Hitchcock was a genius for employing Herrmann to compose his movies.

Bernard Herrmannwas an extraordinary composer, conductor and arranger. His contributions to 20th Century film scores was unparalleled.

His music for citizens Kane is so great you hardly notice it. It just part of the overall masterpiece. Those that do call attention to themselves, like vertigo elevate the film beyond anything it would have been with out it. One of the great geniuses in music and film history.

Brilliant, Brilliant, Brilliant!

I have this program on an old VHS video cassette and I'm glad it's now on KZfaq and can be seen by any or all Herrmann admirers. He was one of the Hollywood greats when it came to memorable film scores. Thanks for the upload!

Benny was a genius; a thoroughly 'mad' genius. Far and away the most talented and innovative composer of music for motion pictures.

Bernard Herrmann is one of my favorite composer of the 20th century film scores.

cape fear so scary ... just astounding

In the end it really didn't matter what film his music was scored for, you're always left with that incredible music. Hitchcock must have known that especially after Vertigo and Psycho. For as good as those films are I believe it's the music which makes them truly great. I found an arrangement of Scene D'amour from Vertigo for piano performed by Richard Glazier, amazing, I can listen to it over and over again. There's nothing like Bernard Hermann's music!

so much appreciated for a genius

He's my favorite film composer. My intro to him as a composer was through Ray Harryhausen films in which he composed for four. I wish that part of his career was mentioned.

In the 1990s, Herrmann began to get his due. When I discovered him in 1979, he was practically unknown. In Tony Thomas' book on film music, "Music for the Movies," he was profiled in a chapter, "The Price of Excellence" which was about lesser know composers like Hugo Friedhoffer. At that time, Steiner, Korngold and Tiomkin were the big names.

HE WAS THE BEST FILM COMPOSER EVER!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Great documentary. Thanks for posting. Pity the talking heads aren't identified!

I was able to identify some of the other composers (Raksin, Elmer Bernstein, etc.) who commented on Herrmann in this documentary, but I wish they had put names beneath the footage of each. Agree with the sentiments that Herrmann was a genius, a landmark film composer.

The word genius gets bandied about a lot, but Herrmann most definitely was one. His music is sublime

How exciting to see snippets of his hand written score. All those tiny brilliant specks on paper turned out such incredible music.

I had this particular documentary on VHS but is now lost. Is this available on dvd? I thought this was the best thing on the greatest American Composer of the Modern Age.

Outstanding

Bernard Herrmann also made vital contributions to TV series. For me his brief musical clips in episodes like GUNSMOKE's "Matt for Murder" made certain scenes memorable for a lifetime.

Vertigo ost is a masterpiece!

i really needed to see this , i love his work from many years, so precious

Wow ..this was FANTASTIC ! Thanks sooo much for the upload. I just finished watching Sisters (1972) and I could have sworn I heard the exact same score from Obsession (1976) (one of my faves and extremely haunting/eerie). 😱 After Sisters...I went straight to KZfaq to find a bio on Hermann, realizing that I love so much of his work in soooo many films. 👍❤️

It's remarkable, really, that some geniuses happen to link together in a way that blesses us all. I wish I had the gifts musical men have. Also that it affects women so much (speaking for myself). Men are so wonderful at these things and I think that's biology at its simplest level. Some of the nerdiest men have the most singular talents.

my dad played hermann in the car every sunday on the way to church… a weird choice for sure but I can still say I was a fan before even seeing a hitchcock film. ❤

Great documentary for a wonderful composer. One of my favorites. I wish this would have mentioned his scores in fantasy films like Seventh Voyage of Sinbad, Jason and the Argonauts and Mysterious Island. Perhaps not on the level of Hitchcock films, but memorable scores nonetheless.

The collaboration between Bernard Herrmann and Brian De Palma should have been included in this documentary. I think it's more prominent than Scorsese's. De Palma's invitation to score his film Sisters (1972) was what lead Herrmann to score Taxi Driver (1976) and Obsession (1976) which Herrmann considered to be his greatest work.

Thanks for uploading this Randall. It was really special to hear Herman’s close collaborators talk about him

Truly, A Musical Master !!!!

Herrmann was a known quantity. The opening statement is a little too dismissive of his recognition at his height. Admittedly, his name wasn't on everyone's lips - but moviegoers of the 50s and 60s were quite aware of the top composers for the top films, and had an interest in them to a degree.

Recetnly i realised,there is no good movie without great music. This just confirm that statement. Especially when i saw scenes with music and without music. Benny was a briliant artist nothing less than Hitchcock.

The stabbing scene in Torn Curtain is like a decades later uncensored version of what he did with Sylvia Sidney in Saboteur.

Thank you so much for the upload. This was a tremendous combination. An outside eye on Hollywood from that other great nation of cineastes.

It’s actually so funny how they are spinning the close up photos of his face to the ominous music 😂

Narrated by Phillip Bosco. Also, the interviewees' names should have always been displayed while they were speaking.

Without Bernard , Alfred is Nothing 😉

So intrigued by Mr. Herrmann's excellent work and life. A side note; I wish I could be as articulate as Bernstein...wow. ps: Thanks very much Mr. Rudd for the upload!

Ironic that the experts here were pointing the difference in styles like Herrmann and Alfred Newman. They were certainly different. And yet, Newman probably helped the career as a film composer as much as anyone in Hollywood. Herrmann, of course worked with Orson Welles on "Citizen Kane" and "The Magnificent Ambersons" at RKO. Traditional Hollywood was skeptical of anyone connected with Welles. But Newman loved Herrmann's work and hired him to work on many important films at 20th Century-Fox in the 1940s and 1950s,ranging from "Jane Eyre" to "The Ghost and Mrs. Muir" to "The Snows of Kilimanjaro." He even made mediocre films like "King of the Kyber Rifles" and "The Egyptian" at times palatable.

Thank You for uploading this!

when it comes to Movie Score Geniuses...meaning those who has more than 5 very recognizable movie theme scores, there are Williams..Goldsmith..and Herrmann.

This was great , thanks.

Great documentary thanks

As a present day composer which means these days unfortunately mainly a soundtrack composer - not that I don’t love that I just miss art for arts sake. That Herrmmann sound soaks my childhood. Citizen Kane - the spooky vibraphone and bass clarinets- that sound, genius. Still actual art. Today there are many soundtracks written by composers using multiple auto-arrangers and one key ambient apps and then for composed music always the same Heroic sound. Brass 8va moving in 4ths a 5ths with low strings. That’s fine but now everyone sounds the same because they rely on the same gadgets and have the same knowledge base of MCU movies. Herrmmann and John Williams- at my best I work to be a combination of these. Honestly the only reason I don’t always do this is THE AMOUNT OF WORK if you’re writing each instrument in an SO with that many layers - people assume it’s the same as doing a simple hero theme Batman style when it’s 10x the instruments and 100x the notes and 1000x the nuances. So if I have one hero theme (20 minutes to do) and a Williamsesque-Herrmmannesque cue (hours to do). I’m so glad for all he gave to me and to everyone who has watched his many movies maybe not noticing the music - but still biting their lips!

Great documentary, but would’ve liked to see name subtitles on each of the commentators.

A shame this documentary does not tell us who the talking heads are.

A little disappointed the documentary did not cover "The Day the Earth Stood Still", which was ground breaking in the combination of instrumentation, electronics, theremin, etc. But still a great biographical tribute.

"Taxi driver" is my all time favourite filmmusic. It's just heartbreaking fucking cool. "Psycho" second one. After that, to me nothing comes for a long time.

He wrote a good bit of music for Twilight Zone, including the season 1 main theme and the music for The Living Doll with Telly Savalis, Check it out.

Bernard Herrmann reminds me of the 1930's-40's New York street/crime scene photographer Arthur Fellig. Better known as Weegee. At least in terms of his personality. Both were rough crude personalities that didn't care much what other people thought of them.

Not covering his scores for Ray Harryhausen films is just wrong. Herrmann wrote his most amazing scores for those films. More people were introduced to his music through those films than any other. There should have been more interview time with fellow film composers John Williams, Miklos Rozsa,

A master, up there with Bach, Beethoven. He's downplayed because he's recent, and produced scores for screenplays. He makes the Hitchcock drama's in my book. Unmistakable sound First North American Hitchcock movie released w/out Herrmann: Torn Curtain 1966 Due to a disagreement with "Hitch" was a disappointment and one true "blunder" by Hitch. Torn Curtain with a Herrmann would of put it right up in his unforgettable column. I attached a sample of Herrmann's rejected score for Torn Curtain. kzfaq.info/get/bejne/m6toiph1mZqmnXU.html

He's the greatest composer for movies ever,even better than John Williams. 👍

My favorite was Jason and the Argonauts

I mean like are you kidding! They leave out "The Day the Earth stood still" !

Vertigo is Hermann's magnum opus in my opinion.

Wow that guy saying he was gruff because if he wasn’t making a joke he’d say something or do some emotional . That’s so me. I’m an outreach worker and therapist for autistic children and basically love and help everyone all day- but I ACT gruff unthinkingly

It appears chryron of who's speaking has been clipped off...shame. Loved this doc but would've liked to know who's speaking.... Anyone out there who can identify commentators?

I wish all the talking heads were labeled. I recognize some of the people, but not all. I wish to know more.

Bernard Herrmann is my favorite film composer. In many respects, this documentary was a good analysis of his work. However, get the impression that some of this was done on the cheap. Why couldn't there have been some title csards telling you who some of the peopl speaing were? I recognized Martin Scorsese, David Raksin and Elmer Bernstein, but that was it. It's a snooty approach to filmmaking to assume things.

1:28 29:10

8:31 who is this interviewee?

Wasn’t his name spelled Bernard Hermann? Mandela Effect.