In this concert devoted to 鈥淢usic from and for Film鈥 Nyman was without his lively band to put some colourful timbral flesh on his music鈥檚 minimalist bones. There was just a piano and a 1960s fleapit cinema-sized small screen.
Appropriate, given the quality of Nyman鈥檚 own home movies. We saw one brilliant short film: 脌 propos de Nice, Jean Vigo鈥檚 dazzling 1930 mixture of cinema v茅rit茅 and surrealism.
But whatever Vigo鈥檚 immediate subject 鈥 old men playing boules, magical transformations, dancing girls showing their knickers 鈥 Nyman鈥檚 dreary music plodded on regardless without any obvious consonance with or illumination of the image.
His own films showed minimal visual flair and a gratingly arch sense of humour. In No Bull we see a bull ring prepared for a fight but not the fight itself. In Berlin Lobbyists we watch people (presumably in Berlin) sitting in a lobby 颅鈥 lobbyists, get it?
These might have been redeemed by some witty, allusive or even varied music but Nyman鈥檚 musical palette was a drab one of few chords, plodding rhythms and little dynamic range.
At least a bit of his lyrical folksy score for The Piano was heard during A History of Cinema Part 67. Nyman鈥檚 efforts might be dismissed as Islington intelligentsia twaddle. I was inspired.
I鈥檝e dusted off my Yamaha keyboard, grabbed a camcorder and I鈥檓 off to create my own movie-and-music show called Money for Old Rope.
