The music of James Bond

Monty Norman: Dr. No soundtrack CD cover The "Bond Music Style" is so familiar to people, that it sometimes seems as though it was always there. But in fact it took a lot of effort to establish all the recognisable facets of this style. Monty Norman had scored most of the first movie "Dr. No" but neither he nor the film-makers were completely satisfied that they had captured the essence of Bond. John Barry was brought in and orchestrated one of Norman's songs on electric guitar, and the unmistakeable Bond Theme had arrived. Barry was asked to score the next film "From Russia with Love" which had a theme tune and incidental music incorporating elements of the Bond theme and its style. The theme song for the next film Goldfinger was written to be larger than life and Shirley Bassey was asked to sing it in her powerful voice.

David Arnold: Casion Royale soundtrack CD cover By now all the elements of the Bond Style were fully established and that format continued throughout the series, with John Barry staying on as composer for many years. A few other composers did one-off stints with Bond films, and there were several attempts to update the format and introduce pop songs and artists. It wasn't until the late 90s that David Arnold successfully updated the mix by introducing techno beats into the high-octane chase sequences, and Arnold has remained as the resident Bond composer every since. The recent Daniel Craig movies have reinvented the series and the music has also gone "Back to Basics". "Casino Royale" and "Quantum of Solace" are both now on video, and you can be certain that the next Bond film is in preparation.

As an example of how Bond and his music has entered the popular consciousness, there are the adverts for "Milk Tray" (with music by Cliff Adams) and the similar styled "Black Magic" (with music by Christopher Gunning).

The Bond Composers

Here are the score composers for all the Bond films to date, including the original "Casino Royale" and "Never Say Never Again" though these films were made by different groups outside of the main franchise.

The Bond Songs

Bill Conti: For Your Eyes Only soundtrack CD cover The Bond Song is a key part of the overall package, and more often than not the Song has the same Title as the film, or includes the film's title within its lyrics. We have listed the title or main songs of all the Bond films below, with composers, lyricists and performers, but several films have other secondary songs used to accompany the End Titles or as source music in the middle of the film. Notable additional songs include "Underneath the Mango Tree" from "Dr. No", "Mr. Kiss Kiss Bang Bang" from "Thunderball", and "Do You Know How Christmas Trees are Grown" from "On Her Majesty's Secret Service". Many Bond Songs have done very well in the music charts, but others have failed to hit the mark.

Further information and recommendations

Here are various links associated with James Bond music on the mfiles web-site, including score composer biographies and soundtracks reviews.

Here are a selection of external links to sites associated with the music of the James Bond films.




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