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State Theatre Proscenium Arch

The Moving Picture Show

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Modern cinemas are noted for being small black boxes with the walls draped in cloth and low ceilings all for focussing on the front screen and a clearly hearing the dialogue broadcast from carefully positioned speakers. This was not so during the silent era. It was just stepping out from vaudeville and the theatre itself […]
That Mezmerizing Mendelssohn Tune

Magic Lantern Slides

Magic Lantern
A part of early cinema shows was the old fashioned sing a long. This had developed during the magic lantern days before the moving picture shows into an entrancing form of entertainment and continued as an item during the early cinema era. Illustrated songs were sung to a piano accompaniment with lantern slides illustrating each […]
SIlent Film Orchestra

Music and the Silent Film

Music and the Silent Film
People are often intrigued by how music is put to silent films. It is always imagined that the films are accompanied by a little old man on an enormous organ making the music up as he went. That image is one way it was done, but not the only way by any means. They’re called […]
Before restoration!

Restoration of Trip to the Moon

Early film
Before restoration!  A rebirth in color The color version of Georges Méliès’ masterpiece, A Trip to the Moon (1902), was presented at the Cannes Film Festival during the Opening evening, on May 11, 2011. 109 years after its first release, a fully restored color version is once again visible on screen, after being considered lost. […]
When I first started setting music to silent films, I became impressed with the skill of the use of music in many cartoons, in particular Bugs Bunny. Now many of these cartoons really are just silent films with music and sound effects so I began to term my method as the Bugs Bunny way. It […]
The Moving Picture Show Powerpoint 1 (5)_Page_04

State Theatre collection of scores and parts for cinema use

Early film, Music and the Silent Film, National Library of Australia, State Theatre collection of cinema scores and parts
State Theatre Collection of Scores and Parts for Cinema Use Two of the earliest film exhibitors in Australia were Cosens Spencer and T.J. West. Spencer opened the Great American Theatrescope in Sydney in 1905 and soon after acquired a chain of cinemas across Australia. By 1912 he was the largest importer of films in the […]
National Library Stack

State Theatre Collection during Covid part 1

Early film, Music and the Silent Film, National Library of Australia, State Theatre collection of cinema scores and parts
The Covid lockdown has provided me with the opportunity to explore the State Theatre Collection of Scores and Parts for Cinema Use, which contains a staggering 13,548 charts, all of which are available online. This has allowed me to delve into the details of the music and search for PDF copies worldwide. Additionally, I’ve been […]
The Good Old Days

State Theatre Collection during Covid Part 2 The Early Days

Early film, Magic Lantern, Music and the Silent Film, National Library of Australia, State Theatre collection of cinema scores and parts
Cosens Spencer and T.J. West. Spencer opened the Great American Theatrescope in Sydney in 1905 and started gathering music at that time. If the collection is complete, I would expect some music of that age, the difficulty is that it tends to disintegrate if it has been heavily used and is very old. The Gilbert […]
Jewel Song

State Theatre Collection during COVID part 3 Getting Serious with Opera

Early film, Music and the Silent Film, National Library of Australia, State Theatre collection of cinema scores and parts
Around the era of WW1,the silent films were becoming very popular. Longer more serious films were produced and to match this more prestigious profile, it was necessary to get music to match. I imagine this was when The State Theatre people began to be serious about their library. The State Theatre Orchestra had an orchestra […]
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