Music Comments & Discussion

notofthistimeonline today!
This is the Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra of Amsterdam's 1974 performance of Beethoven's 7th, 2nd movement as performed for the film Zardoz, conducted by Eugen Jochum. It includes vocals. The Concertgebouw Orchestra still performs Beethoven's 7th today, but you typically will not hear any vocals because those were unique to the film. I viewed this film while serving in the United States Coast Guard shortly after it was released. My initial response way back then was, cool, a Sci-fi film that underscores the emergence of cultural stagnation and turpitude in a utopian community! However, the critics of that time never really perceived what John Boorman, Zardoz's director, was attempting to convey. Boorman's main theme was conceived as a film-based discussion of to where, within the science fiction form, a utopian community or society just might socially proceed. Such a film vehicle, i.e., Sci-fi, had been used to present other social issues of the 20th century. For example, the 1956 film Forbidden Planet, the 1966 film Farhrenheit 451, the 1968 film Planet of the Apes, and the 1972 film THX 1138; another film, which followed two years after Zardoz, was the 1976 film Logan's Run. Returning briefly to a music theme discussion, all of the sound tracks for these films are unique and should inspire the listener to contemplate the meaning of each in relation to their film's overall meaning. During the 1970s, though, Sci-fi film and other media forms began to include themes that were more oriented toward entertainment rather than science and or philosophy, and soon the Sci-fi fantasy and horror genres began to replace the science-derived form. Though hard science and space endeavors were still slated for accomplishment by corporate and government entities, public education of youth that included the importance of the idea of a "Space Age" or "Science Age" was de-emphasized in the U.S. populace. In my opinion, the end of the Space Shuttle Program, which was an outgrowth of the Apollo Program, was the final example of that de-emphasis in the public education sector. Today, outer space and other efforts that exhibit a need for the sciences are performed by a specialized science-class of people, which few are carefully selected out of the body of students available or are imported, so to speak, from countries like India, Pakistan, and China.

Zardoz was not well received back in the day. This was to be expected, though, because American social manipulators then, via various media methods and outlets, had begun an attempt to move society away from the 1950s and 1960s so-called Space Age and science educational push, which had occurred for a period of about 20 years (approximately 1948 through 1968) just after WWII. Today, one prominent sign that Western society has moved away from the Space Age, especially in the U.S.A., is that of the declining academic scores in the science of Mathematics, which has been steadily occurring since the 1980s. Another would be the steady decline in radio and electronics hobbyists, which is reflected in a commensurate decline of ham radio gear and electronic parts sales (Recall how big Radio Shack was in the past?). The mostly negative reviews of Zardoz were part of the beginning of this trend toward de-emphasizing the sciences for the masses, as none of the critics seemed to be able or willing to fathom what Boorman was attempting to convey. I found that astounding, then, because it was not too difficult to understand that Zardoz was a discussion that primarily concerned the underlying dysfunction of a seemingly idyllic but cloistered society. Real Sci-fi, both in book and film form, during the 1950s and 1960s provided further stimulus for youth of that era who had been interested in more fully embracing the reasons for that push; for example, Issac Aisimov, who was not only a prolific Sci-fi author but also a professor of Biochemistry at Boston University.

More refinements later...

professor

Different clip of same intro

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4fWvLyT_cKk
Post Comment - Let others know what you think about this Music
Report Abuse for this page, if inappropiate

Stats for this Music

Aug 2018
616 Views
1 Fans
Last Viewed: Mar 22
Last Edited: Jun 2022

Add to Your Profile

Share this Music

We use cookies to ensure that you have the best experience possible on our website. Read Our Privacy Policy Here