2001:
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| Program 1 Also Sprach Zarathustra (Thus Spake Zarathustra) Atmospheres |
Program 3 Requim for Soprano, Mezzo Soprano, Two Mixed Choirs & Orch. Lux Aeterna |
| Program 2 The Blue Danube |
Program 4 Gayane Ballet Suite (Adagio) The Blue Danube Also Sprach Zarathustra (Thus Spake Zarathustra) |
Tapes and scans supplied by Lynne Allman and Glenn O'Connell (thanks!)
Listen to HAL9000
(not on the tape, but what the hell)
2001: A Space Odyssey, released in 1968, provided virtually a symphonic musical appreciation course. They must have sold a million of these on 8-track, because you see them everywhere! It inspired many viewers who had no previous interest in classical music to begin listening to it. While many films have used classical music to great affect, no film has so successfully made it a central character in the film. It's difficult, for example, to think of the film without the main theme from the opening of Richard Strauss's Also Sprach Zarathustra. The unusual style of the film, often having long periods without dialog, brought special attention to the music, which acted almost as a narrator to the often baffling action on screen. The film critic Roger Ebert goes so far as to say that the movie was really a silent movie with musical accompaniment!
At the time it was revolutionary to combine serious classical music with science fiction. I have heard that there were shocked gasps from some in the audience when Johann Strauss's Blue Danube began serenading the transport ship as it approached and docked with the space station.
The film's soundtrack includes the latter-day compositions of Gyorgy Ligeti. Some of Ligeti's orchestral music is totally creepy . . . I always loved the music playing in during the scene where they're walking down the ramp to the monolith on the moon and you're thinking "What the hell is that thing?"
Lyn Allman contributed the cart below, which was apparently an attempted to cash in on the success of the original soundtrack. Great cover!
