“The night is darkest just before the dawn” -Harvey Dent (The Dark Knight Rises)

MUSIC 1010SEMESTER PRESENTATION

HANS FLORIAN ZIMMER

An Artist Was Born• Born September 12th

1957• Frankfurt am Main,

Hesse Germany• Alive and well today• Well into his musical

career

A touch of Creativity

• Mother musically talented

• Father skilled engineer

• Hans was the combination that would tear apart the piano and change it around to make different sounds.

THE YOUNG ZIMMERMusical Interests:

• Piano

• Keyboard

• Synthesizer

• Piano lessons? Not so much

Moved to London to attend Hurtwood House School

IN-BE ”TWEENS”Just getting started:

• Zimmer was going to school

• Playing with music

• Writing jingles for commercials

And finally….

Got together with Trevor Horn and Geoff Downes and created…

“VIDEO KILLED THE RADIO STAR”• Buggles

Video Killed the Radio Star, Worldwide hit

• First song eve to be on MTV

HALLELUJAH IT’S RAINING MEN (RAIN MAN)From commercials here and there to a whole score!! • Rain Man

• Oscar• Academy Award Nomination

AND WE PAUSE FOR A DISNEY FUN FACT

• Zimmer did the score for THE LION

KING!!!

Sold 15 million copes of the soundtrack!!

AND SO HE “SCORES” BIG!!

Of 100 music scores Zimmer has created, here are a few:

• Rain Man• Lion King• Pearl Harbor• Gladiator• The Last Samurai• The Pirates of the Caribbean movies

and• Batman: The Dark Knight

OUT OF OFFICEZimmer also has a family life:• Married Vicki Carolin and had one child• Divorced Vicki • Married Suzanne • He and Suzanne are still married and have 3 Children together

WHAT WILL COME NEXT?...ONLY TIME WILL TELL

Rumors are all we know of Zimmer’s future plans

• Teach (as a pay it forward for all he has learned)

• Traveling the world playing music for others

• But who really knows? Anything could happen.

~MUSIC THAT MOVES YOU~• Real music is the music that picks you up and moves you to places you

didn’t know you could go.

• Pearl Harbor is a good example of Zimmer’s music where the music affects your emotions so strongly in accordance with what you are viewing that you

are taken (maybe against your will) to a whole new level of emotions and feelings, all because of a well written piece of music.

QUOTES WORTH QUOTING

When you write a theme one of the things you want to do is you want to see how much life it really has. How many possibilities there are. Can it speak to you in joy? Can it speak to you in sorrow? Can it be love? Can it be hate? Can you say all these things with just a few notes? That's the thing when you figure out if a tune is any good or not. Does it have more than one shallow little character? Does it have just one little thing to tell you. Can it get underneath there under your skin? Can it get dark? Can it talk about the death of a father or something like that.

You have to remain flexible, and you must be your own critic at all times.

-Hans Zimmer

THE DYNAMIC DUO

• Christopher Nolan hand picked Hans Zimmer to score his film.

• Hans focused on each character very thoroughly as he created the music for the film.

• 10,000 bars of noise was the start of the Joker.

• Together they truly brought each character to life.

THE DARK KNIGHT• Warner Brothers published

the album• Sold 25,000 copies in one

week• Won a Grammy for The Best

Score Soundtrack• Won the Classical Brit

Award for Best Soundtrack

LISTENING GUIDE• 0:00 Introduction is the dark and ominous sound of the cello rolling deep and

powerfully as it sets the dark mood. • 0:12 The form begins as violins cut through the deep gloom of the cello in very

quiet and small sounds of hope. The Rhythm stays the same, slow and even but the sounds contrast.

• 0:33 The background of the violins rhythm picks up the pace and the texture is that of the gloomy sounding cello and then the sound of the every quickening positive influence of the violins trying to come in and take over.

• 1:08 The melody now becomes the violins and the cello harmonizes as the violins took over. The rhythm continues to pick up the pace. The form of these two instruments is a battle that the instruments playing the major melody have won.

• 1:28 The dynamics are played forte here for just a moment in a swell to emphasize the good taking over.

• 1:57 Dynamics move into a crescendo as the music grows into the main melody/theme.

LISTENING GUIDE (CONTINUED)• 2:30 The music then slows down again, the texture that of slowly bringing

in the main melody but also remember the dark and dreary beginning. • 3:02 The music then becomes forceful and urgent as the tempo and

rhythm pick up and each instrument is played loudly and with vigor. • 3:53 The timbre here is shown with the drums hitting extremely hard, they

are emphasized above all other sounds at this moment as the melody stops once again.

• 4:05 The same thing happens here as well, the other sounds are background music as the timbre of the drums stands out against it.

• 4:17 The form is also shown here as the timbre of the drums stands out as the contrast, the same sounds that started in the beginning come in once again creating repetition in the music.

• 4:32 This time as the rhythm picks up it adds a few more sounds to the melody as if to show that it has just a little more strength than it did last time.

LISTENING GUIDE (CONTINUED)• 5:00 The same slow but steady pace continues as the melody once again

comes in on the violins the rhythm is slow but it has a hint of beginning to pick up.

• 5:32 A new sound is added and for timbre it stands out even though it is very small because it is the instrument of a vocalist.

• 6:02 The rhythm once again picks up and the form is that of repetition once more with the timbre and texture of a few new sounds (like the vocals) the dynamics are forte once again.

• 6:19 The vocals dynamics are louder still and stand out even more at this point in time.

• 7:04 The notes dynamics are now played in a staccato sound which is new to the piece, the melody was slowing down but the staccato indicates that it is not slowing down for long.

• 7:15 The music goes nearly silent as it plays in pianissimo just before this point, then it begins to play staccato notes again and then builds very powerfully back into the melody/theme of the song, with a lot of power.

LISTENING GUIDE (CONTINUED)• 7:41 Timbre is some hard drum accents once more. Very forceful sounds set

themselves apart from the melody. • 8:00 The melody begins to take on a new sound and key up to this point to build

to the next big part where just after this it swells very loudly with a new sounding rhythm and then in a decrescendo falls back down to nearly no sound.

• 8:30 The form picks up again in repetition sounding almost the very same as when it started.

• 9:19 Timbre the Drums help emphasize the build once again as the rhythm slowly picks up and introduces the melody/chorus again even stronger than time before.

• 9:54 The build is the texture of gloom and darkness and then just after this point it fades away and the violins and a little of the trumpets come in again as they did in the beginning to sort of ward off the bad.

• 10:25 Timbre, all of the instruments collide together making a huge sound of clashing but also harmonious sound to create great contrast to the repetition of the form that has been playing thus far.

LISTENING GUIDE (CONTINUED)• 10:44 The violins squeal alone and the timbre is that of the violins

completely standing out as well as the form shows another great contrast.

• 11:38 Then the violins squeal begins to turn into the sound of the melody once more and begins to take on the repetitious sound it has been making the whole song. All of this creating a big build once again to nearing the end of the song.

• 12:10 The form continues to be that of a build and then a quiet drop as the dynamics pick up very loudly and then drop suddenly soft.

• 12:46 The drums hit once again to signify the change from this contrast in the music to the slow repetitive sound it started with.

• 12:56 Sounds like the beginning once again and builds again with repetitive form.

• 13:34 This time when the melody comes in, it comes in with all of the instruments, the dynamics louder and stronger than all others

LISTENING GUIDE FINALE• 13:59 The sounds stop causing contrast in the music and also

building up to the finale. • 14:02 The tempo picks up significantly just after the music had nearly

ceased. • 14:15 Timbre and dynamics, the staccato notes are back sounding

hard and forceful and strong as the song begins to end. • 14:42 The same melody is heard as from the beginning but the timbre

of the drums hitting changes the form to that of contrasting sounds from the rest and the dynamics of the hard hits emphasizes that sound even more.

• 14:47 It then goes into the melody very strongly once more, continuing hard drum hits are heard throughout the melody. It sounds urgent this time and more positive and less gloomy.

• 15:40 Dynamic fades out to the end.

CITE THE WORKS!• IMDB.com

• Google images for the many pictures