Halloween Original Soundtrack - John Carpenter - When the new
Halloween movie hits theaters in October 2018, it will have the
distinction of being the first film in the series with creator
John Carpenter's direct involvement since 1982's Halloween III:
Season of the Witch. Carpenter serves on the new David Gordon
Green-directed installment as an executive producer, a creative
consultant, and, thrillingly, as a soundtrack composer, alongside
his collaborators from his three recent solo albums, Cody
Carpenter and Daniel Davies. The new soundtrack pays homage to
the classic Halloween score that Carpenter composed and recorded
in 1978, when he forever changed the course of horror cinema and
synthesizer music with his low-budget masterpiece. Several new
versions of the iconic main theme serve as the pulse of Green's
film, it's familiar 5/4 refrain stabbing through the soundtrack
like the Shape's . The rest of the soundtrack is just as
enthralling, incorporating everything from atmospheric synth
whooshes to eerie piano-driven pieces to skittering electronic
percussion. While the new score was made with a few more
resources than Carpenter's famously shoestring original, it's
musical spirit was preserved. "We wanted to honor the original
Halloween soundtrack in terms of the sounds we used," Davies
explained. "We used a lot of the Dave Smith OB-6, bowed guitar,
Roland Juno, Korg, Roli, Moog, Roland System 1, Roland System 8,
different guitar pedals, mellotron, and piano." Unlike the Lost
Themes albums, where the composers wrote the soundtracks for
imaginary movies, Halloween saw the Carpenters and Davies
collaborating on music set to images for the first time. Though
it marked a significant change from their previous creative
process, the trio thrived under the constraints and tight
deadlines that film scoring work demands. "Being limited by the
length of time in scoring the sequence, we focused on the
director's tempo, timing, and vision," Davies said. "He would
tell us what he had in mind, how long the cue should be, what
emotion he wanted, and we would take it from there. It's only the
three of us, there is no elaborate system. We wrote, performed,
and orchestrated everything." For John Carpenter, who reunited on
the new film with original Halloween star Jamie Lee Curtis,
composing the score felt like a homecoming. Not only had he not
worked on a Halloween movie in 35 years, he hadn't composed a
soundtrack since his 2001 sci-fi thriller Ghosts of Mars. "It was
great," Carpenter said of the experience. "It was transforming.
It was not a movie I directed, so I had a lot of freedom in
creating the score and getting into the director's head. I was
proud to serve David Gordon Green's vision." For Cody Carpenter,
John's son, and Davies, his godson, it was surreal to work on
something that means so much to generations of fans, and that
they grew up around. "It was an honor for us to be involved, and
we are really happy to be a part of something that so many people
are anticipating and excited about," Davies said. "Working
together with both the director of the new Halloween and the
creator of the original Halloween was really a fantastic
experience."