My drive for complete authenticity

when creating silent films scores is

motivated by my deep love, appreciation,

and commitment to the artistic and musical culture of the silent film era.

   To create my authentic silent film scores, I draw upon my library of over 20,000 vintage pieces of photoplay music composed for the purposes of perfectly accompanying any scene of any silent film.

   The experience of watching a silent film today is enhanced when the accompaniment reproduces to the greatest extent possible the style of accompaniment that the film in question would have received in its day by the best cinema musicians.

   Accordingly, a film that was released in December 1926, for instance, deserves to have a musical accompaniment that is exactly like the accompaniment that a fine cinema pianist or organist would have given it in December 1926. This means that all the music used in compiling the score will have been published prior to December 1926. I find this approach deeply satisfying because it honors the silent film and shows the deepest respect for the era in which the film was produced. This approach enables modern audiences to imagine that they have been transported back in time. Thus, not only can they enjoy the film on its own merits, but they can experience the added richness of a live musical recreation.

   I compile scores for silent films exactly the same way that cinema pianists and organists compiled scores back in the days of silent films. The first step is to screen the movie carefully to create a cue sheet. This is a breakdown of the film into individual scenes that have a unique emotional component. Thus, in one film, there might be a love scene, followed by a chase scene, then a comedy scene, followed by a scene of anguish, then of joy, and so forth. Each scene requires appropriate music that matches and conveys
the emotional contend of each scene.
 
   In the 1920s, independent companies such as the Cameo Music Service Corporation of New York hired composers and arrangers to produce ready-made thematic cue sheets for new movies. These thematic cue sheets told the pianist what to play and when to play it. The "cue" in "cue sheet" was a point in the film that signaled the musician that it was time to change the music in order to support effectively the shifting action on the screen. I am very fortunate to have a large collection of original cue sheets for silent films. In those instances where I do not have an original thematic cue sheet for a film that I have been hired to accompany, I create my own cue sheet modeled on the same pattern used for published sheets, using a mixture of photoplay music, classical music, semi-classical, and popular songs.

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Here is an example of the first page of a thematic cue sheet for the Paramount film The Popular Sin, which was released on 22 November 1926.