eye_of_a_cat: (frog)
[personal profile] eye_of_a_cat
Peter Jackson's LOTR films were great and all, but my first ever Tolkien adaptation was the BBC radio drama from the early 1980s. My local library had it on cassette and I used to borrow it over and over and over again. One thing that did really really well, and that I missed from the film versions, was the use of Tolkien's songs - done not as background music but sung by the characters as part of the narrative. Here's Sam singing 'Gil-Galad Was An Elven King':



So one of my absolute favourite moments in Rings of Power was Poppy (one of Sam's distant ancestors?) (I will CRY FOREVER if Smeagol/Gollum ends up being one of the harfoots we've met) sings this:



It's not one of Tolkien's songs (although it lifts some words from his) but there's something wonderfully Tolkien-ish about the spirit of it, and it captures the feeling of those radio drama songs in a way I did not realise I had been missing.

Also also I am really loving some of the shippy fanmade music vids (I believe the youth of fandom call them 'edits' these days) that Rings of Power is producing. :



and for a different approach, this one for what you can do with 20 seconds of a song.

(no subject)

Date: 2022-11-13 07:33 pm (UTC)
greenwoodside: (Default)
From: [personal profile] greenwoodside
Haven't seen Rings of Power, but I also loved Stephen Oliver's music for the BBC LotR adaptation. I read somewhere that it wasn't Bill Nighy doing the actual singing for Sam's Gil-galad song, but Oz Clarke (the wine critic, formerly a professional singer) doing a brilliant imitation.

(no subject)

Date: 2022-11-14 05:50 am (UTC)
selenak: (Bilbo Baggins)
From: [personal profile] selenak
The BBC radio series was my first adaption, too, and I loved it. As I did the way Rings of Power carried on the musical tradition. There are already various cover versions of Poppy's song online, would you believe it? Disa singing to the stones was another amazing moment. And of course that chillingly beautiful version of the Ring poem right at the end.
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