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Domino is
a "disarmingly
straight-forward"
work that "pushes
us to reexamine our
relationship to images
and their consumption,
not only ethically
but metaphysically"
-Collin Brinkman

De Palma on Domino
"It was not recut.
I was not involved
in the ADR, the
musical recording
sessions, the final
mix or the color
timing of the
final print."

Listen to
Donaggio's full score
for Domino online

De Palma/Lehman
rapport at work
in Snakes

De Palma/Lehman
next novel is Terry

De Palma developing
Catch And Kill,
"a horror movie
based on real things
that have happened
in the news"

Supercut video
of De Palma's films
edited by Carl Rodrigue

Washington Post
review of Keesey book

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Exclusive Passion
Interviews:

Brian De Palma
Karoline Herfurth
Leila Rozario

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AV Club Review
of Dumas book

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Wednesday, April 5, 2023
AFFLECK'S 'AIR' BORROWS DONAGGIO'S 'TELESCOPE'
MAIN THEME FROM 'BODY DOUBLE' USED FOR THE UNVEILING OF THE SHOE
https://www.angelfire.com/de/palma/air75.jpg

I haven't seen Ben Affleck's Air yet, but several mentions have been made about the film's use of Pino Donaggio's "Telescope" from Body Double. "Air is a joy," tweets Paul Ridd. "A dryly funny, breezily cynical film about business strategy and the power of personality and persuasion. Loved the retro styling and music, particularly the strategic deployment of Donaggio’s ‘Telescope’ from Body Double + Tangerine Dream’s Risky Business score."

Brett tweets, "Air is the last movie I expected to feature the most iconic bit of Pino Donaggio’s score for Body Double, one of my very favorite pieces of music movie ever, for the shoe reveal." And in a review posted today at JoBlo, Chris Bumbray concludes, "All in all, Air really is a terrific package, with Affleck having a ton of fun telling this story. It definitely has one of the best soundtracks of the year, with the needle drops running the gamut from Bruce Springsteen to 'Axel F'. Affleck even repurposes Pino Donaggio’s main theme to Brian De Palma’s Body Double to complement the Tangerine Dream music. It’s a nice touch in a movie that’s full of them."

Film Music Reporter has the lowdown:

The full list of music cues featured in Ben Affleck’s biographical drama Air has been revealed. While the film doesn’t have a credited composer, Paul Haslinger (Underworld, Halt and Catch Fire, Resident Evil: The Final Chapter) appears to have contributed a few original music cues, credited in the end titles as I Want to Sign Him and Sneaker AnthemRunning Out of Tim. The movie also features tracks from multiple 80s scores by the German electronic music group Tangerine Dream (which Haslinger was a member of in the late 80s), including Running Out of Time & Through the Dark/Run Across the Street from Miracle Mile, Shop Territory from Firestarter, Jerry’s Decision [Ed. note: a comment at that site states this is not a Tangerine Dream track] & To the Head of the Class from Three O’Clock High, Love on a Real Train from Risky Business and Breathing the Night Away from Heartbreakers. Harold Faltermeyer’s music from Beverly Hills Cop and its first sequel makes an appearance in a couple of scenes. Other score cues featured in the movie include Leave Atlantic City from Desperately Seeking Susan (by Thomas Newman), JP Brenner Emerges from Raw Deal (by Christopher Boardman), Votes for Women from Suffragette (by Alexandre Desplat), Closing from The Times of Harvey Milk (by Mark Isham), The Girl from Flinch (by Miami Nights 1984) and a track from Pino Donaggio’s score from Brian De Palma’s Body Double.

Andrea von Foerster serves as the music supervisor of the movie, which also features numerous 80s hit songs, including Money for Nothing by Dire Straits, My Adidas by Run DMC, Legs by ZZ Top, Sister Christian by Night Ranger, Ain’t Nobody by Rufus & Chaka Khan, All I Need Is a Miracle by Mike + The Mechanics, Time After Time by Cyndi Lauper and Born in the U.S.A. by Bruce Springsteen. Air starring Matt Damon, Affleck, Jason Bateman, Viola Davis, Chris Messina, Chris Tucker, Marlon Wayans, Matthew Maher, Jay Mohr, Julius Tennon centers on the game-changing partnership between a then rookie Michael Jordan and Nike’s fledgling basketball division. The drama will be released in theaters nationwide on April 5 by MGM/Amazon Studios.


Previously:
Baena had Donaggio's Body Double score "in the back of my mind", thrilled to work with composer on Spin Me Round

Posted by Geoff at 11:36 PM CDT
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Thursday, August 18, 2022
BAENA THRILLED TO WORK WITH DONAGGIO FOR NEW FILM
"IN THE BACK OF MY MIND, I ALWAYS HAD THE BODY DOUBLE SCORE PLAYING IN MY HEAD FOR WHAT I WAS GOING FOR"
https://www.angelfire.com/de/palma/spinmeround5.jpg

Jeff Baena talks to Newsweek's Carla Sosenko about his new film, Spin Me Round, which he co-wrote with Alison Brie, who plays the lead:
On its face, Spin Me Round, out August 19, is about Amber (Brie), the assistant manager of Tuscan Grove, an Olive Garden–like knockoff, who gets the opportunity of a lifetime when she's invited to Italy for a company training program. But, you may have guessed, things are not quite as magical as they seem, and every time you feel like you've got things figured out—or even know what kind of movie you're watching—the rug gets pulled out from under you.

"I guess I'm drawn to things that are hard to categorize," Baena told Newsweek in a separate interview. "I think if you can easily categorize or describe it, why make it? So my instinct has always been to go somewhere that feels uncomfortable and unfamiliar. And so the consequence of that is that it's indescribable."

In addition to Brie, repeat Baena collaborators Molly Shannon, Fred Armisen, Lauren Weedman, Debby Ryan and Baena's wife, Aubrey Plaza, also star. Alessandro Nivola, Lil Rel Howery, Zach Woods, Ayden Mayeri, Ego Nwodim and Tim Heidecker round out the cast.

"I think that after having worked with certain people, I'm just drawn to working with them again," Baena said. "My movies tend to not fit neatly into any kind of box, and going through that experience of shooting it and kind of knowing how I work, it's definitely a benefit to be able to go back and do something else with those people since they already have a sense of how things are. But more than anything, I love actors, I think whenever I work with new people, I try to incorporate them into the next movie...I think it's mostly that I fall in love with their performances and them themselves."

For Baena, one of the biggest highlights was getting to collaborate with legendary film-and-TV composer Pino Donaggio. "I've always been a massive fan of his and honestly reached out to him on a lark, not expecting him to accept the offer," Baena says of Donaggio, whose work includes collaborations with director Brian de Palma on the 1976 Stephen King adaptation of Carrie and1984 thriller Body Double.

"He's such a warm and lovely person, and being able to go to Italy after we finished editing and sitting with him and arranging the score and literally collaborating with this genius master was one of the most invaluable experiences I've ever had. It was one of the ultimate highlights. When I first set out to write this as a movie, in the back of my mind, I always had the Body Double score playing in my head for what I was going for. It was an insane boon to have Pino as a collaborator."


Previously:
Pino Donaggio brought on as key Italian crew member for Jeff Baena's Spin Me Round

Posted by Geoff at 8:51 PM CDT
Updated: Thursday, August 18, 2022 8:54 PM CDT
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Wednesday, March 16, 2022
DONAGGIO BROUGHT ON AS KEY ITALIAN CREW MEMBER
FOR JEFF BAENA'S 'SPIN ME ROUND' - "IT'S REMINISCENT OF HIS OLDER STUFF, BUT FEELS COMPLETELY NEW & FRESH"
https://www.angelfire.com/de/palma/spinmeround1.jpg

Jeff Baena's Spin Me Round stars co-writer Allison Brie as a manager of a California-based Italian eatery franchise who earns an all-expenses trip to Italy, where she participates in the franchise’s educational immersion program. The film had its premiere this past Saturday at SXSW. After filming The Little Hours in Italy with Brie and Aubrey Plaza about five years ago, Baena was eager to return. Plaza appears in the new film, as well.

"We had a blast shooting The Little Hours," Brie tells The Daily Beast's Marlow Stern. "It was especially fun for me to be there with my husband Dave [Franco], who’s in the movie, as well as Jeff [Baena] and Aubrey [Plaza]. And we have a lot of repeat offenders here, like Molly [Shannon] and Fred Armisen. But Jeff came up with the concept for this movie pretty much right after we finished The Little Hours, because he wanted to get back to Italy as soon as possible. There were some delays on that, and in the interim we made Horse Girl together. After that, Jeff brought it back around and said, “I’ve written a 10-page outline for this other Italy movie idea—do you want to write it with me?” The Little Hours and Horse Girl were unscripted—we worked off a 30-page outline—but for this movie, we fleshed it out into a 35-page outline and were gonna take it out like that, and then because of the pandemic and having so much time on our hands we ended up just writing the whole script. And then we had a fun time asking all our friends to be in it."

Plaza recently worked with Michael Caine on a movie called Best Sellers, and tells Collider's Perri Nemiroff that something Caine had told her carried over to the group dynamic in Italy for Spin Me Round:

Michael Caine put it into my head that when you’re shooting a movie, maybe that’s how it was in the old days, but he was like, ‘The way I do it is we shoot all day long and then every night we go to dinner. I put on my dinner jacket and we go to dinner and we have wine,' and we tried to adopt that kind of approach in Italy where, even though we were exhausted and all losing our minds, we just really kind of dove fully in and just tried to have that experience, and I think it’s the best version of filmmaking.

And thanks, apparently, to a tax credit scenario, Pino Donaggio was asked to compose the film's music - according to an article by Mark Olsen at the Los Angeles Times:
The film also surprises with its lush score by Pino Donaggio, the Italian composer best known for his collaborations with Brian De Palma on films including “Carrie,” “Dressed to Kill” and “Body Double.” For a tax credit, it was necessary to have a key Italian crew member, and Baena was a huge fan of what he called the “classiness and sleaziness” of Donaggio’s work, so he figured it was worth asking. When it turned out Donaggio was interested, Baena, Brie and Plaza drove to Venice after they finished shooting to meet the composer. He gave them a whirlwind view of the city, including a long evening at the famed Harry’s Bar.

Baena called the collaboration “a once in a lifetime thing” and returned to Italy for the scoring sessions. “I went to Rome to meet him at the studio where all the Italian greats worked, it’s basically this one studio that the legends recorded at,” Baena said. “And it was like my dream to basically spend a week with Pino Donaggio and just hang out with him. And he is like this cute, amazing old guy who is so on the level and is so sharp and funny and so down.

“And his music is incredible,” added Baena. “It’s hard to basically say, ‘I wanna do something like your old work,’ but I didn’t really wanna push that. I want him to go to a new place. And I think he found this middle ground where it’s reminiscent of some of his older stuff, but it feels completely new and fresh. So it has a familiar, but also unique feeling, which is what I want the movie to feel like.”


A review of Spin Me Round by The Wrap's Carlos Aguilar describes some of Donaggio's music:
Casting a wide casting net, Baena also folds in bit parts for name talent like Fred Armisen, Ego Nwodim and Lil Rel Howery. They’re responsible for most of the effective comedy, though in some cases with portrayals that border in “SNL”-style caricatures. While not always as funny as it wishes to be through the managerial team bickering dynamic, “Spin Me Round” is generally engaging thanks to the “what the hell is happening here?” doubt that Baena instills early.

An interesting comedic exercise, this is Baena’s least eccentric outing yet (considering there are no jealous zombies or foul-mouthed nuns), but it’s perhaps his most narratively ambitious, in terms of its genre playfulness and a clear objective of dismantling its protagonist’s false illusions. Both the score (by veteran composer Pino Donaggio) and Sean McElwee’s cinematography go along with variations in tone.

Just as the music goes from happy-go-lucky, jingle-like cheer to suspensefully ripe enough for a James Bond film, the lighting choices become more purposefully on the nose to reflect the terror Amber perceives all around her. There’s a thematic and practical synergy that’s far more impressive than some of the dry-humor gags that don’t amount to much.


Posted by Geoff at 12:01 AM CDT
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Wednesday, November 24, 2021
HAPPY 80TH BIRTHDAY TO PINO DONAGGIO
REVIEW OF NEW AUTOBIOGRAPHY FROM ROLLING STONE-ITALY
https://www.angelfire.com/de/palma/pinobrianvenice2012a.jpg

Pino Donaggio, pictured above with Brian De Palma at the 2012 Venice Film Festival, turns 80 today. In an interview posted three days ago by Massimiliano Cortivo at Corriere Del Veneto, Donaggio refers to De Palma as "my brotherly friend," who he met in Hollywood as he began his "third life," writing music for images, for the cinema and also television.

Donaggio was celebrated in Venice the night before his birthday at Rossini Cinema. The evening was to begin by retracing "the life, career and music of the great composer, in a conversation that will also be an opportunity to present the book Come sinfonia (Baldini + Castoldi, 2021), a biography released in October, written jointly by the same Pino Donaggio with Anton Giulio Mancino." Afterward, there was a screening of the 2020 film The Big Step. According to the Rossini Cinema description, it is "the latest film set to music by Pino Donaggio, the story of two distant and unlikely brothers capable of dreaming and taking a big step towards the Moon."

Meanwhile, at Rolling Stone, Luca Barnabe reviews the Donaggio book in an article with the headline, "Pino Donaggio, an eighty-year long symphony" -- here's a Google-assisted translation:

Mr. Brian De Palma has no doubts: "The Blow Out score is my favorite. The main theme is very moving, especially the music on the credits, after the fade out with John (Travolta, ed.) covering his ears." That is only a hyper-cinematographic fragment, as well as hyper-musical, taken from the book Come sinfonia by Pino Donaggio and Antongiulio Mancino (ed. Baldini + Castoldi). That is the fresco of a life in music, a life in cinematographic art, but not only.

"Up there I hear the angels singing for us, sweetly / it's a song made of happiness" recited Donaggio - who turns eighty on November 24 - in the famous single Come symphony, also interpreted by Mina. It almost seems that the angels really played a decisive role in the life of the musician. "A film critic friend of Brian (De Palma, ed.), passing from London to the airport, had seen, bought and brought to America the LP of Don't Look Now […] Brian had exposed the problems he was encountering in finding a viable replacement for Bernard Herrmann. And his friend: "Look, when I got back from London I took the Don’t Look Now record. It is from a new composer ”. […] Why do I always talk about destiny? That copy will have been one of the last in circulation, because in the meantime the English record company had also gone bankrupt."

This is just the beginning of one of the most significant musician-director collaborations in the history of cinema, Pino Donaggio-Brian De Palma, which would begin with Carrie (1976) and continued for eight films, to date, with Domino (2019), passing through such masterpieces as Dressed to Kill (1980), Blow Out (1981), Body Double (1984)... That journalist who, thanks to fate (the angels?), found Donaggio's score for Nicolas Roeg's Don't Look Now (1973), was Jay Cocks, film critic for the weekly Time magazine at the time, then Scorsese's co-screenwriter.

As a symphony, it is a work-river of heartfelt, chiseled pages, full of plots, sub-plots and anecdotes. On the first score for De Palma, the musician recalls how the scene at the cemetery on Carrie's grave made "George Lucas jump out of his chair during a screening". Donaggio-Mancino's book is many things together, just like the artist at the center of the story, composer, violinist, songwriter, singer. It is a short story, a symphony in words (consisting of an introduction / overture and four chapters / movements), an essay on music and cinema, an adventure novel, autobiography and biography. The childhood of a brat in the Venetian streets, until today.

Donaggio is spoken of in the third person, as the protagonist of a novel of an incredible and "cinema" life. His speech is carried over between narratives and passions, from adolescence to pandemic contemporaneity. A flow of consciousness in words, fragments of dialogue between Donaggio and Mancino, defined by the musician as "one who doesn't understand anything about Venice." Monologues by Pino and scraps of old writings. An email from De Palma to Donaggio in which the director notes: "You write enchanting melodies, sensual music, suspense and simple heartbreaking emotional phrases that bring tears to the eyes of the spectators. You also know how to shock and amaze an audience. Together, we have always found the ideal piece of music to accompany my elaborate sets."

The style of the text, like the artist's musical one, is at the same time melodic, destabilizing, precise and dissimilar to the contemporary, at times baroque, poetic, poignant. Obviously, it is not limited to the scores for De Palma, but contains the whole range of experiences and personal works. From training (family of musicians) to private life, from pop songwriting (memorable songs, like Io che non vivo, brought to Sanremo in the 1960s) to pieces reinterpreted by others like Jannacci (Mario) and Mina, up to cinema.

A long list of hits: the surprising and experimental score for Don't Look Now, the collaboration with Dario Argento (Two Evil Eyes, Trauma), Nothing Left To Do But Cry for Benigni and Troisi, Don Camillo and the incredible popularity of the melody Why for Terence Hill, Così fan tutte for Tinto Brass, up to Don Matteo again with Terence. Donaggio seems to have plowed with the same professionalism in popular and author cinema, exactly as he has never made distinctions between classical music and songs since he was a child - in a family of musicians.

Hill himself writes in the short but poetic preface to the text: "The undisputed quality of this composer is known to all. The public's affection for Don Matteo is due to the sensitivity and depth of his music. It transports the viewer into a rarefied world where the desire for the transcendent becomes, even if only for a moment, a reality." To say it with Pino's mother, perhaps the fundamental teaching in life, perhaps to find the help of fate or angels, is: "Butite nel mar grando!" [Throw yourself into the great sea!]


In an interview from a year ago at Sorrisi, Donaggio told Andrea Di Quarto the story of meeting De Palma for Carrie like this:
“Bernard Herrmann had recently died and Brian didn't want the usual Hollywood musicians. A friend of his played that soundtrack of mine and the spark went off. Editor Paul Hirsch called me, who spoke Italian and who shortly after would win the Oscar for Star Wars. I didn't speak a word of English at the time, but I remembered my mother saying: "Butite nel mar grando" ("Throw yourself into the big sea", in Venetian, ed). I threw myself. There was an affinity with Brian from the start. I understood what music he wanted and went back to Venice. He heard the music only in the recording studio."

Posted by Geoff at 7:34 PM CST
Updated: Monday, November 29, 2021 7:55 AM CST
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Friday, October 22, 2021
VIDEO - 45-MINUTE PINO DONAGGIO INTERVIEW
SPANISH SUBTITLES FROM ITALIAN - DONAGGIO SINGS A "BONUS TRACK" AT THE END OF THE INTERVIEW


"I only know this," Pino Donaggio says in the video above as he talks about being asked to work on Piranha in 1978. "When Corman saw the movie, he already had music from another composer, from a young man, I don't know. And he said: 'If the movie has stronger music, more importantly, it can make money.' So he asked Joe Dante, do you know any composer that you like? And Dante said: PINO DONAGGIO, because he had seen Carrie." The video comes from the Spanish site TheMovieScores, which features the following description via Google translation:
TheMovieScores exclusive VIDEO INTERVIEW with the great Italian composer, who tells us his story, his beginnings in classical music, his time in pop-rock, and his foray into film music, with his extensive collaboration with the American director BRIAN DE PALMA in films such as Carrie, Blow Out, Dressed to Kill, Body Double, with JOE DANTE in Piranha and The Howling, and also with directors such as Darío Argento, George A. Romero, Pupi Avati, Lucio Fulci, and Tinto Brass, among much others. A very interesting conversation, in which the Venetian master contributed unpublished data, told curious anecdotes and even allowed himself to joke about certain aspects of his prolific career, with more than 200 soundtracks to his credit. A luxury and a pleasure to have had the opportunity to interview PINO DONAGGIO, one of the last sacred monsters of film music of all time. Thanks, Pino !!!!!!

Posted by Geoff at 12:01 AM CDT
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Monday, June 7, 2021
'OMAGGIO a DONAGGIO' FOR RECORD STORE DAY
ISABELLA TURSO HAS COMPOSED PIANO WORKS INSPIRED BY DONAGGIO'S MUSIC FOR NEW ALBUM
https://www.angelfire.com/de/palma/pinoisabella.jpg

Isabella Turso celebrates Pino Donaggio, who turns 80 later this year, with an album of new songs directly inspired by the composer. And it turns out, Donaggio himself suggested the idea to Turso. All of the images here come from the album cover of Omaggio a Donaggio, a special limited edition release for Record Store Day.

https://www.angelfire.com/de/palma/omaggioadonaggio0.jpg

https://www.angelfire.com/de/palma/omaggioadonaggio1a.jpg

https://www.angelfire.com/de/palma/omaggioadonaggio2.jpg

https://www.angelfire.com/de/palma/omaagiocover.jpg


Posted by Geoff at 12:01 AM CDT
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Friday, December 1, 2017
DONAGGIO TALKS DE PALMA, 'DOMINO', 'CARRIE', ETC.
SAYS HE ALWAYS WANTS TO SCORE EVERY DE PALMA FILM, BUT DE PALMA FEELS HE IS BEST FOR SUSPENSE
https://www.angelfire.com/de/palma/pinotorino.jpg

Pino Donaggio took a break from working on the score for Brian De Palma's Domino this week to appear during the De Palma retrospective at the 35th annual Torino Film Festival, where the composer received the Grand Prize prior to a screening of Dressed To Kill. Film.it has some highlights from Donaggio's press conference there-- here's a rough Google-assisted translation:
The thirty-fifth Torino Film Festival invites Pino Donaggio as the representative of the retrospective dedicated to Brian De Palma. An author for whom Maestro Donaggio wrote the music for six of his films. We all know the titles - Carrie, Dressed to Kill, Blow Out, Body Double, Raising Cain, and (the less famous) Passion - but listening to the composer's stories instantly provokes goosebumps: "Do you remember Carrie's ending? When Amy Irving walks past the grave and we see her hand jump off the ground accompanied by the music? I saw George Lucas jump during that scene, he jumped from the cinema chair. And he started laughing as if he wanted to say: 'You cheated me!'".

Another anecdote about Carrie is about Martin Scorsese: "We were in New York and in a cinema showing Carrie ... with the title in the luminous sign in big letters, and at the bottom, but much smaller, there was the title of the second film: Taxi Driver. Brian took the picture of that sign and sent it to Scorsese! I have wonderful memories of that period: Brian was very close to Spielberg, Scorsese and Coppola."

Maestro Donaggio still works with De Palma today. He is currently busy creating the music for his new thriller: Domino. What will we see on the screen?
The plot is simple: the films of Brian are, at least the ones that I do with him which are those full of suspense, action and sex. Domino opens with a death: they kill the companion of a policeman and then this protagonist goes around all over Europe to look for the perpetrators. Among other things, he also meets ISIS members and other terrorists while he continues to hunt for the guilty. There will be a great finale set during a Bullfight with people running up the stairs.

You named De Palma's friends: Scorsese, Spielberg and Coppola, that is, authors who almost always work with the same troupe. Are there any De Palma films that you did not participate in - I think about Scarface or The Untouchables - were you too busy at the time?
No. I wanted to do them all. But he had made up his mind that I was good at making that kind of music for that kind of suspense film. He said that he had worked with many but that he found me "the best of all on those films in particular". He thought I was not suitable for more dramatic films like The Untouchables, or Casualties Of War. The strange thing is that when this happens, he avoids me. He does not want me to do even the audition, because he feels uncomfortable telling me no. I remember in the eighties I was in New York: I was working on the music of The Fan ... he was in the same building I was in. I wanted to say hello. He told me he was busy. The truth is that he was starting another movie. And he could not tell me that I would not have done that movie. He is a bit like that. But when he comes to Venice we always see each other. (Smiles)

You have worked a lot also for Italian cinema. Is there a film you would have liked to participate in, which you did not do?
We should have done with Benigni and Troisi the following: Nothing Left To Do But Cry. It was scheduled but then it was different after the death of Troisi. It was a lot of fun to work on that first film: Benigni and Troisi came to me to ask me the theme. They left me free: "You and we listen to him" - they told me. And then in that movie we played with the music. There were musical gags like in the scene in which they open the door hoping to find themselves in the present and instead find the musicians of the Middle Ages.

Returning to the cinema of De Palma. One of the greatest fans of the director is Quentin Tarantino. Have you ever discussed with him about a potential project to be developed together?
Tarantino used the Blow Out theme in his Death Proof. Once I read an interview in which he said: "I love the music of Donaggio" ... yet he never called me (smiles). Another who loves my work is Benicio del Toro. He said: "When I prepare a film I listen to Donaggio's music" ... he too has never called me though. Maybe he does not have my number yet!


Posted by Geoff at 1:31 AM CST
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Friday, November 17, 2017
DONAGGIO TO RECEIVE GRAND PRIZE AT TORINO FEST
BEFORE NOV 29 SCREENING OF 'DRESSED TO KILL', PART OF FULL DE PALMA RETROSPECTIVE
https://www.angelfire.com/de/palma/tff35.jpg

Pino Donaggio will be presented with the Torino Grand Prize at the 35th edition of the Torino Film Festival, which runs November 24 through December 2. Donaggio will be handed the award ahead of a screening of Dressed To Kill on November 29th. That film is part of a complete Brian De Palma retrospective, which includes everything from Woton's Wake to videos for Bruce Springsteen and Frankie Goes To Hollywood, and all the features in between (including 1979's Home Movies, projected from DCP).

Posted by Geoff at 5:37 AM CST
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Sunday, December 13, 2015
NEW CD - DONAGGIO, SONGS FOR MOVIES
NEW ORCHESTRAL RECORDINGS INCLUDE "I NEVER DREAMED..." FROM 'CARRIE', "SALLY & JACK"
Quartet Records and Music Box Records are both taking pre-orders for a new Pino Donaggio CD collection being released this week, Canzoni per il Cinema ("Songs for Movies"). The CD contains new orchestral arrangements of Donaggio songs, chosen by the composer himself, including songs from Carrie and Blow Out. Donaggio and film music author Gergely Hubai also provide liner notes in a "lavishly designed 20-page full-color booklet." Here's the rest of the description, as listed on the websites:
For over 55 years, legendary composer Pino Donaggio has been in the forefront of the Italian popular music scene; 40+ years of his career have spanned an impressive line of film scores as well. This orchestral album, Canzoni per il Cinema, is a testament to the composer’s versatility, featuring some of his most popular songs for cinema in brand-new orchestral arrangements.

Recorded with The Bulgarian Symphony Orchestra under the baton of Maurizio Abeni, the program—personally selected by Donaggio—focuses on two different types of compositions: it naturally includes some of Donaggio’s most beloved theme songs written for movies (Don’t Look Now, Carrie, Blow Out, Trauma, Cin cin, etc.), but it also includes some of his pre-film-scoring hits that were subsequently used in various films (immortal songs such as “Io che non vivo,” “Come sinfonia” or “Una casa in cima al mondo”). The selection thus comprises not only fan favorites, but also some lesser-known pieces that merit a second look in the decades-spanning career of Pino Donaggio.


Posted by Geoff at 11:38 AM CST
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Tuesday, November 3, 2015
DONAGGIO & ARGENTO ON DE PALMA, 'RAISING CAIN'
COMPOSER RECEIVES LIFETIME ACHIEVEMENT AWARD FROM ARGENTO IN ROME


Pino Donaggio received a lifetime achievement award, presented to him by Dario Argento, as part of last week's La Chioma di Berenice in Rome, which honor the imagination and skills of craftsmen and artists of the Italian and international cinema: hairdressers, makeup artists, costume designers, set designers and music composers. Donaggio was interviewed by LoudVision's Donato D'Elia. The latter also separately interviewed Argento.

D'Elia was especially interested to ask both Donaggio and Argento about Brian De Palma's Raising Cain. "I speak about it with pleasure," Donaggio tells D'Elia. "My score is more atonal, more studied, and I'm also very attached to this work. De Palma, especially in our first collaborations, almost forced me to be close to the canon of Herrmann, with small variations and steps that maybe the untrained ear could not perceive, but then little by little I would always try to detach myself and to customize the job. In Raising Cain now the process had reached maturity, so I could afford to go back to a more classical score without overdoing those connotations, which can forcibly seem most derivative. But even in our latest collaboration, Passion, in the finale we return once again closer to that musical world."

ARGENTO: "BRIAN IS A FRIEND; I TAKE IT AS A COMPLIMENT"
Meanwhile, D'Elia was curious to hear Argento speak about the final shot of Raising Cain, which D'Elia tells Argento seems to "copy verbatim a famous sequence" from Argento's Tenebre. D'Elia asks Argento if he has ever confronted De Palma about the scene. "No, we never confronted the question," replies Argento, "but there was also no need, Brian is a friend. In his films he often cites Hitchcock, and this time also mentioned me, and I take it as a compliment."

DONAGGIO: "I TRIED TO CREATE A PECULIAR STYLE OF MY OWN"
Delving deeper into Donaggio's style, D'Elia tells the composer, "There is, in my opinion, a peculiar feature: the keyboard parts to introduce a serene, almost dreamlike atmosphere, and then precipitate tension with the arrival, in fact, of the strings. Am I correct in my impressions?"

"Yes, of course," Donaggio replies, "it is a process that I used from the start even, just to break away from Herrmann and exploit my knowledge as a pop arranger who had matured in the first part of my career. Herrmann communicated suspense right away, but I was trying to lighten and then give after the coup of suspense, so to speak. I saw people jump on their chairs at screenings of Carrie, because of these changes in tone: one of these was George Lucas, when Brian showed the film to him and a few others in a preview screening. I tried to create a peculiar style of my own, and I think I succeeded. As I said before, I used my Italian, come from the opera, the singing in the works already as a boy, twelve years of conservatory."

When D'Elia mentions that Donaggio's "Telescope" from De Palma's Body Double "became a big disco hit in the eighties," Donaggio replies, "It was the only piece that was always requested in record stores. That was an idea of Brian, immerse the film in those plasticky sounds, with synthesizers: everything worked properly, I think."


Posted by Geoff at 12:48 AM CST
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