Land of the Pharaohs one sheet, US
Thanks to the Art Directors Guild and the London Symphony Orchestra, respectively, cinephiles and music lovers will be granted a rare opportunity to see Land of the Pharaohs in CinemaScope in Hollywood and to hear some of the grand symphonic music from the film performed live in concert in London, all within the same week. The Art Directors Guild Film Society and American Cinematheque will screen Land of the Pharaohs (1955) on Sunday, October 23, at 5:30 p.m. at the Egyptian Theatre in Hollywood, California. Following the screening, production designers John Muto and Tom Walsh will moderate a panel discussion featuring art director Jim Hewitt. Hewitt’s book, Egypt Visual Sourcebook: For Artists, Architects, and Designers, is a unique reference to the country’s architectural heritage published earlier this year by the American University in Cairo Press. Tickets for the screening can be purchased on www.Fandango.com. 24-hour information is available at 323-466-FILM (3456). For more information about American Cinematheque and the Egyptian Theatre go to www.americancinematheque.com.
Tiomkin at work at the time of Land of the Pharaohs, circa 1955.
The London Symphony Orchestra will perform two selections from the film as part of the concert program, Symphonic Hollywood: The Music of Dimitri Tiomkin, on Thursday, October 27, at 7:30 p.m at the Barbican Hall in London. The main title song “Land of the Pharaohs,” with lyrics by Ned Washington will be followed by the dramatic underscore for the film’s opening sequence, “Pharaoh’s Procession.” In the liner notes for the soundtrack released by Film Score Monthly in 2008 (see January 2008 News), album producer Lukas Kendall quotes musicologist Sigmund Spaeth, “In the impressive opening scene showing Pharaoh’s armies marching home from their conquests, the chief theme of the score is heard immediately, in blaring brass and percussive rhythm, represented in the picture by the long trumpets characteristic of authentic Egyptian music and portable drums shaped like the modern timpani, which actually supply the sturdy beat of the march time.”
Cover for CD booklet.
“Production, Music Stars of Gigantic Howard Hawks Film” proclaimed the subhead of the film’s review in the Hollywood Reporter by Milton Luban, an actor and screenwriter. In the opening paragraph, Luban raves about the wall-to-wall underscore, declaring that it certainly must be counted among the stars of the picture: “In fact, it is doubtful if this Warner Bros. CinemaScope epic would be nearly as exciting without the tremendous symphonic background created by Tiomkin.”
Sheet music for the song, “Land of the Pharaohs” can be found in the Dimitri Tiomkin Anthology.