# Any silent film fans here? I have written many, many silent scores, some are online



## dsosin

Hi all, I'm new to this website and want to say hi. Please check out my own website at oldmoviemusic.com. I'm currently touring the country with violinist Alicia Svigals doing our score for the 1923 German film THE ANCIENT LAW by E. A. Dupont. Hope to meet some of you!

All best 
Donald Sosin


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## Kieran

Well, funny you mention it but I watched The Artist the other night and am now going to trawl YouTube for old silent movies. First one to watch will be Hitchcock's first - The Lodger...


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## pianozach

dsosin said:


> Hi all, I'm new to this website and want to say hi. Please check out my own website at oldmoviemusic.com. I'm currently touring the country with violinist Alicia Svigals doing our score for the 1923 German film THE ANCIENT LAW by E. A. Dupont. Hope to meet some of you!
> 
> All best
> Donald Sosin


12 posts in 18 months.

I've accompanied two silents: *The General* (Buster Keaton), and *Safety Last* (Harold Lloyd).

I used to accompany melodrama and vaudeville at a Melodrama and Vaudeville Theatre, so by the time I delved into accompanying silents, I had a wealth of knowledge of old and forgotten music.

For the films I used a mixture of P.D. music, original music, and some open improvisation. I also utilized some old music books designed way back in the 1910s and 20s specifically for use in accompanying films.

Funny thing about the Harold Lloyd film: Shortly before the performance date the venue got a call from the Harold Lloyd estate, letting them know that Lloyd's films were NOT in the Public Domain, as Lloyd kept copies of his films in a vault on his estate, and renewed the copyrights in a timely fashion, unlike every other silent film. Chaplin and Keaton didn't.

It's weird, but back then films were treated like one-shot deals . . . make 'em, show 'em, and melt 'em down to reuse the materials, 'cause "why would people want to see them more than once?" Surprisingly, this notion continued well into the 1960s in television, where tapes of old broadcasts were regularly reused, and erased.

In fact, the whole notion of "Lost Art" is a sad one, whether it's fine art, or even operetta (Gilbert & Sullivan's first collaboration, the operatic extravaganza, *Thespis, or The Gods Grown Old*, (1871), was never published, and most of the music has been lost.


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