{"id":3043,"date":"2017-10-13T15:57:00","date_gmt":"2017-10-13T13:57:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.tarantino.info\/?p=3043"},"modified":"2017-10-13T17:26:44","modified_gmt":"2017-10-13T15:26:44","slug":"sound-of-the-spaghetti-west-ennio-morricone-quentin-tarantino-and-the-hateful-eight","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.tarantino.info\/2017\/10\/sound-of-the-spaghetti-west-ennio-morricone-quentin-tarantino-and-the-hateful-eight\/","title":{"rendered":"The Sound of the Spaghetti West: Ennio Morricone, Quentin Tarantino, and The Hateful Eight"},"content":{"rendered":"

Gunshots, bells, whip cracks, whistles, chants and wordless voices, a mariachi trumpet, violently percussive acoustic guitars \u2013 such are the predominant sounds in Ennio Morricone<\/em><\/a>\u2019s soundtrack for Sergio Leone<\/em><\/a>\u2019s 1960s Dollars Trilogy<\/strong><\/a>. Each successive film in the trilogy is bigger, longer, and more ambitious in story, cinematography, and music. The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly<\/strong><\/a> (1966), the trilogy\u2019s third film and the seminal work of the spaghetti western genre<\/a>, best represents the stark contrast to the Old West that Hollywood had been romanticizing for decades. The music, too, was different \u2013 raw, dirty, and wild; less heroic yet still epic, grand, and other-worldly.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>Italy\u2019s fascination with the old American West during the sixties and seventies spawned hundreds of films that make up the spaghetti western <\/a>oeuvre. Only a few dozen may be worth watching, but they\u2019ve had a tremendous impact on present day film directors John Carpenter<\/em>, Alex Cox<\/em>,<\/a> Robert Rodriguez<\/em><\/a>, and Quentin Tarantino<\/em>, among others. Sergio Leone<\/em><\/a> is universally acknowledged as the most important and influential director of the genre, while Clint Eastwood<\/em><\/a>, thanks to top billing in Leone\u2019s trilogy, remains the face. And while his name may not be as well-known as Eastwood\u2019s or Leone\u2019s, Ennio Morricone<\/em><\/a>, who wrote more than forty film scores for the genre, provided the sound of the spaghetti west.<\/p>\n

Compare Morricone\u2019s spaghetti western music <\/a>to that of a typical American western, The Magnificent Seven<\/strong> (1960). A few minutes after pressing play, a listener might mistake Elmer Bernstein<\/em>\u2019s music for something written by the American composer Aaron Copland<\/em> in the 1930s and 40s; in a symphony concert hall it would fit right in alongside Copland\u2019s ballet suites Billy the Kid and Rodeo. It\u2019s the stereotypical music of the cheesy, fun-loving Old West later affectionately mocked in faux-Westerns Blazing Saddles<\/strong>, City Slickers<\/strong>, and Back to the Future Part III<\/strong>.<\/p>\n

Morricone is now pushing ninety, and in recent years his name and music have become more associated with writer-director superstar Quentin Tarantino<\/em>. Tarantino\u2019s encyclopedic knowledge of spaghetti westerns<\/a> has been well-chronicled \u2013 of the many hundreds made, one gets the impression Tarantino has seen them all \u2013 and he has often cited The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly<\/strong><\/a> as his favorite movie. With his love for spaghetti westerns comes his love for Morricone\u2019s music. In large part due to Tarantino\u2019s championing, both the genre and Morricone have enjoyed a revival in popularity over the past decade-plus.<\/p>\n