A WOMAN OF NO IMPORTANCE [9.2.60] ITV
A prestigious scoop for a new boy TV composer was this well known Oscar Wilde play about the hypocritical attitudes of Victorian society towards a woman discovered to have had a child outside of marriage. A TV Times article made quite a fuss of the fact that all the gowns and accessories worn by actresses in the play were 1890s originals discovered in warehouses and second hand stores in London and Paris. [3]
Director Joan Kemp-Welsh also directed two 1960 Harold Pinter TV plays with Grainer scores "The Birthday Party" and "Night School". [4]
After adapting Wilde's play for TV Paul Denn wrote the screenplay for three highly successful spy films “Goldfinger” [1964] “The Spy Who Loved Me” [1965] and "The Deadly Affair" [1966] [5]
In December 2010 / January 2011 the Galleon theater company of London presented at the Greenwich Playhouse a modern updating of “Woman” resetting it at a 1959 Christmas party [6]
THE BIRTHDAY PARTY [22.3.1960] Granada TV
The first of three known Ron Grainer involvements in filmed presentations of works by the "original,disturbing and arresting talent with the enigmatic endings” playwright Harold Pinter.
“The Birthday Party” was first performed on stage in 1958 and received a mixed reaction. Most theatre critics hated it. “No one can say precisely what it is about and what produces its spine chilling quality. “Most people admitted they didn’t “get” the play but they knew they had shared a strong emotional experience.” [7]
It’s not known if Grainer provided a conventional music underscore for either of these two plays. He certainly didn't for the 1963 movie version of Pinters "The Caretaker" starring Alan Bates.
Harold Pinter was born in London's working-class Hackney district to Hyman and Frances Pinter, Eastern European Jews who had immigrated to the United Kingdom from Portugal. [8]
Grainer was later to reverse the Pinter elders migration and relocate from London to Portugal.
THE FACTS OF LIFE [7.4.1960] ITV
An unlikely cameo appearence for Grainer as a member of the Ron Grainer Quartette a band playing during a night club scene in this television adaption of a Somerset Maughan short story about a tennis player who rebels against his fathers advice and experiments with the gambling, money lending and mercenary women of the French principality of Monaco.
Music for this play and most of the first series of ITV Somerset Maughan Short Stories was composed and played by guitarist Sacha Distel. Grainer's composer credibility boosting venture into the French mode of Maigret was six months later. [9]
NIGHT SCHOOL [21.7.60] ITV
An early Harold Pinter one act play for which Grainer was commisioned to provide a soundtrack. [10]
SATURDAY PLAYHOUSE: ON THE EDGE [16.7.60] BBC
BBC play based on the 1959 book “The Pimpernal in Prague: An Account of the Author's Experiences in Rescuing Friends from the Communist Régime in Czechoslovakia. With Plates, Including Portraits, Facsimiles and a Map”. by David Campbell-Shaw . Incidental music and music direction for the TV version was by Ron Grainer [11]
"The Pimpernel in Prague" book is Internet listed on the official American Central Intelligence Agency declassified books list so must have been controversial in its day. [12]
NO WREATH FOR THE GENERAL [19.9.60] BBC
Described in the British film Institute online database as “an adventure series in six episodes” little else appears to be known about it except that one story had actor Michael Caine playing a “second constable” [13]
LOOKING FOR GARROW [30.10.60] BBC?
No information about "Garrow" could be found apart from a passing reference to the plays title and screening date in a 1960 unidentified British newspaper interview about the debut screening of the Maigret series. [14]
MAIGRET [31.10.60] BBC
In late October 1960 Grainer finally found public acclaim, if not immediate financial benefit, with his signature tune and incidental music for the first series of a new 39 part TV dramatisation of the best selling “Maigret” detective yarn books by French author George Simeon.
In a 1966 radio interview Grainer said after hearing a series was being planned he wrote a theme based on the impression he had developed of the Maigret character from his own reading of the original books. His unsolicated work was accepted and, unusually for a TV theme, the opening and closing credits were based around his composition.
Writing the incidental music was not a simple task. It was usually recorded a week before the drama was filmed and allowance had to be made for abrupt changes of mood in the script as well as last minute and sometimes split second image editing decisions by the director. There was also the important consideration of a TV audiences emotional association with certain modes of music that they would instantly recognise as French. [15]
“[Maigret] certainly opened up a lot of opportunities ... but I had to work so fast. Once I scored 22 minutes of the show between Friday night and Sunday morning”. [16]
The Maigret theme owes its unusual sound from the featured combination of a musette [a small French accordion] and clavichord one of the earliest keyboard instruments” [17]
"These themes are known to millions of people around the world and it seems natural to suspect they had brought quick fortunes to their author but the strange truth is for Maigret he received about $50 and it was two years later that performing and record royalties began to flow. [18]
There does not appear to be any international copyright for the “Maigret” theme taken out in Ron Grainer’s name [19]
When an extended play 45 rpm disc of Maigret music was released in 1960 Warner Brothers USA proudly announced “The new Grainer recording of Maigret themes is the first ever for a British artist and the Warner Brothers label. It is also the first British TV music to be recorded by Warner Brothers” [20]
Little did Grainer realise just how time consuming his composing career was going to become over the next four years but in the meantime there was the personal satisfaction of the “Maigret” theme winning an Ivor Novello award in 1961 for Outstanding Composition for Film / TV or Radio. [21]
1960 Referendces
[01] An Honourable Murder IMDb [Internet Movie Database]
[02] Brian Clemens Wikipedia
[03]TV Times 7- 13.2.1960 p16
[04] Joan Kemp - Welsh IMDb
[05] Paul Denn IMDb
[06] A Women of No Importance / Galleon Theate Company
[07 ]TV Times March 20-26 March 1960 p16
[08 Harold Pinter IMDb
[09] TV Times # 251 3rd - 9th April 1960 p33
[10] Ron Grainer IMDb
A prestigious scoop for a new boy TV composer was this well known Oscar Wilde play about the hypocritical attitudes of Victorian society towards a woman discovered to have had a child outside of marriage. A TV Times article made quite a fuss of the fact that all the gowns and accessories worn by actresses in the play were 1890s originals discovered in warehouses and second hand stores in London and Paris. [3]
Director Joan Kemp-Welsh also directed two 1960 Harold Pinter TV plays with Grainer scores "The Birthday Party" and "Night School". [4]
After adapting Wilde's play for TV Paul Denn wrote the screenplay for three highly successful spy films “Goldfinger” [1964] “The Spy Who Loved Me” [1965] and "The Deadly Affair" [1966] [5]
In December 2010 / January 2011 the Galleon theater company of London presented at the Greenwich Playhouse a modern updating of “Woman” resetting it at a 1959 Christmas party [6]
THE BIRTHDAY PARTY [22.3.1960] Granada TV
The first of three known Ron Grainer involvements in filmed presentations of works by the "original,disturbing and arresting talent with the enigmatic endings” playwright Harold Pinter.
“The Birthday Party” was first performed on stage in 1958 and received a mixed reaction. Most theatre critics hated it. “No one can say precisely what it is about and what produces its spine chilling quality. “Most people admitted they didn’t “get” the play but they knew they had shared a strong emotional experience.” [7]
It’s not known if Grainer provided a conventional music underscore for either of these two plays. He certainly didn't for the 1963 movie version of Pinters "The Caretaker" starring Alan Bates.
Harold Pinter was born in London's working-class Hackney district to Hyman and Frances Pinter, Eastern European Jews who had immigrated to the United Kingdom from Portugal. [8]
Grainer was later to reverse the Pinter elders migration and relocate from London to Portugal.
THE FACTS OF LIFE [7.4.1960] ITV
An unlikely cameo appearence for Grainer as a member of the Ron Grainer Quartette a band playing during a night club scene in this television adaption of a Somerset Maughan short story about a tennis player who rebels against his fathers advice and experiments with the gambling, money lending and mercenary women of the French principality of Monaco.
Music for this play and most of the first series of ITV Somerset Maughan Short Stories was composed and played by guitarist Sacha Distel. Grainer's composer credibility boosting venture into the French mode of Maigret was six months later. [9]
NIGHT SCHOOL [21.7.60] ITV
An early Harold Pinter one act play for which Grainer was commisioned to provide a soundtrack. [10]
SATURDAY PLAYHOUSE: ON THE EDGE [16.7.60] BBC
BBC play based on the 1959 book “The Pimpernal in Prague: An Account of the Author's Experiences in Rescuing Friends from the Communist Régime in Czechoslovakia. With Plates, Including Portraits, Facsimiles and a Map”. by David Campbell-Shaw . Incidental music and music direction for the TV version was by Ron Grainer [11]
"The Pimpernel in Prague" book is Internet listed on the official American Central Intelligence Agency declassified books list so must have been controversial in its day. [12]
NO WREATH FOR THE GENERAL [19.9.60] BBC
Described in the British film Institute online database as “an adventure series in six episodes” little else appears to be known about it except that one story had actor Michael Caine playing a “second constable” [13]
LOOKING FOR GARROW [30.10.60] BBC?
No information about "Garrow" could be found apart from a passing reference to the plays title and screening date in a 1960 unidentified British newspaper interview about the debut screening of the Maigret series. [14]
MAIGRET [31.10.60] BBC
In late October 1960 Grainer finally found public acclaim, if not immediate financial benefit, with his signature tune and incidental music for the first series of a new 39 part TV dramatisation of the best selling “Maigret” detective yarn books by French author George Simeon.
In a 1966 radio interview Grainer said after hearing a series was being planned he wrote a theme based on the impression he had developed of the Maigret character from his own reading of the original books. His unsolicated work was accepted and, unusually for a TV theme, the opening and closing credits were based around his composition.
Writing the incidental music was not a simple task. It was usually recorded a week before the drama was filmed and allowance had to be made for abrupt changes of mood in the script as well as last minute and sometimes split second image editing decisions by the director. There was also the important consideration of a TV audiences emotional association with certain modes of music that they would instantly recognise as French. [15]
“[Maigret] certainly opened up a lot of opportunities ... but I had to work so fast. Once I scored 22 minutes of the show between Friday night and Sunday morning”. [16]
The Maigret theme owes its unusual sound from the featured combination of a musette [a small French accordion] and clavichord one of the earliest keyboard instruments” [17]
"These themes are known to millions of people around the world and it seems natural to suspect they had brought quick fortunes to their author but the strange truth is for Maigret he received about $50 and it was two years later that performing and record royalties began to flow. [18]
There does not appear to be any international copyright for the “Maigret” theme taken out in Ron Grainer’s name [19]
When an extended play 45 rpm disc of Maigret music was released in 1960 Warner Brothers USA proudly announced “The new Grainer recording of Maigret themes is the first ever for a British artist and the Warner Brothers label. It is also the first British TV music to be recorded by Warner Brothers” [20]
Little did Grainer realise just how time consuming his composing career was going to become over the next four years but in the meantime there was the personal satisfaction of the “Maigret” theme winning an Ivor Novello award in 1961 for Outstanding Composition for Film / TV or Radio. [21]
1960 Referendces
[01] An Honourable Murder IMDb [Internet Movie Database]
[02] Brian Clemens Wikipedia
[03]TV Times 7- 13.2.1960 p16
[04] Joan Kemp - Welsh IMDb
[05] Paul Denn IMDb
[06] A Women of No Importance / Galleon Theate Company
[07 ]TV Times March 20-26 March 1960 p16
[08 Harold Pinter IMDb
[09] TV Times # 251 3rd - 9th April 1960 p33
[10] Ron Grainer IMDb
[11] Pimpernal In Prague / Google Books description / David Campbell-Shaw IMDb
[12] Index of Declassified Books Reviews by Author / C. I. A / Campbell- Shaw, Donald
[13] Filmography - The Official Michael Caine Website
[14] "Music in the Maigret Manner" M N Spinning Discs ? UK paper 1.11.60 November 1960
[15[ BBC Radio interview" broadcast 29.3.1966
[16] "Move Over Rodgers" Australian Women’s Weekly 5 August 1964 p9]
[17] “Music in the Maigret Manner” MNS Discs unknown English newspaper 1 November 1960
[18] "Making Tunes We Can't Forget" The Australian 20.12.75 p20]
[19] U.S. Copyright Office / Search / Ron Grainer
[20] Mike Littman Warner Brothers publicity sheet 24th October 1960
[21] Bucks Music Group / Ivor Novello Awards / 1961 / The Maigret Theme
[12] Index of Declassified Books Reviews by Author / C. I. A / Campbell- Shaw, Donald
[13] Filmography - The Official Michael Caine Website
[14] "Music in the Maigret Manner" M N Spinning Discs ? UK paper 1.11.60 November 1960
[15[ BBC Radio interview" broadcast 29.3.1966
[16] "Move Over Rodgers" Australian Women’s Weekly 5 August 1964 p9]
[17] “Music in the Maigret Manner” MNS Discs unknown English newspaper 1 November 1960
[18] "Making Tunes We Can't Forget" The Australian 20.12.75 p20]
[19] U.S. Copyright Office / Search / Ron Grainer
[20] Mike Littman Warner Brothers publicity sheet 24th October 1960
[21] Bucks Music Group / Ivor Novello Awards / 1961 / The Maigret Theme
