Comments on: A Strange Border – Essay on Music & Sound, by Paul Davies

By: Week 12 (Audio Visual) – justinblackburnrmit

Week 12 (Audio Visual) – justinblackburnrmit — Wed, 12 Oct 2016 09:00:44 +0000

[…] https://designingsound.org/2011/10/a-strange-border-essay-on-music-sound-by-paul-davies/ […]

By: Melissa Pons

Melissa Pons — Fri, 07 Oct 2011 04:09:49 +0000

Flick: good one about “The Birds”. I guess it is more noticeable to find that border crossing in the horror/ thriller genre but actually in a sort of an action/ (almost) fantasy film I’m working on as a sound designer, I clearly felt that need to make scenes blend together when the film edition keeps jumping in flashbacks and to provide the right attitude of the characters. Actually, I wasn’t able to came up with a better solution if it was to have some impact, as if it was not meant to be a TV show where we easily find those differences. It happened that HFX turned into Production FX which will turn into music making a sweet blending sound.

Great article!

By: Cody Flick

Cody Flick — Thu, 06 Oct 2011 17:55:55 +0000

I should note that “The Birds” had no actual musical score and is mainly an example of sound as “music” and not really the other way around.

By: Cody Flick

Cody Flick — Thu, 06 Oct 2011 17:54:30 +0000

My favorite “crossover” is the film “The Birds.” I wrote a paper in college about it. A wonderfully fascinating specimen in this discussion and I highly recommend researching it to anyone interested in this topic. It’s not at all hard to find. If I can find my paper when I get home I’ll post my bibliography. As a side note, Hitchcock was always highly involved with the sound and score of his films; a wonderful film maker he was.

I can’t help but wonder though, is the crossover limited to the thriller/horror genre? I can’t think of any examples of sound design that fall into music or vise versa. Certainly would be hard to find or distinguish any examples in a romantic comedy, and my though of “thriller” could be as tame as something like “Being John Malkovich,” or “Punch Drunk Love.” This strange border is even more greatly divided by genre in television. Sound is always sound and music is always music except in the case of a “thriller” show like “Criminal Minds.” Can anyone think of any examples of non “thriller/horror” films that have this blurry border? Maybe animation?

Great post! Love this topic!

By: Brendan Rehill

Brendan Rehill — Thu, 06 Oct 2011 00:52:50 +0000

Brilliant, I’m writing a college dissertation on the affect of sound FX on audience psychology. Will definitely be referencing some of this in my argument of the importance of FX vs. music cues. Thanks Paul!