Samuel Barber's Adagio for Strings

[David Challinor]

My favourite film, as I have said earlier, is The Elephant Man which I saw when it was released in 1980 at Birkenhead's dear old ABC...it uses the famous classical Adagio for Strings in its final scenes, a piece of music which is now familiar to many more people through CD collections/Classic FM etc...However, many people know of Barber's excellent piece from the 1986 US film Platoon, and believe it was first used in Ollie Stone's subtle (I jest) Vietnam epic, which grates with me somewhat... ' ''The Elephant Man'' got there first!' I quietly fume... But surely the adagio was used visually before???? I don't know - can anybody tell me how and when it was used before 1980. Come on, spoil my day.

[Freddy]

According to IMDb The Elephant Man was the first film that used it.



http://us.imdb.com/name/nm0053462/



When they played it at the end my friends and I(all in our 20s) simply couldn't speak.



Television could be another matter and the only time I remember was that it was used as background music when they repeatedly showed the planes flying into the Twin Towers on that September day.



all I can say about that was that in my humble opinion it was wrong to use any music or video replay in that situation.



Freddy

[David Challinor]

Thank you for that reply Freddie

[Tony Pendrey]

Well Freddy you beat me to it. "Adagio For Strings" has been a favourite piece for many years, but ever since the BBC used it as the background music to a montage of Sept 11 events at the end of that day, I have not really been able to enjoy it.

[Marky B]

I do believe it is the unofficial anthem for mourning in the USA.

Ta Ta

MArky B thumbs_u

[David Challinor]

Sad to hear it has been further stolen from my favourite film then (but I think I'm taking this a bit too seriously!)

[Freddy]

Not really David, Barber died in 1981 so i wonder if he got to see the Elephant Man and how well it was used.

For classical music and film I remember Ken Russell's TV drama/doc about Elgar many years ago. I loved it and it started my interest in music.

regards

Freddy