The Music of Manhattan Transfer

As a lover of film music, I often think of what sort of orchestral score should accompany a potential film or TV adaptation of John Dos Passos stories.

I’m a big fan of legendary Hollywood film composer Jerry Goldsmith and I think one of this themes from the film City Hall (1996), “The Bridge,” is just the right sort of tune to run over the opening credits to a feature film adaptation of Dos Passos’ Manhattan Transfer (1925). Maybe a an uptempo hit song from the 1920s could begin the credits and then fade into a piece like “The Bridge.”

“The Bridge” is so effective because it conveys the power, speed, and pain of the Metropolis. Just the tone of Manhattan Transfer, I think.