Star Trek Start‑class Mid‑importance

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I have removed the lyrics as copyvio per WP:LYRICS. 23skidoo 16:05, 31 October 2006 (UTC)[reply]

I'd just like to note that your edit comment "Wikipedia policy prohibits the use of copyrighted song lyrics" is not entirely true, and fair use of the lyrics depends on the circumstances, with some guidance on the very page you quote. However, in this case, the lyrics may indeed not be notable enough to warrant an inclusion, although I doubt we'd have legal problems if including them, as I doubt Snopes has by using them on their page, especially as we have an article here written about the theme and aren't simply reposting the lyrics. Note that there's no general rule against copyrighted lyrics on Wikipedia, just advise to judge the situation before removing something in order to avoid copyright paranoia. -- Northgrove 00:26, 18 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]

There is a distinction to be made between citing an example from lyrics (like citing a passage from a book) vs. restating the entire lyrics. Just because another website might post the entire lyrics doesn't mean they are legally safe, just that nobody has sued them yet. But I don't see any harm in citing the first line or two from the lyrics, to give the reader of "flavor" of them. Wahkeenah 13:01, 7 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]

From the article: "It is also one of the best known pieces played on the theremin."

Does this mean it was played on the theremin in the actual series or by people covering the melody later? In my episodes it's quite clear that a woman sings the melody line and in the instrumental version, it sounds like the melody line is played by a string instrument. Davhorn 20:51, 30 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I wondered about that too. I would slap a "cn" tag on it if I were you. The first year version was a straight orchestral instrumental. The second-third year version was obviously a female voice singing "ooh, ooooh, oo-oo-oo-oo-ooooh." And let's not forget the bongo drums that were in there someplace. I kid you not. Wahkeenah 20:55, 30 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I did that, let's see if someone finds a reference. Davhorn 00:03, 31 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I'm sure Trekkers watch these pages frequently, so if there's no citation within a week or so, I would delete it. Wahkeenah 00:22, 31 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I see you zapped it. It occurs to me that someone heard that female vocalist going "ooh-oooooh, ooh-ooh-ooh-ooh-ooh" and thought it was a theremin, even though the article clearly states it was a vocalist. That's technically known as "original research", if not pure speculation. As I've found from bitter experience, there can be a fine line between O.R. and "guessing". Wahkeenah 13:04, 7 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Yeah, that's my guess as well. The old VHS tapes had worse sound quality compared to today's DVDs so that might have made it sound more nonhuman too. Davhorn 18:19, 7 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I recall the first time I heard it, on the first run of the first episode of season 2, and how I didn't like it very well compared with the straight instrumental of season 1. However, there was no doubt in my mind even then that it was a human voice. Wahkeenah 18:31, 7 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]

(it's just a jump to the left...) If anyone wants to take the time to pursue this, Courage talks about this in the documentary. I don't have time to rewatch it right now, but I believe he said something about how he did a mix of instrumentals and vocals with the intent of creating something that sounded like neither, so that people would ask "what the heck is that?" But ( according to Courage) Roddenberry had them remix the female vocal way up, basically because he was a horn-dog. (Hey, I'm just reporting what he said -- you don't think Courage was bitter over the whole lyrics thing, by any chance?)

I don't believe there was any discussion of whether this remix happened in between seasons, or if there was any mention of a Theremin anywhere in there. I also don't have any of the episodes on tape, so I cannot personally verify the "first season instrumental, 2nd and 3rd vocal" statements made here; I'm trusting others are obsessive enough to be reporting this faithfully.--NapoliRoma 21:08, 6 August 2007 (UTC)[reply]

OK, here's what Courage said:

I wrote it for a marvelous lady named Loulie Jean Norman, plus a flute, Jack Cookerly's organ, and maybe a vibraphone. And the whole idea was to mix it in so that it would be a "what is that that I'm hearing?" sound, you know. It came off fine—till Gene got his hands on it. He wanted to hear the girl more, because he was such a sex maniac, and so he had her sort of pushed up a little bit in the mix, and it sounded like a soprano solo after that.

So no theremin, and now you know what happened between seasons one and two.--NapoliRoma 18:45, 7 August 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I'm a bit mystified by this matter. There were definitely two versions of the theme used in season one episodes. There's the well-known orchestral version which appeared on most of the episodes (indeed, on *all* of the episodes in prints struck in the '70s, and possibly beyond). But - in the UK, and so I assume in the US too - some early episodes ('Where No Man Has Gone Before', 'The Naked Time', 'Charlie X', and possibly others) were originally transmitted with a different arrangement/mix. I used to have off-air audio recordings of those episodes taped from the BBC transmissions; if there are any surviving off-air tapes out there then it would be possible to confirm the use of this arrangement/mix. In this version the melody line (on both main and end titles) *appeared* to be played on a theremin or ondioline, or similar-type instrument. It *could* be, however, that this was actually, as others have described, a very dense mix of instrumentation and soprano (but it didn't sound like it). Also, as originally transmitted in the UK, 'Where No Man...' included the opening Shatner narration, but with this alternative theme arrangement. The first obvious use of a soprano in the Star Trek theme, as transmitted, comes with Season Two. 86.149.11.233 (talk) 11:03, 15 May 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Short of having a film of the actual recording sessions, I don't know if you can have any more canonical source than a documentary with the guy who wrote, scored and recorded the theme describing its instrumentation, which is what we have as a reference for this section of the article.

The above paragraph from August 7, 2007 is an exact transcription of what he said; you can watch it yourself if there's any doubt. (It's a great documentary; I actually do highly recommend watching it if you have the time.)

If you poke around a little on teh Google about Jack Cookerly, there are hints that "Jack Cookerly's organ" (which would be a great name for a band) may have been something a little more exotic than a Hammond B3 -- maybe something like an ondioline (which I hadn't heard of until you mentioned it -- interesting)? But it's very clear that Courage's goal was precisely to make this a very ambiguous, hard-to-figure out sound.

(There was a cue they used several times in TOS episodes when something kind of eerie was happening, or Kirk was being seduced by some scantily-dressed alien, which sounded almost but not quite like a theremin -- maybe that was Jack Cookerly and his organ, too? :-) --NapoliRoma (talk) 13:10, 15 May 2009 (UTC)[reply]

I just did some rewriting in the article, some of which is based on an excellent viedoe documentary on Courage, which I recommend highly to anyone interested in such things -- see the links to Youtube clips in the article. This documentary is not in IMDB, which is surprising, given its quality.

However, I left one contradictory bit in, as I don't have the time at the moment to see what the correct answer is. Did Courage agree initially to the lyrics, or were they written without his knowledge? Or is it that he agreed to the lyrics being written and somehow missed the real intent, which was to snag half the royalties?--NapoliRoma 20:10, 20 May 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Roddenberry wrote the lyrics without his knowledge, as far as I know, so he could get half of the royalties. Courage said what he did was unethical, but didn't pursue it further. Davhorn 21:14, 20 May 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Someone is trying to delete the ctaegory Category:Star Trek soundtracks. Please go to the talk page, and try to keep this category in existence. Thanks. --Steve, Sm8900 14:04, 13 August 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I'm desperate to find out which is the Alexander Courage theme and which is Jerry Goldsmith's theme. From what I've heard, Courage's theme is always played when the title appears in the movies, but I'm not sure if Jerry Golsmith theme is the marh-like, sweeping theme. Its impossible to describe it in Wikipedia without an audio sample. Somebody, please upload it, so I can finally know the difference! —Preceding unsigned comment added by Surten (talk • contribs) 03:44, 20 July 2008 (UTC)[reply]

If you watch the video tribute cited in this article, you can hear what Courage wrote; the most famous Courage-written element that has been used outside of the original series theme is the four overlapping held notes (A, E, G, B) followed by a French horn fanfare. The "march-like" theme is Goldsmith's, written for the first movie and later used as the theme for ST:TNG.--NapoliRoma (talk) 07:03, 20 July 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks, that helps out a lot. Sorry for the spelling. --Surten (talk) 03:28, 15 August 2008 (UTC)Surten[reply]

I just did an edit to try to remove some redundancies and contradictions. I'm basing this mostly on the Courage tribute video, and my main goal was to eliminate the "first it was electronic, then vocals were added" bits that contradicts his description. What Courage himself says is that the vocals were always there, and that there were no electronics (other than organ; definitely no theremin).

What I don't know is the nuances of what else may have changed after the "Roddenberry amps up the vocal" change made apparently starting with the eleventh episode in season 1. Based on what many people have added into the article, it sure seems like there might have been another change beginning at season 2, but I don't have any recordings of any of the episodes -- and more importantly, there are no reliable sources apparent on this. There is one article about the CBS remastering where the author states that in the original recordings the organ is punched up starting in season three, but this same article also talks about how the vocal was added in season 2, which contradicts Courage, whom I would consider to be the canonical source, at least about the very first recordings.

There may also be more to add about the CBS remastering. The article above says they recorded three versions. I think I was reluctant to add that to the article, since what the article reports as the remastering team's choices seems to contradict the timeline of the changes in the original episode theme versions. I don't know whether that's an error in reporting, or an error in what the team actually chose to do.--NapoliRoma (talk) 08:11, 20 July 2008 (UTC)[reply]

So here's yet another Courage interview (which I've added to the article, too)—in this one he sheds significantly more light on what the instrument-that-is-not-a-theremin actually is, starting at 2:08. Here's the key bit:

...there was a fellow in town named Jack Cookerly who had been playing with various kinds of strange things on guitars, and this was just the absolute bare beginning of the synthesizer. We had a Yamaha something or other, which was a very early primitive Japanese synthesizer...

--NapoliRoma (talk) 03:57, 26 May 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Color me curious,

Anyone know why the instrumental theme appears on the home releases during the first season, when on the original run it was the only season graced with the vocal version? If anyone has any idea why this is so, it would make a good addition to the article.

Seanmercy (talk) 15:01, 18 July 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Past edits eradicated some important facts, while adding some inaccuracies. I've tried to fix it.--Dvd-junkie (talk) 20:41, 7 October 2009 (UTC)[reply]