Per Un Pugno Di Dollari / C'era Una Volta Il West

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PER UN PUGNO DI DOLLARI (For a Fistful of Dollars) 1964
Italy had already 25 Spaghetti Westerns ready when director Sergio Leone made his first one in 1964 called For a fistful of dollars. Leone considered Henry Fonda but asked James Coburn to play the role of “The man with no name”. But Coburn was too expensive. Charles Bronson said no and that it was the worst script he had ever seen. Richard Harrison also turned it down. Leone then offered the part to “Rawhide” (1959) star Eric Fleming who declined and suggested his co-star Clint Eastwood. We all know how that ended. The film For a fistful of dollars was a remake in a different setting of the Japanese samurai film Yojimbo (1961). Akira Kurosawa, director and co-screenwriter of Yojimbo sued the filmmakers for breach of copyright. Ennio Morricone and Sergio Leone knew each other since 3rd grade school days. Morricone gave Leone is availability to write the music for his new film even if the director was not keen on using a yet unknown composer for his film. But Michele Lacerenza’s initial trumpet performance on the score made him change his mind. As it is known both the movie and the score had huge success and the Morricone’s famous western style started here and then it has been copied all over the world ever since. The relationship between these two artists continued for all the Leone movies that were not only westerns until the director’s death happened in Rome the age of 60. Ennio Morricone with this movie had his big launch pad and actually he is still active, after having written about 500 scores for cinema and TV.
C’ERA UNA VOLTA IL WEST (Once Upon a Time in the West) 1969
Ennio Morricone had composed the music score of Once Upon a Time in the West using the original script for the film, so the most part of the music was recorded before the film was shot. Then during the production of the film, the script was changed several times. However Sergio Leone directed the film scenes around the recorded music played on the set with a tape recorder. Edda dell’Orso with this score became famous around the world. Her extraordinary soprano voice with a three octave range has been as instruments in many scores. Franco de Gemini plays the harmonica in his unique way so that was asked his collaboration by Morricone and many other composers for many movies and not only westerns. Typical for Ennio Morricone was the use of atonal music like in track 19: L’attentato that worked very effective in the film. The use of exceptional instruments in the orchestra became the trademark of the composer. This time he used the harmonica, banjo and electric guitar. A soundtrack LP was released by RCA when the film came out. The eventful music for the film made that the soundtrack sold more than 10 million copies worldwide. In Holland, where Ennio Morricone received his first platinum album, the LP was nr. 1 in the LP top 50 for years and sold over 800.000 copies. The soundtrack LP had 13 tracks and the running time was 37:40. In those days it was usual to re-arrange and rerecorded soundtracks for LP releases. This CD has the original film version of the score remastered and almost complete. It is a masterpiece and a classic.