In this episode: Ben talks about doing double-duty as both silent film accompanist and Blu-ray producer-distributor; Ben talks about accompanying “Clash of the Wolves” starring Rin-Tin-Tin at the TCM Classic Film Festival and the differences between this performance and the one of recording a score for this film, along; Kerr and Ben talk about the upcoming Ernie Kovacs book “Ernie in Kovacsland”, and Kerr takes a real deep dive into the history and recordings of “Die Moritat”, known to Kovacs fans as the music heard during the comedian’s “oscilloscope” gag sequences; Ben talks about the 10th a ..read more

In this episode: Ben and Kerr discyss about Ben’s process for creating and recording silent film scores for home-video releases, and how it differs from scoring a silent in performance. Ben talks about composing by using the start-stop possibilities of recording in place of traditional notation, as well as using underscoring to help audiences register certain kinds of transitions or to grasp subtleties in the mood or intent of certain kinds of scenes. Recording examples includes segments from Tom Mix in “The Best Bad Man”, recently restored by the Museum of Modern Art,; Tom Mix in “Sky High ..read more

In this episode: Ben talks about scoring silent films that lack a traditional narrative – films made for educational purposes – and creating music that is more “visual” than what is usually done for silents; films discussed are the 1922 “Making of a Bronze Statue” and the 1970 “Spirals” produced by the Metropolitan Museum of Art; Ben has been hired to score these and others for the Met’s online “From the Vaults” series; also covered are the live-scoring of polar exploration silent films shown at the Stumfilmdager (Silent Film Days) festival in Tromsø, Norway, and the accompanying of college gr ..read more

In this episode: Ben talks about the fun and challenges of playing a number of different organs at silent film shows during October and November in Ocean Grove NJ, Ursinus College in PA, and at the historic Everett Theatre in Delaware; Ben and Kerr discuss how often to use leitmotivs and some techniques Ben uses to create themes before or during a show; Ben talks about the sixth sense silent film accompanists develop and use to sense an audience’s engagement with a silent film during a screening; plus some thoughts on Lois Weber’s direction of “Shoes” (1916), meeting a Silent Comedy Watch Part ..read more

In this episode: Ben reflects on his conversation with William Perry heard in the previous two episodes of the podcast; discusses how considering a show’s intended audience is part of his programming process; covers the different film options for Halloween shows; talks at length about his recent live-underscoring of the 1931 “Frankenstein” at the Library of Congress, incl. multiple examples recorded during the show; shares a few minutes of his pipe organ accompaniment for Harold Lloyd’s “The Freshman” at South Dakota State University; answers listener questions, and more. Show notes for episod ..read more

In this episode: Ben interviews composer, silent film pianist and television producer William Perry. Perry is probably best-remembered for his scores for the now-legendary television series “The Silent Years”, produced by Paul Killiam, that ran for two seasons on public television, in 1971 and 1975. For twelve years Perry was the music director and composer-in-residence at the Museum of Modern Art in New York. In the second part of this interview, Perry talks about his work as MoMA’s full-time silent film accompanist, his friendship with Lillian Gish, how he approached composing his “Silent Ye ..read more

In this episode: Ben interviews composer, silent film pianist and television producer William Perry. Perry is probably best-remembered for his scores for the now-legendary television series “The Silent Years”, produced by Paul Killiam, that ran for two seasons on public television, in 1971 and 1975. For twelve years Perry was the music director and composer-in-residence at the Museum of Modern Art in New York. In the first part of this interview, Perry talks about his impressive musical background, how he became MoMA’s full-time silent film accompanist, the origins of the “Silent Years” shows ..read more

In this episode: Ben accompanies a bunch of shows of silent serials during June, and talks about the musical challenges of accompanying serials and in scoring an entire program of them; Kerr and Ben continue their conversation about Ernie Kovacs’s use of music, and discuss Kovacs’ “Street Scene” video of Bartok’s “Concerto For Orchestra”, and for music by Stravinsky, Karajev and Esquivel; Ben gives a progress update on his new book “The Silent Film Universe”; Kerr and Ben talk about silent film comedian Raymond Griffith, and Ben discusses the nuances of accompanying a comedian whose humor is m ..read more

In this episode: Ben plays with holding back musically to help an audience of art deco fans connect with Valentino and Nazimova during a show of “Camille” (1921); he and Kerr Lockhart dig in to details about “Oriental Blues”, the theme song Ernie Kovacs used for all of his shows from 1951-1962; and Ben discusses the various intricacies of live-scoring Keaton’s “The General” in order to help one gag, get out of the way of another, and to create a musical arc for a feature-length comedy that’s essentially one very long chase. Show notes for this episode can be found here ..read more

In this bonus episode, podcast co-host Kerr Lockhart talks with Rick Benjamin, musical director of The Paragon Ragtime Orchestra, about mood cues and photoplay music from the silent era ..read more