DRACULA

JOHN WILLIAMS

Rating:

Original Review: In between writing scores for two little science fiction films called Star Wars and Close Encounters, and a low-budget action flick called Raiders of the Lost Ark, John Williams found time to visit a genre which, so far, had been largely untouched by the maestro's hand: horror. John Badham's version of the classic vampire tale Dracula pre-dated Francis Ford Coppola's supposedly 'faithful' re-telling of the Bram Stoker novel by about fifteen years, and starred Frank Langella in the title role of the debonair blood-sucker, preying on the weak and helpless in deepest Transylvania.

Apparently, Williams had never seen a vampire film before he scored this one, and his comparative 'virginity' allowed him to approach the movie from a different angle than his predecessors. The resulting score is an exercise in mesmerising Gothic romance, brimming with full-bodied orchestral passages, soaring love themes, and a set of dark, pulsating scherzos to accompany the Count's deadly journeys across Victorian Europe. The London Symphony Orchestra simply oozes power and evil sexuality, and all of the cues have an overarching sense of foreboding and impending doom.

Parts of Dracula, especially the bold trumpet fanfares, seem to preclude the opening moments of E.T., especially in 'Storm Sequence' and 'The Love Scene', and occasionally the music incorporates a subtle recapitulation of the ominous Death Star motif from Star Wars. The vast majority of cues are built around performances of a descending two-note motif embellished by rumbling strings and shrill woodwinds, which first appears in the 'Main Title' and is further spotlighted in cues such as 'Night Journeys', 'The Love Scene' and 'Dracula's Death'. Other tracks worth mentioning include 'To Scarborough', a pulsating, slightly chaotic travelling montage; 'Meeting in the Cave', which features some virtuoso string writing and low, growling pianos; and 'The Bat Attack', a fabulously creepy action cue which truly makes the skin crawl, using a combination of unsettling pizzicato passages and strangely attractive dissonance to great effect. The other major highlight of this album is a beautifully realised love theme, 'For Mina', which sits amongst all the carnage and completely captures the inner feelings the undead aristocrat has for his beautiful, but ill-fated beau.

Varése Sarabande re-released this score on CD in the early 1990s, the album having been largely unavailable since its initial release on the old MCA label in the late 70s. The only drawback with this release as a whole is its sound quality: Varése were obviously were not into digital re-mastering at that time, and the sonic limitations of the recording quality are clearly audible. At times, the music is clear and sharp; at others, it is muffled and distant. Having said that, Dracula is still a worthwhile album for any serious fan of film music to track down. Firstly, because it is becoming rarer and is likely to be a collectable in the near future; and secondly because, in a way, this is yet another example of Williams altering the way in which a certain genre of films are scored. Think of the pre-1970's horrors, from the Hammer stable especially, and then compare them to later 1990's retellings, especially the likes of Doyle's Frankenstein and Kilar's Dracula. The differences speak for themselves, as does the quality of this score.

Track Listing: Running Time: 36 minutes 42 seconds

Varèse Sarabande VSD-5250 (1979)

Music composed and conducted by John Williams. Performed by The London Symphony Orchestra. Album produced by John Williams.


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