Sound of Cinema

Matthew Sweet looks at music associated with Alexander Korda's famous Denham Film Studios which between the 1930s and 50s were a major part of British cultural life bringing us films such as Things To Come, A Matter Of Life and Death, Henry V, Great Expectations and Brief Encounter as well as the famous "Denham Concerto". The Classic Score of the Week is Charles Williams's "The Dream of Olwen" fro...

Matthew Sweet looks at representations of Queen Victoria in film with a programme of film music inspired by the release of "Victoria and Abdul" featuring a new score by Thomas Newman. The programme marks the reverent and the irreverent on film, about a monarch whose reign saw the advent of cinema and whose Diamond Jubilee in 1897 was one of the first events to receive the multi-camera treatment. F...

Matthew Sweet meets the Golden Globe, Emmy and Ivor Novello award nominated composer Benjamin Wallfisch. With his music for A Cure for Wellness, Annabelle: Creation and Dunkirk already in cinemas this year we'll get a sneak peak at his latest soundtrack for It, as the terrifying clown, Pennywise, floats onto the big screen once again.

Matthew Sweet with a film music inspired by London's historic East End, prompted by the release of "The Limehouse Golem" which features a new score by Johan Soderqvist. The film, by Juan Carlos Medina, stars Bill Nighy as a Victorian detective, troubled by a case of bizarre and perplexing murder. The plot is inspired by the novel of the same name by Peter Ackroyd. Matthew focuses on the more colou...

Matthew Sweet marks the release of Kathryn Bigelow's "Detroit" with music from films featuring urban chaos and trouble on the streets - from historic riots in cities across the US to dystopian visions of the future in Mega-City One, Gotham City and Springfield. Including scores by Howard Shore, John Tavener and Hans Zimmer. The Classic Score of the Week is Bernard Herrmann's music for Francois Tru...

Matthew Sweet with underwater film music marking the release of The Odyssey, based on the career of the pioneering French underwater explorer Jacques Cousteau: from deep sea diving adventures scored by Eric Serra, John Barry and Alan Silvestri, to claustrophobic U-boat classics with music by Klaus Doldinger and Leigh Harline. ProducerRUTH THOMSON PresenterMatthew Sweet.

Matthew Sweet presents a selection of film music inspired by the space opera genre following the release of Luc Besson's "Valerian and the City of a Thousand Planets" with a new score by Alexandre Desplat. The programme looks at some of the earliest examples of space operas, including "Flash Gordon" and "Buck Rogers", defining the genre, and features music from the likes of "Battlestar Galactica",...

Matthew Sweet with a Sound of Cinema for Gay Britannia exploring homosexual presence and portrayal in British and American movies prior to the UK Sexual Offences Act of 1967 and its partially decriminalisation. Among the films and scores that Matthew features are The Maltese Falcon, Rebel Without A Cause, Rope, Spartacus and Ben-Hur.

Matthew Sweet with music for films about contact with new worlds, new people and extra-terrestrials, in the week of "Arrival", a new Sci Fi film with a score by Jóhann Jóhannsson. The programme features music from "The New World"; "1492 - Conquest of Paradise"; "The Mission"; "The Abyss"; "First Men In The Moon"; "The Terrornauts"; "The War of the Worlds"; "Close Encounters of the Third Kind"; "ET...

Matthew Sweet looks forward to the forthcoming release of Christopher Nolan's Dunkirk with a look at how film and film music portray historic battles. The programme features music from "Sink The Bismarck", "The Battle of Britain", "The Battle of the Bulge", "The Sands of Iwo Jima", "The Battle of Algiers", "Passchendaele", "Waterloo" and "Zulu". Plus a chance to hear part of Hans Zimmer's new scor...

Forty years ago this week cinema audiences were introduced to the Galactic Empire, Death Star and Tatooine as the very first Star Wars film - A New Hope - opened in the US. With its Academy Award winning score by John Williams it heralded a new era in music for the movies. Today Matthew Sweet celebrates its 40th birthday and explores what other scores were making waves in 1977; the year that saw J...

Matthew Sweet presents a selection of film music and takes a look at some of diverse range of films inspired by the Arthurian legends in the week of the release of Guy Ritchie's new film "King Arthur: Legend of the Sword" with a score by Daniel Pemberton. The programme includes music by Trevor Jones, Miklos Rozsa, Franz Waxman, Hans Zimmer, Jimmy Van Heusen, Lerner and Loewe, Anne Dudley and ... M...

Matthew Sweet with a selection of film music inspired by the political world of Washington DC, in the week of the release of 'Miss Sloane' with a score by Max Richter. The programme looks at some of the many films covering the Nixon era, but also looks back at the ways that Washington has been covered in American cinema from the time of Frank Capra's "Mr Smith Goes to Washington" through to films...

Matthew Sweet with a selection of music reflecting the film career of pioneering Hollywood genius Erich Wolfgang Korngold, featuring examples from the scores for A Midsummer Night's Dream, Captain Blood, Juarez, The Adventures of Robin Hood, The Private Lives of Elizabeth and Essex, The Sea Hawk, The Constant Nymph, Kings Row, Escape Me Never, and Magic Fire. (first broadcast in 2017)

Matthew Sweet with a selection of music inspired by films that take inspiration from the works of Shakespeare in the week of the release of William Oldroyd's film "Lady Macbeth". While the cinema has brought many famous adaptations of Shakespeare's plays to the screen, the story of The Bard's influence on film is far greater. Matthew Sweet presents a selection of soundtracks for films that have ta...

Matthew Sweet with a selection of film music reflecting wartime propaganda in the cinema and the wartime spirit, inspired by Lone Scherfig's new film "Their Finest" with a score by Rachel Portman, released in cinemas this week.

For the Easter weekend Matthew Sweet goes on a cinematic egg hunt encountering music by Jerry Goldsmith, Lalo Schifrin and Bernard Herrmann along the way. There are some bunnies too, courtesy of Donnie Darko, Watership Down and Fatal Attraction... The 1948 Oscar-winning score to Easter Parade is the classic score of the week.

Matthew Sweet presents a programme of film music marking Radio 3's Uproot festival, held in Hull - the 2017 UK City of Culture. The programme is inspired by films associated with one of the driving forces of British cinema, Hull-born Joseph Arthur Rank. His Rank Organisation films were famously prefaced with a sequence featuring a man striking a giant gong, and they brought us some of our best lov...

Matthew Sweet marks the BFI's retrospective of the films of the pioneering German director and screenwriter Rainer Werner Fassbinder with a look at his collaboration with composer Peer Raben. Plus music from some of Fassbinder's favourite films including Gentlemen Prefer Blondes, The Night of the Hunter, and Johnny Guitar.

Matthew Sweet explores the subject of the eye in cinema through an anthology of film music culminating in the music for Nicolas Pesce's new horror film "The Eyes of My Mother". "The eye is a magical, paradoxical organ. Soft, vulnerable, worryingly penetrable - and yet an instrument of mastery and control." Matthew explores the many ways in which the eye takes a central role in film and features mu...

In a live edition from the Free Thinking Festival at Sage Gateshead, Matthew Sweet is joined by Guy Austin, Founding Director of the Research Centre in Film and Digital Media at Newcastle University, for a jaunt through the history of music for French cinema. France was one of the first nations to recognise the possibilities of cinema and through the pioneering work of figures such as Auguste and...

Matthew Sweet meets composer, conductor and arranger Anne Dudley for a focus on her music for film in the week of the launch of Paul Verhoeven's acclaimed new film "Elle". One time member of the 80s synth band Art of Noise, Anne has an extensive catalogue of film scores from across 30 years in the industry and is one of the few women to win an Oscar for her music. The programme includes music from...

Matthew Sweet with film music inspired by the Raj in the week of the release of "The Viceroy's House" with a score by AR Rahman.

Matthew Sweet considers film music written to accompany films concerned with family matters, following the release of "It's Only the End of the World", with music by Gabriel Yared. The programme features music from "The Royal Tenenbaums", "The Incredibles", "The Addams Family", "The Godfather", "The Sound of Music", "Little Women", "Mary Poppins", "Star Wars", "A River Runs Through It", "The Famil...

Matthew Sweet with film music inspired by the moon in the week of the release of "Hidden Figures", with music by Hans Zimmer, Pharrell Williams and Benjamin Wallfisch. The Moon features in a variety of ways in the history of film, from werewolves and romance to the stuff of hard science. It today's programme we hear music from "Road To Morocco"; "An American Werewolf in London"; "The Wolf Man"; "B...