Haunted Halloween Harmony: Conjuring the GHOSTBUSTERS soundtrack by Elmer Bernstein

October 24, 1:37 AMSoundtracks ExaminerMark Morton

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Elmer Bernstein is one of the most respected names in Hollywood film music making. For decades, he was the “go-to guy” for high-profile comedies – so much so that he was dubbed “the king of comedy.” Some of his most notable credits include Animal House, Meatballs, Stripes, Airplane!, and a little 1984 flick called Ghostbusters.

Now, before we continue, it must be said that Bernstein’s breadth as a composer reached much, much further than comedy. In fact, if you listen to many of his comedy scores outside of the film, they take on a much more grandiose tone. Spies Like Us, for a perfect example, is incredibly reminiscent of a large-scale, ‘old-Hollywood’ epic – similar to his sadly underappreciated score to the 1956 Biblical epic The Ten Commandments. On top of that, few composers could match his grit and charm for westerns, save Dmitri Tiomkin and Ennio Morricone.

But back to 1984 (again). Following his work on the relatively obscure science fiction film Spacehunter: Adventures in the Forbidden Zone (AKA Molly Ringwald’s second film), Bernstein was pulled back into the world of Ivan Reitman to score Ghostbusters, and similarly to his comedy films, the music did not echo the silliness of the cast members. In the liner notes of Varese Sarabande’s 2006 edition of the Ghostbusters score, he stated, “I think one of the reasons that the scores work is that I do not denigrate the film. I don’t try to do anything hokey, I don’t try to make the music funny. My theory is that if the comedy is working in the film, let the film do the comedy, and let the music get behind the emotion or the action, so as to add another element. If I just made the music funny, then it’s funny on funny – so what do you need the music for?”

“Part of it is comedy, and yet you have to take the ghost business quite seriously. You have to believe, along with these guys, that the ghosts really do exist. Therefore the score also had to walk a very fine line. It was probably one of the most difficult jobs I ever had to do.”

Sure enough, what he created was a bold construction of classical devices mixed with jazz, likening to a cross between bebop and Third Stream. Largely comprising piano, whispy strings, synthesizers, and extraordinarily eerie use of an ondes Martenot (a relatively obscure, early French electronic instrument developed in the 1920s, creating a sound similar to a singing saw or theremin), Bernstein soared way above and beyond the call of duty and offered up a compositional feast of equal parts chilling foreboding, romance, and adventure.

However, the score was somewhat undermined, at least to popular consciousness, by an official soundtrack featuring “it” artists of the era (The Bus Boys, Laura Branigan, Air Supply, and Thompson Twins among them), not to mention the chart-topping hit single by Ray Parker, Jr. Luckily, Parker’s cut served as the ultimate advertisement for the film, helping propel Ghostbusters to blockbuster status very quickly.

That said, Bernstein wasn’t exactly thrilled. He said, “I have nothing against rock-and-roll, per se. I think if it’s appropriate, then fine. What bothers me is that it’s a shame that in a film like Ghostbusters one feels compelled to put in a rock-and-roll tune for public acceptance. There isn’t any real reason why Ghostbusters had to have rock-and-roll music – after all it’s not Footloose! I’d rather handle the whole thing myself and, ultimately, I don’t think it’s as good for the film as having a completely composed score.”

And aside from the inclusion of two small cues from the score, the official soundtrack did not exemplify Bernstein’s far-reaching vision. Many fans were exceptionally thankful when Varese Sarabande finally released the score in 2006, though it came two years following Bernstein’s unfortunate passing. The score featured a whopping 39 cuts, including four cues omitted from the film and another four special recordings by Bernstein for the original soundtrack (though only two were ever used).

Bernstein’s vision for comedy film music composition has gone uncontested to this day, which makes these kinds of special releases that much more cherished. Hopefully, Varese will continue the trend of compiling these exquisite releases and keeping Bernstein’s transcendent music alive for generations to come.