Venice will comfort you
From the BBC comes a beautiful song that appears to be
tailor-made for our city -- John Patten, 11/16/07
--jpatten@veniceflorida.com
Pack up your worries, lay down your fears... Three years ago, the BBC brought Doctor Who out
of the mothballs, where it had sat since the late 1980s (with the exception of a
one-off TV movie that bombed in the ratings in 1999). For myself, it was a cause
for celebration: I've been a big fan of the show since my college days when Tom
Baker was romping through the universe, fighting Daleks and Cybermen and handing
out jellybaby candies to alien races.
The program is the longest-running sci-fi television
series, eclipsing even Star Trek in all of its various incarnations. It is an
institution all its own in Britain, where nobody doesn't know what a TARDIS or a
Dalek looks like. The Doctor's character and his anti-authoritarian personality
is ingrained into the British psyche and is weaved into the literature and
political dialogue. He's every bit as iconic and symbolic to Brits as Captain
Kirk is to Americans. Here in the U.S., Doctor Who never quite caught on as much as
deserved, something that I've never quite understood.
At any rate, Christopher Eccleston was
tapped as the new face of The Doctor in 2005, only to regenerate into David Tennant
a year later (The Doctor never dies, he just morphs into a new body). Tennant
also appeared briefly in one of the Harry Potter movies as a villain of some
sort (I've yet to sit through a Harry Potter movie, a decision I hope I can
maintain for at least the next decade).
One of the most stunning things about the newly revamped
Doctor Who is the music. Every episode has a unique orchestral score that is
brilliantly tied to the story and the characters (example
-- music from "Doomsday"). The music truly shines in
period episodes, where The Doctor is transported to earlier times in our
planet's history. All of the orchestral music is composed and directed by
Murray Gold, who has
repeatedly been nominated for BAFTA awards for his work in British television.
Now why am I telling you this? Bear with me for just a bit
more.
Russell Davies is the producer and head writer
for the show. Under his helm, the program has consistently stayed at the top of
British viewing figures. Just prior to the re-launch of Doctor Who in 2005, Davies
was the head writer for Casanova, a
three-part miniseries for the BBC.
Casanova was aired here in the States in
2006
on PBS' Masterpiece Theatre in two parts. It starred Peter O'Toole as the elder Casanova, with
Tennant playing the part of a younger Casanova in the flashback scenes that
dominated most of the film. It's an hilarious and bawdy film, one that I highly
recommend (Sarasota County Library System
has two
copies in stock), but that's not the point of this article.
Tucked away in Part One is a partially completed song,
"Venice Will Comfort You." The song is used as a background set piece to further
the telling of the story of the early days of Casanova and his experiences in
Venice, Italy. The composer and director of the music in Casanova? Murray Gold.
The first time I heard the song, I immediately knew it
was THE perfect song to be the official song of Venice Florida.
Two problems
The first is that the song was never completed. It is
only shown twice in the film, both times as a partial performance of the work.
From later inquiries that I made to the BBC and to David McCleery, agent for
composer Murray Gold, I discovered that it was unlikely that any further
portions of the song would be recovered as production materials for the film had
already been dissipated by time.
Secondly, I was not the most favored person of city
council. If I tried to bring the idea to council, it would have been killed
simply because I was the one promoting the idea.
So, much to my own chagrin, I abandoned the idea as
unfeasible. Times change, however, and this is one of those pet
back-projects of mine that has been gathering dust for months. So I'm blowing
the dust off of it and throwing it at the city at large.
Below is a partial set of the emails between myself
and David McCleery, Murray Gold's agent, as well as a short video clip. The clip
shows the two usages of the song as seen in the film. That's it, though-- that's
as much of the song as you ever get to hear in the film.
In order for this to work, clearances will have to be
obtained from Gold. The song will have to be rewritten a bit in order to finish
it. Hopefully, someone
over at, say, the Venice Symphony Orchestra (hint, hint) will take an interest
and pick up on the idea.
The song, as you will hear, is stunningly beautiful.
From: John Patten [mailto:jpatten@veniceflorida.com]
Sent: 08 March 2007
To: The BBC
Subject: Making one of your songs our official city song
To Russell Davies:
I live in Venice Florida and I produce the towns unofficial political rag,
www.veniceflorida.com
In your wonderful TV film Casanova, there is a beautiful song "Venice Will
Comfort You." I would be very interested in promoting this song to our city
council to become our official city song. I need to know where I can find a full
copy of the song, who holds the royalties, etc. and what clearances I would need
from you and/or the songwriters.
Thank you in advance for any help you can give.
----------
Dear John
Your email to Russell Davies has been forwarded to me. We look after Murray Gold
who wrote the music for Casanova.
I don't have a copy of the song, but I will see if I can track one down. The
clearances you need would depend on how you were going to use the song. It is
published by Bucks Music Group and the master rights are owned by BBC Worldwide
- and if you want to go ahead with something, I can certainly let
you have the contact details.
Best wishes
David McCleery
Manners McDade Artist Management
4th Floor, 18 Broadwick Street
LONDON
W1F 8HS
tel: 020 7277 8194
----------
From: John Patten
To: David McCleery
Sent: Thursday, March 08, 2007
Murray Gold is God. I have thoroughly enjoyed his work through Doctor Who,
absolutely amazing.
That said, the song Venice Will Comfort You is a great classic-feeling song. The
first time I heard it (Casanova was broadcast here on PBS' Masterpiece Theatre),
I immediately thought of my own town. It just smacks of civic pride and all that
stuff.
I don't know how City Council will react, mainly due to the bawdy source of the
material (we're a bit more prudish in our public tastes in some areas here in
the states, particularly in the hypocritical area of broadcast material), but
the worst that can happen is that they tell me to go away.
At any rate, can someone e-mail me an MP3 of the full song so that I can play it
at a city council meeting for council to hear it? I'm gonna count on you guys
not coming after me for a performance royalty for the purpose of the sales
pitch.
"Mine can't do that" -- David Tennant, in Casanova (my favorite line in the
movie)
----------
From: David McCleery
To: John Patten
Sent: Thursday, March 08, 2007
What a nice compliment for Murray!
The Doctor Who live concert was indeed an amazing experience - no doubt you've
seen the Silva Screen CD soundtrack of Murray's music to the series?
It may be difficult to get hold of an mp3 of the Casanova song, but I've put out
a few feelers and will do my best.
Best wishes
David
----------
From: David McCleery
To: John Patten
Sent: Wednesday, March 14, 2007
Hello again John
I've been doing some research into 'Venice Will Comfort You'. The only way we
have at the moment of getting a sound file would be to get the production
company to extract this from the digibeta of the programme and there would be a
charge for this - and it would just be the extract from the show and not the
full song. Murray has just moved and does not have access to a lot of his old
files.
So, it's probably best at the moment to show the video at the council meeting.
If your idea goes down well with the council, we can look at whether Murray can
track down the original recording, or whether the song would need to be
re-recorded.
All best
David
John Patten is the head of Web Operations for Creative Pages, and has worked in broadcasting for over 12 years. He
can also be incredibly rude at times.
