Film Music

A special issue of Arts (ISSN 2076-0752).

Deadline for manuscript submissions: 1 June 2025 | Viewed by 1702

Special Issue Editor


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Guest Editor
Department of Music Studies, National and Kapodistrian University of Athens, Zografou, 157 84 Athens, Greece
Interests: film music; cinema; musicology; ethnomusicology; film studies; cultural studies

Special Issue Information

Dear Colleagues,

This Special Issue of the MDPI journal Arts, titled “Film Music”, is seeking contributions that delve into the multifaceted world of music in film and explore its pivotal role in shaping narrative, emotion, and atmosphere in moving pictures. This collection of articles would offer an in-depth examination of the historical, theoretical, and practical qualities of film music, highlighting its evolution and significance in the film industry.

Possible topics include the examination of miscellaneous practices of film music from the silent era to the present day of digital cinema; the work of pioneering composers; the techniques and conventions in film scoring; the methodological frameworks for analysing film music; the applied aspects of film music creation and business through specific case studies; the cultural and cross-genre influences in film music; the diverse musical styles—from classical and jazz to electronic and world music—integrated into film scores; the auditory experience of film music; the impact of technological advancements on the composition and production of film scores; film music soundtracks and their commercial impact; and the advancement of new directions in film musicology and film sound studies.

We invite scholars to submit articles that explore, analyse, and/or recode the interplay between film and music/sound, including global non-mainstream and non-Western cinema traditions. Proposals employing mixed and interdisciplinary perspectives on film music are highly encouraged.

Dr. Nick Poulakis
Guest Editor

Manuscript Submission Information

Manuscripts should be submitted online at www.mdpi.com by registering and logging in to this website. Once you are registered, click here to go to the submission form. Manuscripts can be submitted until the deadline. All submissions that pass pre-check are peer-reviewed. Accepted papers will be published continuously in the journal (as soon as accepted) and will be listed together on the special issue website. Research articles, review articles as well as short communications are invited. For planned papers, a title and short abstract (about 100 words) can be sent to the Editorial Office for announcement on this website.

Submitted manuscripts should not have been published previously, nor be under consideration for publication elsewhere (except conference proceedings papers). All manuscripts are thoroughly refereed through a double-blind peer-review process. A guide for authors and other relevant information for submission of manuscripts is available on the Instructions for Authors page. Arts is an international peer-reviewed open access semimonthly journal published by MDPI.

Please visit the Instructions for Authors page before submitting a manuscript. The Article Processing Charge (APC) for publication in this open access journal is 1400 CHF (Swiss Francs). Submitted papers should be well formatted and use good English. Authors may use MDPI's English editing service prior to publication or during author revisions.

Keywords

  • film music
  • film sound
  • cinema
  • musicology
  • film studies
  • cultural studies

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Published Papers (1 paper)

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Research

13 pages, 18381 KiB  
Article
Sound and Perception in Ridley Scott’s Blade Runner (1982)
by Audrey Scotto le Massese
Arts 2024, 13(5), 154; https://doi.org/10.3390/arts13050154 - 5 Oct 2024
Viewed by 1301
Abstract
This paper discusses the renewal of the conception of film sound and music following the technological advances of the late 1970s. It analyses the ways in which film sound and music freed themselves from traditional uses and became elements to be designed creatively. [...] Read more.
This paper discusses the renewal of the conception of film sound and music following the technological advances of the late 1970s. It analyses the ways in which film sound and music freed themselves from traditional uses and became elements to be designed creatively. The soundtrack composed by Vangelis for Blade Runner (1982) is exceptional in this regard: produced in parallel to the editing of the film, it forged an intimate connection between sound and image. Through the method of reduced listening put forward by Michel Chion in Audio-Vision (2019), this paper scrutinizes the specific ways in which sound shapes the perception of the image and narrative in Blade Runner. The first part of this paper analyses how sounds come to replace music to characterize moods and atmospheres. Ambient sounds create a concrete, sonically dense diegetic world, while music is associated with an abstract, extra-diegetic world where spectators are designated judges. This contrast is thematically relevant and delineates the struggle between humans and replicants; sound and music are used for their metaphorical implications rather than in an effort for realism. The second part discusses the agency of characters through the sonorousness of their voices and bodies. Intonations, pronunciation, and acousmatic sounds anchor characters’ natures as humans or replicants to their bodies. Yet, these bodies are revealed to be mere vessels awaiting definition; in the third part, we explore how sound is used to craft synaesthetic depictions of characters, revealing their existence beyond the human/replicant divide. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Film Music)
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