{"id":668968,"date":"2026-05-13T20:55:18","date_gmt":"2026-05-13T20:55:18","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/668968\/"},"modified":"2026-05-13T20:55:18","modified_gmt":"2026-05-13T20:55:18","slug":"how-hollywood-became-a-new-home-for-classical-musics-grandest-ideas","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/668968\/","title":{"rendered":"How Hollywood became a new home for classical music\u2019s grandest ideas"},"content":{"rendered":"

Classical music isn’t dead, but who’s listening, and how, is changing.<\/p>\n

One of the clearest signs of that change is the rise of live orchestral concerts paired with blockbuster film screenings.<\/p>\n

These concerts are significantly driving the growth in live performance of classical music in Australia.<\/p>\n

Vote now in the ABC Classic 100: Greatest of All Time<\/a><\/p>\n

From core classical favourites to iconic music for the screen, we want to know what you think is the greatest classical music of all time.\u00a0<\/p>\n

According to the latest Live Performance Australia data<\/a>, the most popular classical music performances in 2024 included Star Wars, How to Train Your Dragon, Pirates of the Caribbean, and The Man from Snowy River in Concert.<\/p>\n

According to Screen Sounds presenter Dan Golding, watching a film with a live orchestra isn’t new.<\/p>\n

“In the 19th-century, film was something that was added into a musical context,” Golding says.<\/p>\n

How Hollywood embraced classical music<\/p>\n

Before the days of movie theatres, opulent opera houses were built to maximise opportunities for people to meet one another and to observe what other audience members were doing.<\/p>\n

Composers like Giuseppe Verdi and Giacomo Puccini wrote and staged operas with huge orchestras, but some attendees barely heard or saw anything during the performance.<\/p>\n

That changed when Richard Wagner built a theatre in the small German town of Bayreuth to stage his operas<\/p>\n

\"An<\/p>\n

Wagner may have created a prototype of a movie theatre at his Bayreuth Festspielhaus, Dan Golding says. (Wikimedia Commons: Rico Neitzel)<\/p>\n

“Bayreuth looks like a movie theatre,” Golding says. “It’s a darkened room, all the seats face the stage, and the orchestra is obscured in the pit.”<\/p>\n

Wagner profoundly influenced classical music.\u00a0<\/p>\n

He changed audience behaviour, and also introduced the musical concept of leitmotif: a recurring musical idea associated with a person, place or situation.<\/p>\n

This became an important building block for later film composers.<\/p>\n

Golding says the earliest forms of film emerged from less highbrow entertainments, such as variety shows and fairs, which were often rooted in music.<\/p>\n

But in the 1930s, when Hollywood wanted to build some cultural cachet, they turned to classical music.<\/p>\n

“[Warner Brothers] wanted a great big-name composer to write a soundtrack so that they might be taken seriously,” Golding says.<\/p>\n

The big name they turned to was Erich Korngold, a composer following in the footsteps of Wagner.<\/p>\n

In 1938, Korngold made the journey from Austria to Hollywood to refuse the offer in person.<\/p>\n

“[But] by the time he got off the boat in America, Germany had annexed Austria.”<\/p>\n

This placed Korngold in a difficult situation because “he was a Jewish man,” Golding says.<\/p>\n

\"Errol<\/p>\n

The Adventures of Robin Hood was the first film for which Erich Korngold composed an entirely original score. (Getty Images: Silver Screen Collection)<\/p>\n

Korngold changed his mind, scored The Adventures of Robin Hood, and became one of the first composers of international stature to write for Hollywood.<\/p>\n

He became known for writing original, symphonic soundtracks for “Errol Flynn-type adventure movies,” Golding says.<\/p>\n

Korngold blazed the trail for later composers like John Williams, Howard Shore, Hildur Gu\u00f0nad\u00f3ttir and countless others.<\/p>\n

Inside the screen music industry today<\/p>\n

By the time Australian composer Jessica Wells had her “baptism of fire” working with Hollywood composers and engineers in 2006, the screen music industry was a well-established ecosystem.<\/p>\n

Wells is a composer, but often orchestrates other people’s music.<\/p>\n

She has worked with composers including John Powell on Happy Feet and How to Train Your Dragon, and Elliott Wheeler on the Elvis biopic.<\/p>\n

\"Animation<\/p>\n

How to Train Your Dragon has become one of the most iconic and most widely attended films\u2011in\u2011concert. (via Dreamworks)<\/p>\n

Using her deep knowledge of orchestral instruments, Wells translates “the composer’s intentions to the performers reading the notes.”<\/p>\n

“There’s a lot of musical decision-making that an orchestrator has to do along the way.”<\/p>\n

This involves everything from ensuring the players’ parts are in the right key, to knowing what notes they can or can’t play well.<\/p>\n

“You don’t want to turn up to a recording session and have someone say, ‘I can’t play this note’,” Wells says.<\/p>\n

Films with orchestral soundtracks require a big team to assemble the music, especially to work with the lead composers and directors.<\/p>\n

Not only does everything need to be approved by the director, Wells also has to look after the complex process of getting the music onto players’ stands.<\/p>\n

“If the music’s not being approved until the day before the recording session, then you’re in a bit of trouble, and I’ve had to deal with that,” she says.<\/p>\n

\"Jessica<\/p>\n

Jessica Wells helps translate composers\u2019 ideas into music that instrumentalists can play. (Supplied: Jared Underwood)<\/p>\n

Despite the hectic pace, Wells loves working in the screen music industry.<\/p>\n

“[Working on] a couple of pieces from How To Train Your Dragon, performed by the London Symphony Orchestra, was the biggest orchestra I’d ever orchestrated for,” Wells reflects.<\/p>\n

“That was really fun and has become one of the most iconic film scores,” she says.<\/p>\n

Bringing the screen to symphonic orchestra concerts<\/p>\n

Golding notes that in the 1920s, Australian audiences often heard live orchestras accompany premiere silent-film screenings.<\/p>\n

It disappeared in the 1930s when orchestras were replaced by synchronised soundtracks and visuals.<\/p>\n

It took nearly half a century before film and live orchestras started coming together again.<\/p>\n

\"Andrew<\/p>\n

Dan Golding (right) has been unpacking the relationship between classical music and the screen for years. (Supplied: Jay Patel)<\/p>\n

“In the 1970s, orchestras started to program bootleg arrangements of Star Wars in particular,” Golding says.<\/p>\n

“There wasn’t anything official because nobody really thought that this was something that people would love.”<\/p>\n

The arrangements became global hits, according to Golding.<\/p>\n

Then, around 2010, film companies began officially partnering with orchestras to present films-in-concert.<\/p>\n

Conductor Nicholas Buc remembers “the sudden interest and rise in performing films live in concerts” around that time.<\/p>\n

Buc, a lifelong movie buff, co-hosts a podcast with Golding discussing scores in films, and regularly conducts films-in-concert with orchestras around Australia.<\/p>\n

“The very first film I conducted was Psycho, followed by a [compilation] show of 10-minute vignettes of every single Pixar film,” Buc says.<\/p>\n

Soon after, symphony orchestras around Australia began programming blockbuster titles including The Lord of the Rings, Doctor Who and Star Wars.<\/p>\n

Screen Sounds on ABC Classic<\/a><\/p>\n

Hear the best soundtracks for film and television, from the golden age to new releases.<\/p>\n

Today, films-in-concert have become part of the regular offerings of major state orchestras across Australia.<\/p>\n

Buc says performing to a film requires a unique set of skills.<\/p>\n

“The music needs to be very precise, so a lot of the job is about getting the timing right,” Buc says.<\/p>\n

He uses a tiny screen above his music stand with a built-in visual cue to conduct the orchestra.<\/p>\n

In studios, this music is often recorded in sections over many weeks. In live performance, “some of this music is pretty hard, long and relentless,” Buc says.<\/p>\n

But conversely, the reward for the musicians and audiences can be incredible.<\/p>\n

\"Nicholas<\/p>\n

Nicholas Buc regularly conducts film concerts with live orchestras around Australia. (Supplied: Jay Patel)<\/p>\n

“When you get a great film and a great score, it really is electric,” Buc says.\u00a0<\/p>\n

These films are people’s gateway to experience a symphony orchestra concert for the first time, according to Buc.<\/p>\n

That gateway can open other areas of classical music, such as introducing audiences to music by female composers.<\/p>\n

Wells is currently working with symphony orchestras across Australia to tell the story of Mozart’s Sister, Maria Anna, through a documentary she scored.<\/p>\n

“A lot of the orchestras are pairing the Mozart’s Sister concert with other works,” Wells says, “either by women who were composing during the Mozarts’ lifetime or by contemporary female composers.”<\/p>\n

But for some people, these experiences are “significant concerts in their own right”, says Golding.\u00a0<\/p>\n

“Some people may only ever go to see an orchestra when they do one of these films-in-concert because it connects with their own cultural life in a totally different way.”Get the latest classical music stories direct to your inbox<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Classical music isn’t dead, but who’s listening, and how, is changing. One of the clearest signs of that…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":668969,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[32],"tags":[322843,64,63,447,9472,322846,134,322844,1689,102387,1973,322845,81729,195979,322847,57174,146397,322842],"class_list":["post-668968","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-celebrities","tag-art-of-the-score","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-celebrities","tag-classicreads","tag-dan-golding","tag-entertainment","tag-erich-korngold","tag-film","tag-golden-age-of-hollywood","tag-hollywood","tag-jessica-wells","tag-john-powell","tag-john-williams","tag-nicholas-buc","tag-opera","tag-screen-music","tag-symphony-orchestra"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/668968","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=668968"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/668968\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/668969"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=668968"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=668968"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=668968"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}