Inappropriate background music

[Beef Oven]

Buona notte, Beef - I hope you find peace in the night, in this and other nights, any way you can.

"nec spe, nec metu"
Jayne.

goodnight Jayne - pleasant dreams!

P.S. might play bob marley's exodus later!

[MrGongGong]

I think there is a danger of thinking that "inappropriate" is fixed
some people object to ALL "background" music (frequent rants on R4 feedback etc )

A good example of brilliant use of "inappropriate" music recently was the BBC4 documentary on the Regency (http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b0144nvh) the music was hardly "correct" for the period BUT supplied witty correspondences to the visual and spoken word so that we got bits of Wim Mertens's music which IS quite "odd" with the Brighton pavilion which uses similar appropriations architecturally and is equally ".......... sticking to the "correct" music for the period would have failed to have the effect of dislocation.

The Eroica was at the time very strange music indeed (a bit like putting your quartet in helicopters ? ) but to most people's ears today is simply another piece of "classical music".

[salymap]

Pleased to meet you, too, Belle , & welcolme to the Board.

I've had similar thoughts when I've seen a documentary - it's got so bad that one almost expects that the music selected for a film about a composer will be equaly anachronistic. I assume that the director, or editor, just asks some hapless assistant (probably an 'intern' - ie an unpaid volunteer) who knows nothing about classical music, to choose something to suit a particular mood or scene.

Salymap, did you ever get asked for suitable music by documentary makers? (Oh, & I'm not suggesting for a minute that you fit my description of a "hapless assistant who knows nothing about classical music").

Welcome HB from me Flossie, most of my jobs in music were before TV documentaries and we were never approached by anyone for that. Of course lots of our composers were busy writing film music but only the finished product ever came my way.

[JFLL]

The one that bugs me most is that a presenter only has to enter a medieval parish church and the all-purpose 'chanting monks' soundtrack makes its nth appearance. Inappropriate and a cliché.

[gamba]

I pre-record all such programmes, not forgetting to press the ' subtitles ' button. Just like watching a good French film in the old days.