Halloween is a soundtrack album composed by John Carpenter in 1983. Lacking a symphonic soundtrack, the film’s score consisted of a piano melody MonsterMash, the perennial holiday favourite for Halloween parties has been clawing its way out of the grave every year since.
8. Psycho’s terrifying music changed film forever. Alfred Hitchcock’s grisly horror turns 65 this month might not have become known as the all time classic without the crucial addition of Bernard Hermann’s disturbing score. Screaming violas and thumping bass notes, seem to imitate a victim’s faltering heartbeat. Its knife-edge music. The composer studied under legendary Percy Grainger. He worked with Orson Wells for the music in War of the World’s.
9. The original score composed by Nathan Johnson, as a string quartet-piece later expanded into an orchestral score. String players dig-in with their bows, so that you can hear the scrapping against the strings.
10. ICE DANCE from Edward Scissorhands, is the most beautiful piece of music ever written for film Haunting, longing, and yet eternally hopeful, and all of that without a single word. ICE DANCE is ethereal, one of Danny Elfman’s more poignant and stirring scores.
11. Boys and Girls of every age
Wouldn’t you like to see something s. Strange?
Come with us and you will see
This, our town of Halloween
From the Nightmare Before Christmas
12. What’s This? from the Nightmare Before Christmas is the magnum opus for Danny Elfman who not only wrote the original score for this animated cult classic but penned all the songs, even singing the voice of Jack Skellington.
13. David Mook, songwriter and composer wrote the lyrics for the theme song for SCOOBY-DOO, While Ben Raleigh wrote the music Mook was most active in the late 1960’s composing music for Hanna Barbera. His ability to develop well-written hooks placed at the forefront of TV composers and producers.
14. BEETLEJUICE’s musical score composed by Danny Elfman was originally recorded by Harry Belafonte. Danny in collaboration with Tim Burton, he wrote the scores for lots of films.
15. THE ADDAMS FAMILY is a brainstorm. From just the opening 4 notes and 2 finger clicks, you know where it’s from. Themed by Vic Mizzy, legendary American composer for television and movies like Green acres. He broke into television in 1959 composing for Shirley Temple Storybook, Klondike and the Don Rickles Show.
16. THRILLER is a song by Michael Jackson. Written by Rod Temperton and produced by Quincy Jones, included a spoken-word sequence performed by horror actor Vincent Price. The Thriller music depicts Jackson dancing with a word of zombies. It became the best selling album in history.
17. The soundtrack for WEDNESDAY is familiar pist the Addams Family score.
18. GOO GOO MUCK performed by the Cramps featured in Netflix’s ‘Wednesday’. Its primary meaning is a fictional monster prowling Saturday night or as a metaphor for teenage hormones and lustful, restless energy.. the Cramps song was a cover for a 1962 song by Ronnie Cook and the Gaylads.
19. Its astounding
Time is fleeting
Madness takes its toll
But listen closely
Not for very much longer
I’ve got to keep control….
….I remember doing the time warp
History has carried a torch for “The Rocky Horror Picture Show” for over 50 years. Written by Richard Obrien, the dance sequence is still the jumpiest, camping intergenerational hit. Meatloaf was the best singer to bounce the lyrics to the heavens.
20. IN THE HALL OF THE MOUNTAIN KING is a piece of orchestral music composed by Edvard Greig in 1875 as incidental music for his sixth scene of Act 2 in Henrik Ibsen’s 1867 play Peer Gynt. Its easily recognisable theme that attained iconic status in pop culture. Peer Gynt’s dreamlike fantasy has trolls, courtiers, gnomes and goblins. Cellos, double basses and bassoon, move in and out of different octaves until they collide with each other at the same pitch
The joint was jumping. The quartet were pumping the songs fast, curiosity, at times, to the joy and thundering applause of a very enthusiastic audience. The clapping went on and on. A very successful performance.
