Phillip Johnston - The Adventures of Prince Achmed (October 26, 2018)

This CD contains music that was composed as a soundtrack which is performed live with the The Adventures of Prince Achmed (1926) by Lotte Reiniger, a silent silhouette animation, considered by many to be the first feature length animated film, and based upon One Thousand and One Nights, a collection of Middle Eastern folk tales often known in English as The Arabian Nights. The music, which when performed with the film comprises a continuous score of 65 minutes, is here broken into individual tracks. It is performed live by a quartet of soprano sax, trombone, and two keyboards, against a pre-recorded track of samples, loops and live drums. 

Phillip Johnston has been composing and performing original scores for silent films for 25 years. His previous silent film scores include The Unknown (Browning, 1927), The Merry Frolics of Méliès (Méliès, 1902-1909), Page of Madness (Kinugasa, 1926), Faust (Murnau, 1926), the first three of which have been previously released on CD. [Wordless!, his collaboration with graphic artist Art Spiegelman, is also a variant on this kind of work.] The film and music have been performed across Australia, including the Sydney VIVID Festival, MONA FOMA and the Woodford Folk Festival. As of this writing it has yet to be performed overseas.

Phillip Johnston: soprano saxophone

James Greening: trombone

Alister Spence: organ, keyboards

Casey Golden: organ, keyboards

Nic Cecire: drums

1. Prelude

2. The African Magician

3. Prince Achmed

4.Pari Banu Kidnapped

5. Adventures in China

6. The Witch & The Wedding

7. Take Me to Wak-Wak!

8. The Magic Lamp

9. Aladdin's Tale

10. The Witch vs The Magician

11. The Battle of The Spirits

12. Return to the Land of the Mortals

All tracks by Phillip Johnston © Jedible Music (BMI)

Recorded in Aug/Sep 2013 at Q Studios, Sydney

Record and pre-mix engineer: Richard Hundy

Final mix and mastering by Paul Bromley/Tanuki Studios

Cover design: Keith Lobue