Episode 6: Dances With Wolves

Art of the Score

In 1990, Kevin Costner’s Dances With Wolves set the film world alight, and won seven Academy Awards in the process. But what about the score? In this episode, we take a look at the music of John Barry – who, although best known for his Bond scores, here manages to create something at once completely Barry-esque and wholly unique for a film about the flawed myth at the heart of American cinema’s greatest genre: the Western. Episode notes: 2:58 – Dances With Wolves as a Western 6:00 – An indie production and adaptation 9:30 – John Barry 10:21 – Basil Poledouris’s near miss with Dances With Wolves 12:40 – The John Dunbar theme, and comparisons with Lonesome Dove and Legends of the Fall 14:30 – The John Barry ‘mythic’ mode, comparison with Out of Africa and Chaplin 18:30 – The ‘breathing’ nature of the John Dunbar theme, and his pop music origins 21:50 – Solo trumpet version of the Dunbar theme, comparison with Legends of the Fall 24:00 – Dunbar theme on harmonica, and the use of harmonica in Barry’s work 26:11 – The threatening, solo flute version of the Dunbar theme 28:24 – Mournful version of the Dunbar theme for the slaughtered Buffalo 30:35 – The ‘album version’ of the Dunbar theme during the hunt, with comparison to Barry’s 007 theme 34:15 – The ‘film version’ of the hunt theme, with comparison to The Big Country 37:25 – The love theme 41:35 – The ‘Two Socks’ wolf theme 44:37 – Comparison with A View To A Kill 46:33 – The Sioux motif 49:50 – Traditional musical representations of Native American clichés, comparison with The Searchers 52:10 – The Pawnee motif 55:00 – Development of Pawnee motif with threatening children’s themes 59:23 – Brusque French Horn performance of the Pawnee theme 1:00:25 – Comparison with The Living Daylights 1:02:33 – Leaving Fort Sedgewick and the travelling music 1:06:22 – The Buffalo motif, and comparison with The Living Daylights 1:10:10 – Andrew’s argument that the music represents the film’s geography 1:11:25 – The fire dance by Peter Buffett 1:14:05 – Barry’s compositional style and his legacy We’d love to hear from our listeners – get in touch via Twitter, and if you like The Art of the Score, please take a moment to subscribe, rate and comment.