Sundays | 6 – 7 pm
What is Film Classics?
By Jack Goggin
Briefly, it’s a weekly hour-long radio program devoted to music written for motion pictures. I began doing it back in the late 70’s at the old WQRS when we had scheduled a syndicated movie music show hosted by the composer David Raksin (“Laura” among other scores) which management decided not to run when it turned out the program was not free. Jerry Dellinger, our Music Director at the time, remembered that I was a fan of cinematic music, and asked me if I had enough material in my collection to do a month’s worth of programs so our Program Guide would be more or less accurate. I said “I think so,” and wound up doing the show for about 18 years until 1997.
Later, when WRCJ came into being, Dave Wagner asked me to come on board and mentioned that if things worked out, we might be able to bring the show back here on 90.9 FM- and sure enough, that’s what happened in April of 2007. It is truly a dream come true to be able to do the program again- to be honest, I doubted that I would ever get another opportunity.
The music we play on the show consists mostly of orchestral scores from the early 30’s (the beginning of talking pictures and of background scoring) up to the present (as recently as last week’s new releases), and as I like to point out to people, Film Classics is the only program on WRCJ exclusively devoted to music from the 20th and 21st centuries literally, there’s new material coming out all the time, as well as new recordings of classic scores by the old masters of the genre like Steiner, Korngold, and Herrmann.
Sometimes the show will be devoted to a single score, like “The Ghost and Mrs. Muir”, or sometimes it will follow a theme, like “Submarine Movies.” Generally speaking, we don’t do pop soundtrack compilations or very many musicals.
The theme music for the show, heard at the beginning and end of each program, is the main title sequence from “Since You Went Away” by Max Steiner, which won Steiner his third Academy Award for Best Original Score in 1944.
Thanks for Listening!
I’ve just listened to the program on 11/28 on less well-known Miklos Rosza. I had no idea I would enjoy it so much and didn’t get my pen out early enough to note all the movies down. Is there some way I can get a list of the movies that were played? (It would be lovely if the titles could be listed in your playlists each week.)
Love the show. Many thanks!
Lyriel Claire
Hi Lyriel, the movies Jack featured are:
“Because of Him”
“Knight Without Armour”
“That Hamilton Woman”
“The Jungle Book”
“Moonfleet”
“The World, the Flesh and the Devil”
“Time After Time”
“Dead Men Don’t Wear Plaid”
“Tribute to a Bad Man”
I’ve been a loyal listener to Film Classics since the ancient WQRS days. I hope Mr. Goggin can dig out the Columbia L.P. soundtrack to Alec Wilder’s score to “The Sand Castle”. It was in the WQRS library and one track, ” Ragtime ” was used as the theme music for one of the station’s sillier programs. The entire L.P. lasts under a half hour and I think thr music would be a engaging surprise for listeners unfamiliar with it.
Thank you Gerald, you are a loyal listener! We’ll pass this along to Jack, maybe he has “The Sand Castle” in his collection…
Jack I found you again! I used to listen to your religiously on WQRS Detroit Classical Radio in the 1980’s Still have tapes of a lot of your shows, So much has changed since I left the state in the early 90’s. I’m so glad to see you are around.
Yay, welcome back! We borrowed some of the other WQRS folks too.
Great program last week I watched Scrooge (1951) the night before the music is excellent from that movie hope one day you do twilight zone jerry goldsmith and Bernard Herman did music for that show
Thanks Jim! If Jack owns that album then it’s a possibility. We’ll ask him.
Looking forward to Sunday’s Force Spectacular. Jack is always so on target as today’s “Lusty Month of May” start.
Oh you caught that one, yes he tries to find fun little things like that to program. If you enjoy the Star Wars show, there will also be a few selections on Monday too.
Just thought I would drop a note My wife and I have been a fan of yours since WQRS days. I am a movie fan and enjoy “seeing” the movie again through your program Keep on doing what you’re doing We will be listening
Thanks listeners! We will send this along to Jack. He appreciates your loyalty!