Ben
Model has served as resident silent film
accompanist on both piano and organ for The Museum of Modern
Art (MoMA)
in New York City for over 25 years. He has played for silents in
many other theatres, museums, universities , schools and other venues
around the U.S. (and in Norway!), has recorded numerous scores for
silent
film DVDs, and
produces The
Silent Clowns Film Series with film historian Bruce Lawton.
Ben composes
and improvises all
his own scores, and performs in a style that is both evocative of the
silent
era and also aware of a contemporary (and younger) audience's awareness
of music and film scoring. Ben is also a silent film historian,
and frequently introduces the films he accompanies. In the spring
of
2006, Ben co-organized MoMA's acclaimed two-month retrospective of the
films of
Roscoe "Fatty" Arbuckle. and in the May of 2009 he co-curated MoMA's
series Cruel and
Unusual Comedy: Social Commentary in the American Slapstick Film,
which
he
also
co-taught
as
a class for MoMA in November 2008.
Ben has been
fortunate to have had his
lifelong
passion for silent film
fostered by important figures in classic cinema: he grew up watching
silent movies at the home of Walter Kerr, drama critic and author of
“The
Silent
Clowns” (Knopf, 1975), he accompanied silent movies for
noted film historian William K. Everson's classes at NYU while
attending film school there, and learned the craft and technique of
silent film scoring from legendary silent film organist Lee
Erwin.
Currently,
Ben is playing for a weekly film history series at MoMA
entitled
An Auteurist History of Film
which started in September 2009 and will run through May 2010.
His other regular screenings are at The Silent Clowns series and on
Long Island at a monthly silent film series at the
Cinema Arts Centre.
Ben
is also re-working the third of his four orchestral scores for high
school band (Charlie Chaplin's
The
Immigrant), and is preparing a score – suitable for piano or
organ – in preparation for any upcoming screenings of the brand new
2010 restoration of
Metropolis that he may be
booked for after the film's re-premiere in the U.S. in April 2010.
Click
on
the
buttons
above to see information about Ben's performance
schedule, recordings on home video, orchestral scores available, or to
send an e-mail about bookings and more. Scroll down to watch
videos of Ben's scoring work and radio/TV appearances.
silent film,
silent
film music, silent clowns, theater organ, theatre organ, photoplay,
Buster
Keaton, Charlie Chaplin, Harold Lloyd, D.W. Griffith, John Barrymoore,
Lee Erwin, Wurlizter, Ben Model, Bruce Lawton, Synth-Org, silent film,
silent film music, silent clowns, theater organ, theatre organ,
photoplay,
Buster Keaton, Charlie Chaplin, Harold Lloyd, D.W. Griffith, John
Barrymoore,
Lee Erwin, Wurlizter, Ben Model, Bruce Lawton, Synth-Org, silent film,
silent film music, silent clowns, theater organ, theatre organ,
photoplay,
Buster Keaton, Charlie Chaplin, Harold Lloyd, D.W. Griffith, John
Barrymoore,
Lee Erwin, Wurlitzer, Ben Model, Bruce Lawton, Synth-Org, Miditzer,
Donald Sosin, Phil Carli, Dr. philip C. Carli, Jon Spurney, jon
mirsalis, robert israel, dennis james, dave knutsen, donald sosin,
Kino, Metropolis, restoration
