Wednesday, November 03, 2021

The Tooth of Crime (An Occasional Series): Special "Some Days I Really Miss Barbara Hale" Edition

I have been known to say that Fred Steiner's theme for Perry Mason is the best two minute orchestral piece written in the 20th Century. In fact I just said it again.

Here's Steiner explaining how the whole thing came about.

And here it is in all its stereophononic glory as played by The Royal Philharmonic.

I was going to find a rock band cover but I figured -- The Blues Brothers? Not in this here blog, no sirree.

6 comments:

Unknown said...

"here it is"

?where it is?

steve simels said...

I regret the error, which has been corrected.

pete said...

nor mine, either. The first BB sketch was a dance routine, a good one but not about the music. The rest, a blow-fueled in-joke.

pete said...

and the best use of piano triplets in the history of music

Anonymous said...

What a great track. One of the all-time TV theme songs. Nice to hear some of the story behind it.

On orders by the show's producers was Fred Steiner in Mexico City to get around the musicians union regulations?

Just wondering.

Pro labor Captain Al

Alzo said...

Yes, it IS a superb theme song and it's hard to think of anything of recent vintage that can begin to compare. As for the Blues Brothers... I am a Chicagoan and, to this day, people here still do the BB thing as if it's cool. Pete got it right: The inconvenient truth is that movie is mostly hot garbage. The SNL 3-minute rule holds.