Death of Vangelis: 3 unforgettable movie scenes thanks to the composer’s music

Evangelos Odyssey Papathanassiou, known as Vangelis, died on Tuesday, May 17, at the age of 79. A pioneer of electronic music, he has created some of the most important film soundtracks in the history of cinema. “I never grew up with the idea of ​​becoming famous or having a career in music, or becoming a composer; it meant nothing to me.” He said Interview.

However, this brilliant self-taught person could find his inspiration in space exploration, nature, futuristic architecture, or even the New Testament to deliver particularly memorable compositions. Here are three.

Chariots of Fire

He deservedly won an Oscar for his fabulous batch of firecrackers by Hugh Hudson, whose main theme opens and closes the film; Elegant notes on his keyboard, accompanied by a memorable run by British athletes at sea, in Scotland, on St Andrews Beach. Before the filmmaker wanted to use it ChildTheme included in the album Wild Opera The musician of Vangelis (1979) offered him an original work which was a great success.

authorized Eric’s themeNamed after one of the film’s protagonists, Eric Liddell, the track has become so cult that it has even gone down in history as a remake of the film’s title. This was especially the case with Steve Jobs on January 24, 1984, during a commemorative presentation of the first Macintosh computer.

It is even closely related to the Olympic Games. The BBC also used it to cover the 1984 Los Angeles Summer Olympics in 1984 and was also used as a musical theme during the Sarajevo Winter Olympics that same year. Most recently, we remember his delicious parody of Rowan Atkinson, nicknamed Mr. Bean, at the opening ceremony of the 2012 London Olympics. In short, cult.

blade runner

The Blade Runner is clearly a fabulous artistic vision pursued by Ridley Scott, backed by industrial designer Sid Mead, and behind the visual effects is a huge artist, the late Douglas Tramble, who has just left us. But this monument to SF certainly would not have become such an unusual soundtrack signed by the cult Vangelis, which is also mistreated like the movie: it was really blocked for dark reasons of rights and will even have to wait 12 years. For the release of the official album.

In 1982, Vangelis locked himself in his Marble Arch studio in London to create the soundtrack for a Scott movie. The composer is very receptive to the world of cinema, delivering a score in a blues tone. The hypnotic, disturbing, moving and melancholy soundtrack revolves around every shot of the movie.

Although Main title Opens the film with a Dantean vision Landscape of Hades And its cyberpunk urbanism, playing jazz notes on the saxophone The theme of love It still haunts the memory when it is not a luxurious melody Memories of green Playing the piano, to name a few examples.

The strength of the composer’s soundtrack lies in the fact that he did not think of it as a “simple” musical accompaniment, but as an album in itself, which, of course, can marry – even merge – with images, but also be completely autonomous.

Here it is again Main title Of the movie. Absolute wonders …

1492: Christopher Columbus

Ten years later, Vangelis finds Ridley Scott again to collaborate on the film 1492: Christopher Columbus. A film commissioned by the famous Genoese navigator to mark the 500th anniversary of the “discovery” of America, the film was quite vague by critics, even though it was a huge success in French cinemas, just over 3 p.m. Million viewers.

The scheme Conquer paradiseWhich included MadnessThe dance, which originated in 15th century Portugal and was used for variations by more than 150 composers, is one of the oldest European musical themes. In France, alone 68,000 copies were sold. A figure that pales in comparison to colossal sales alone In Germany, which will sell for 15 million copies.

Here it is again …