Pleasantville NY, Feb 19 (Mon) — Played for Victor Sjöstrom’s Korkarlen (Thy Soul Shal Bear Witness, or The Phantom Carriage) this afternoon in Pleasantville, NY. The Jacob Burns Film Center is running the 50 years of Janus Films series that is touring the country, and this is the only silent film in the package. I’ve been playing for silents at the Burns Center since it opened four or five years ago. The center is the town’s original movie theater, rescued and refurbished by Steve Apkon. I’ll be back on April Fool’s Day with Bruce (Lawton) for a program of Hal Roach shorts.
Really enjoyed playing for this film; it’s moody and expressive, and a welcome break from comedy shorts. Got to use a lot of musical vocabulary, chord progressions and moods I don’t usually get to. They had a really good crowd…around 100 people or so. Not bad for a Monday at 5pm on Presidents weekend in Westchester. Have posted some of the music below.
http://www.silentclowns.com/podcast-audio/korkarlen021907.mp3
[This recording and music is copyright ©2007 by Ben Model. All rights reserved. This is for your listening enjoyment. Period.]
Had not previewed the film, but I’ve played for it recently — I forget where, probably MoMA, and I’d played for it in 2003 when the Swedish Film Institute’s Sjöstrom retrospective ran at MoMA. Now, to take a look at Keaton’s Our Hospitality, which I’m playing for in two days on Long Island…