The Velvet Touch Of Nino Rota, Italian Composer Of Film Scores

I have often contemplated who is really the greatest film composer of all time? Is it Ennio Morricone, who teamed up with Sergio Leone, for the classic Spaghetti Westerns? Maybe…Or is it the dark tones of Bernard Hermann who coupled with Alfred Hitchcock? I favor the velvet touch of Nino Rota (1911-1979), an Italian composer, who forged a perfect partnership with Federico Fellini. I watched “Juliet of the Spirits” last night, and was enchanted with the ingenious synching of tracks with the themes of otherworldly spirits, séances, and dreams, that weave in and out of the camera.

Nino Rota`s strength is in the arrangements, that in their complexity, rotate thematic melodies into the storyline of the film, yet they have been given new rhythms and different instruments are employed also. The closest I can come to pigeon-holing, though inadequate to capture Rota`s whole aura, would be ‘circus music’. With lots of bright organ, and muddy lounge guitar, the music builds when Fellini`s eccentric characters promenade across the screen. When the mood gets sad or sentimental, Nino Rota`s provides the perfect texture of ‘heartstring rapture’. Just listen to the theme of “La Dolce Vita,” you can see Anita Ekberg splashing in the Fontana di Trevi, can`t you?

And did you know that Nino Rota wrote the score for The “Godfather?” “The Love Theme of the Godfather” is one of the catchiest film songs of all time! I was an usher at a movie theater when I was a youngster, and I still hum to myself the theme to Franco Zeffirelli`s “Romeo And Juliet”-Mister Rota wrote that too. The ladies would be weeping copiously as they exited the theater. I would say, “Madam, a hanky?” The music trickles from the auditorium…”A Rose will bloom, it then will fade…” I recommend the CD “Amarcord-Nino Rota” as a good sampling of his work. La Doce Vita & TGIF Aound The Water Cooler!