Thames Silents Orchestra – Carl Davis: Buster Keaton [Thames Silents Orchestra; Chamber Orchestra of London [Audio CD]

Description

My first contact with Buster Keaton’s films was in the late 1970s, preparing for the Thames Television series Hollywood. It was in the context of a comparative study of silent film comedy – ranging from The Keystone Cops through to Keaton, Harold Lloyd to Charlie Chaplin’s first recorded score City Lights in 1930. All three began their careers in live theatre, Chaplin in the Music-halls of London, Keaton and Lloyd touring the United States. Working with live music was an intrinsic part of their act and remained so for all of their film careers. It was important that I understood their different characters: Charlie – the tramp, the total outsider, Lloyd – your average contemporary man and Keaton – the ‘Great Stone Face’, concealing his thoughts behind an inscrutable mask. All their individual characteristics had to be placed in the context of the plot of the film, be it historical or modern. The latter was more frequently used by Keaton. His subjects ranged from the Stone Age to the American Civil War of the 1860s, as well as the present day, meaning the 1920s.