Francis Chagrin (1905-1972) was born in Romania but moved to Paris at the age of 23 both to pursue musical training (over parental opposition) and to give his wife grounds for divorce (i.e., desertion) so she could marry her new lover. He changed his name to “Chagrin” (his real name was Alexander Paucker) to reflect his feelings over this turn of events. In Paris he studied with Dukas and Boulanger, and he moved to Britain in 1936. He became a respected concert composer, but to support his family he also wrote more than 200 film scores as well as music for television shows and commercials.
This program contains selections from 10 Chagrin films. Two of these, a rollicking overture from a goofball comedy called Helter Skelter (1949), and the Yugoslav Suite, were arranged by the composer. Three of the other arrangements were made by Chagrin and edited for concert performance by Philip Lane. The other five excerpts or suites were selected and arranged by Lane, who is credited with orchestrating one of them, “Portrait of Eva”, from An Inspector Calls, evidently a Laura-like psychological thriller. In mood they range from violent (Colditz Story) to wistful (Last Holiday, an Alec Guinness vehicle about a man who falls in love after having been told, mistakenly, that he has only a few months to live) to heartwarming (Greyfriar’s Bobby, the Disney production about the faithful Skye terrier that stood vigil for its deceased owner every afternoon for seven years).
Two selections are laced with musical inside jokes–the six-minute score to a cartoon called The Hoffnung Symphony Orchestra, chock-full of musical quotations, and Il basso ostinato, a segment of a compilation film called Easy Money, wherein a bass player rebels, like Tubby the Tuba, over having to play oom-pah accompaniments. He then wins the football pool, financially rescues the orchestra, and finally gets to play good melodic material. There’s insufficient space to describe the rest, but everything here is first-class music. All of it is in a tonal idiom, laced with non-demanding modernisms as called for.
The playing of the BBC Philharmonic is splendid. Conductor Rumon Gamba has helped make Chandos’ film score series a leading survey of British cinema music, and he seems to capture the mood and idiom of every score. The orchestra is recorded in a good broadcast studio ambience, quite different from the hard-echoed stone church atmosphere Chandos used to favor. The sound, from a 24-bit master, is detailed, natural, and warm.
