On 5 August Carl Davis’ score for The General opens the Locarno Film Festival, performed by the Orchestra della Svizzera Italiana and conducted by Philippe Béran.
The 1926 silent, directed by Buster Keaton and Clyde Bruckman, is an action-adventure-comedy set in the American Civil War, telling the story of a railway engineer infatuated equally by a young woman and eponymous locomotive. Both objects of his affection become entangled in the ongoing struggle between Union and Confederate forces. The film is renowned for an extravagant sequence showing the destruction of a purpose-built railway bridge and multi-wagon train – the most expensive single shot ever featured in a silent movie.
Davis’ 76-minute score for 31 players combines a symphonic sweep with mock-heroic aspects, chiming with both the comic elements of the film as well as the grandeur of its spectacular action sequences. Davis also weaves popular songs from the period into his soundtrack to render the conflict between North and South in musical terms.
Thames Television commissioned Davis’ score to The General, which premiered in 1987. It has been performed over a hundred times worldwide since; its exponents have included the London Philharmonic Orchestra, the City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra, the Luzerner Sinfonieorchester, the Belgian National Orchestra, and Basel Sinfonietta.
Béran has opened the Festival with several of Davis’ film scores in recent years, conducting King Vidor’s The Crowd in 2024, the Lillian Gish vehicle Broken Blossoms in 2022, Harold Lloyd’s Safety Last! in 2021, and Vidor’ss Show People in 2019.
Davis himself conducted The General on numerous occasions; he recorded it with the Thames Silents Orchestra in 2021 alongside his music for other Buster Keaton classics, including Our Hospitality and One Week. In April 2027 The General returns to French audiences with the Orchestre National de Montpellier at Le Corum, conducted by Gwennolé Rufet.