Listen to some of the musical scores for Bill Morrison's silent films on this New Sounds program.  There’s a mix of brass ensemble & electronics in Icelandic composer Jóhann Jóhannsson’s score to “The Miners’ Hymns,” a documentary that depicts an ill-fated mining community in England. One "can almost hear the cavernous mineshafts and their ominous heritage in the brutal electronic treatments, and hear the creaking, crumbling landscapes beneath the haunting brass." (Boomkat)

Bill Frisell’s small combo of guitar, bass, trumpet and drums scores Morrison's “The Great Flood,” a visualization of the most destructive river flood in American history, in 1927, when the Mississippi River broke out of its banks in 145 places and inundated 27,000 square miles to a depth of up to 30 feet.  There’s also an electro-acoustic score by trumpeter Dave Douglas and Keystone for Morrison’s "Spark of Being," a retelling of the Frankenstein myth, along with music from violinist Todd Reynolds & Bang on a Can Co-Founder Julia Wolfe.  Plus, music from fellow Bang on Can Co-Founder Michael Gordon, who has scored Bill Morrison films, “Light is Calling” and Morrison’s most well-known film, the arresting “Decasia.”

PROGRAM # 3295, Scoring Bill Morrison (First aired on 1/26/2012)