December 1998

Related Links George Mason University Deaprtment of Music

Music Professor Supervises Orchestration of DeMille's The Ten Commandments By Tami Dimock On Dec. 4, Hollywood's black tie crowd will attend a very special screening of Cecil B. DeMille's classic silent film The Ten Commandments, which will take place at the grand opening celebration of the newly renovated Grauman's Egyptian Theater. The screening occurs 75 years to the day after the film premiered at the Egyptian back in 1923, when the ornate picture palace was just one year old. This time, however, the orchestral score accompanying the film will be performed under the direction of Gillian Anderson, acclaimed musicologist and student of George Mason's own Stephen Burton, Heritage Chair in Music. Burton, who supervised the orchestration to The Ten Commandments, has worked with Anderson in the past as she restored the original scores to such film classics as Ben Hur and The Passion of Joan of Arc. The author of Music for Silent Films, Anderson receives private orchestration instruction from Burton, who says that his supervision of her efforts involves "suggesting ways to improve the combination of instruments, the tone color, the technique of individual instruments, the balance between different groups of instruments, the approp- riateness of a certain combination of instruments for the particular visual images on the screen at the time . . . and so on. "Orchestration," explains Burton, "is different from composition. In composing, I hear the instruments in my head as I'm composing. It is inseparable, to me, from the creative process. Orchestration is a different matter. You take a piece of music [composed] by someone else and arrange it for some group of instruments--or for a different or smaller or larger group--or you dictate it from a recording because no one has any written music for the piece." It was in 1978 that Burton received his first orchestration commission. "The Joffrey Ballet had prepared a ballet to premiere in one week. Then someone suddenly noticed that there was only a recording and no written music for the musicians to play," he says. "What I began to think of as Burton's 'Emergency Orchestration Room' came into being." Since then, he has orchestrated numerous works, and his 1982 book, Orchestration, has been adopted by more than 100 schools and music departments. The book is also used by musicians Michael Gibson and William Brohn, who, between them, have orchestrated the musicals Cabaret, Grease, Crazy for You, Miss Saigon, Ragtime, and The Secret Garden, among others. The Dec. 4 grand opening and screening of The Ten Commandments is being hosted by American Cinema-theque, a nonprofit, viewer-supported film exhibition and cultural organization dedicated to the celebration of the moving picture in all its forms. It was American Cinematheque that renovated the historic Egyptian Theater, recently making the Hollywood Boulevard landmark its permanent home. Although he would like to be there to support Anderson as she helps bring The Ten Commandments back to life on the big screen, Burton is unable to attend the grand opening party in Holly- wood. "I will be there in spirit," he says, "though my duties keep me here." For more information about the grand opening event or American Cinematheque, visit its website at www.americancinematheque.com.